LA PLATA — Five words in Maryland’s police accountability law, “involving a member of the public,” decide whether a misconduct complaint against a Charles County officer goes to the county’s administrative charging committee or stays inside the police agency. Officers’ lawyers around the state are now using those words to get discipline cases thrown out, according to the Sheriff’s Office attorney, and the Charles County Police Accountability Board wants the General Assembly to fix them.
At its October meeting, the board agreed to make clarifying the language a formal recommendation in its 2026 annual report, which goes to the Charles County commissioners and the county’s state delegation. Board members, their attorney and the Charles County Sheriff’s Office’s attorney all said the wording has left agencies, oversight panels and judges reading the law differently.
“So it absolutely is an issue that could use some clarification,” the Sheriff’s Office attorney told the board.
Two sections, two different tests
The Maryland Police Accountability Act of 2021 created three layers of oversight in every county: a police accountability board, an administrative charging committee, or ACC, and trial boards that hear contested discipline. The board’s attorney, Ms. Mitchell, walked members through the two provisions at issue.
- Public Safety Article Section 3-102 says the accountability board receives complaints filed by members of the public.
- Section 3-104 says the ACC reviews completed investigations of police misconduct involving a member of the public and an officer.
The gap between “filed by” and “involving” is where the trouble starts. One board member said they had understood the ACC’s job to cover anything a member of the public complained about. Mitchell said the statute does say “involving,” and that the issue has been building for some time. “Certainly either side would like to see clarity,” she said, adding that it would warrant a recommendation in the year-end report.
Easy cases and hard ones
The Sheriff’s Office attorney laid out how the agency reads the law. Whether a complaint comes from inside or outside the agency doesn’t matter, he said; if the misconduct involves a member of the public, it goes to the ACC. The agency makes that call first.
Some cases are simple. An officer using force on a resident clearly involves the public. An officer seen speeding down Route 301 by a passing driver, who then complains, does not, he said, because the driver saw the conduct but wasn’t part of it.
The harder cases sit in between. He described one involving purely off-duty conduct with no use of police authority, which the agency did not treat as “police misconduct” involving the public even though a civilian was present. Another, an off-duty incident at a bar in St. Mary’s County, was sent to the ACC because the allegation was that the officer acted in a police capacity, even though the agency said video disproved the claim.
When the ACC believes it should have received a case, the agency confers with the committee’s attorney adviser, he said.
Cases lost on a technicality
The stakes show up at the end of the process. According to the Sheriff’s Office attorney, trial boards in some Maryland jurisdictions have dismissed charges because a case was routed the wrong way, in both directions. In some, defense lawyers argued a case should have gone to the ACC and didn’t. In others, they argued a case went to the ACC when it shouldn’t have. Either way, he said, administrative law judges have dismissed the charges, and some attorneys now raise the issue as their first argument.
His view is that lawmakers should step in, particularly on the back end, so that a routing mistake by an agency or an ACC doesn’t automatically wipe out a misconduct case.
The definition also shapes what reaches oversight panels at all. Earlier in the meeting, a board member said the ACC and the board learned of two Charles County cases only after they appeared in the news. Sheriff’s Office officials said they send every case they judge to meet the legal criteria and can’t send cases that don’t, even when they draw public attention, because doing so would set a precedent.
Into the annual report
When the board turned to its 2026 annual report later in the meeting, a member noted the 3-102 and 3-104 ambiguity was the main issue hashed out that day, and the board agreed to include it. Members also agreed to repeat last year’s call for an independent legal team to present cases before trial boards on the ACC’s behalf, and to wait for any input from law enforcement partners before finalizing the draft.
The report is provided to the county’s delegation each December, a board official said during the meeting. Neither the commissioners nor the delegation is required to act on it.
The push follows a broader list of legal changes the board has sought. The Chronicle reported earlier this month that Charles police oversight is seeking law changes four years in. The state’s Statewide Administrative Charging Committee handles cases involving state and bi-county agencies under the same law.
Any change to the statute would have to come from the General Assembly, which convenes its 2027 session in January.
