A photo of Marcus Perez, the outgoing administrator of the Office of Professional Standards, was recently seen posted behind the security desk at Cleveland City Hall.
That photo told security workers that Perez, who is on administrative leave, is not allowed back into parts of city buildings that aren’t open to the general public without an appointment. A spokesman for the city said the restriction is routine practice for employees on administrative leave.
“This is similar to any employee who is placed on administrative leave — as they are not permitted access to non-public areas of City buildings (e.g. individual offices, conference rooms, etc.) without a verifiable appointment per HR’s policy,” city spokesperson Tyler Sinclair wrote in an email.
The photo was no longer posted as of Friday.
It was a sign that the roller coaster of Perez’s short stint at the city will soon run out of track. The boss of OPS will leave his job April 10, Civilian Police Review Board Chair Billy Sharp said at a March 18 meeting.
OPS investigates citizen complaints against Cleveland police and presents its findings to the CPRB. It’s one piece in a broader puzzle of police oversight in the city.
Just two years ago, Mayor Justin Bibb’s administration heralded Perez’s hiring, calling him a “globally-recognized U.S. Army policing expert.” A year later, the CPRB cleared Perez following a city investigation into complaints of discrimination.
This year, the Bibb administration publicly upbraided OPS, saying that the agency emailed out a link to an internal dashboard that contained “sensitive criminal justice information.” (The recipients did not have email addresses that enabled them to access the dashboard, City Hall said at the time.)
Over the last few weeks, Perez seemed both to hint and deny that he was on his way out. He declined to comment when Signal Cleveland reached him this week.
At a Feb. 19 budget hearing, he told Council President Blaine Griffin, “If you have any questions, now would be the time because this will be my last budget hearing with the city.” The next day, News 5 reported that Perez told the TV station that he planned to resign.
One month later, the Civilian Police Review Board — which oversees Perez — voted to accept his resignation and place him on leave until April 10. Sharp said that Perez had offered a “verbal resignation” the week before.
But Perez told Fox 8 that he didn’t give CPRB a formal resignation. “In my mind, it’s a termination,” he said. “I had to be escorted into my office.”
Signal Cleveland reporter Nick Castele contributed to this story.
Correction: An earlier version of this item said that the city cleared Perez following discrimination complaints. The city investigated the complaints but the CPRB voted to clear him of the accusations.
