As Boston police officials laid off cadets and cut popular units like the mounted patrol, some police officers managed to dramatically boost their paychecks last year, in a few cases to more than a quarter of a million dollars, the Boston Globe reports.
Some officers earned extra cash because contracts require that officers working a detail or testifying in court be paid for a minimum of four hours. In one case, a lieutenant was paid for four hours after 15 minutes of case preparation. All of the officers benefited from a retroactive, one-time salary boost under a new police contract. All worked a lot of overtime. “The salaries are excessive,'' said Police Commissioner Edward Davis. “Clearly the average person on the street does not make this kind of money. We're completely aware that this is a difficult topic to discuss, but it's a function of a system that's been in place for decades.''