2 LA Cops Decided To Catch Pokemon Instead Of Robbers & Now They Won't Get Their Jobs Back
They really watched to catch a Snorlax in Pokemon Go.
Let's be honest: most people slack off at work now and then.
But losing your job over Pokemon Go is not something that happens a lot — especially when the "catch 'em all" part of your job is to catch criminals.
Two ex officers with the Los Angeles Police Department have lost an appeal to get their jobs back, after they were fired for playing Pokemon Go on the job in 2017.
The two ex-officers, Louis Lozano and Eric Mitchell, decided not to respond to radio calls about a robbery nearby because they were trying to catch a rare Pokemon in the augmented reality game, according to court documents.
They were fired after an investigation and a California court just threw out their latest appeal to get their jobs back, the New York Times reports.
The incident took place in April 2017, when the officers were called to the scene of a robbery at a mall. Police had received "more calls than police cars available to respond," reported the Los Angeles Times.
The officers failed to respond and when they were asked about it, they falsely claimed that they didn't hear the radio over some loud music, according to court documents.
But their supervisor was not convinced, so he reviewed the in-car video camera and discovered that they'd been playing Pokemon Go through the radio call. They even discussed whether or not to respond to the calls and ultimately decided not to.
"Screw it," Lorenzo can be heard saying to Mitchell, according to court documents.
Five minutes after ignoring the calls, Mitchell notified Lorenzo that the Pokemon Go character Snorlax was nearby. They then proceeded to drive "to different locations where the virtual creatures apparently appeared on their mobile phones," said the court documents.
The officers' attorney, Greg Yacoubian, said they "obviously are disappointed" by the decision and argued that the LAPD breached its rules by using a recording of the officers as a way to spy on them.
The two officers pleaded guilty to not responding to the radio calls but denied all the other allegations against them, including the accusation that they were playing Pokemon Go.
The court eventually decided that "it would be preposterous to require commanding officers and internal affairs investigators to ignore evidence of 'criminal or egregious misconduct' simply because it was unintentionally captured."
Mitchell ended up catching the Snorlax, according to the court documents.