SAN ANTONIO – A San Antonio police officer was suspended 30 days without pay late last month after an internal affairs investigation determined he went shopping while on duty and visited his home three separate times while assigned to calls for service, discipline records obtained by KSAT Investigates show.
Officer Mark Walaski was suspended for rules violations, including neglect of duty, acts showing a lack of good moral character and conduct prejudicial to good order, city records state.
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Following a complaint to internal affairs, investigators determined that Walaski entered an AutoZone in his assigned service area on Aug. 2 and purchased two items for his personal vehicle, records show.
Walaski was in full police uniform and operating an SAPD patrol vehicle, records show.
SAPD conducted an audit of Walaski’s activities covering 30 days and determined he had also visited his home on three separate occasions while assigned to calls for service.
The incidents were captured on Walaski’s body-worn camera and showed him checking on his personal vehicles and handling personal business, discipline records show.
The audit showed Walaski failed to turn on his body-worn camera during 39 calls for service between July 1 and Aug. 2.
Walaski failed to turn off his body-worn camera after the completion of 14 calls during this timeframe, records show.
He N-coded, meaning he took no action, during seven calls that should have generated crash or offense reports and failed to dock the body-worn camera in a timely manner, which did not allow the device to charge, have videos downloaded off of it or be updated, records show.
Walaski’s suspension was finalized on Oct. 30, discipline records show.
His suspension runs from Nov. 13 through Dec. 12, according to records.
The department handed Walaski an indefinite suspension in July 2017 after a separate internal affairs investigation concluded that he had a relationship with a woman accused of being a prostitute.
Department records show the woman had an active warrant for prostitution in July 2016 when Walaski began dating her and allowed her to live with him.
That same year, Walaski paid a bond company to bail her out of jail on warrants for two separate prostitution charges, SAPD records previously showed.
In 2017, Walaski signed a lease and began paying for an apartment for the woman, records show.
Walaski appealed his indefinite suspension to a third-party arbitrator.
However, Walaski reached a negotiated settlement agreement and returned to work before going to arbitration, an SAPD spokesman confirms.
Walaski returned to duty in March 2018, a city human resources official confirmed to KSAT.