FRANKLIN — Franklin’s mayor is calling a town hall meeting to respond to nearly 20 misconduct allegations, including sexual harassment, during his time as a lieutenant with the Waterford Police Department.
TMJ4’s Lighthouse team found the misconduct allegations aren’t just in Waterford.
Mayor John Nelson spent months fighting in court to also have his records with the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office sealed.
Nelson spent 26 years with the MCSO up until about a decade ago.
Just like in Waterford, he was accused of sexually harassing a female officer at the MCSO, but that's not the only allegation against him.
Audio recordings from a 2006 Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office internal interview reveal they investigated Nelson for allegedly cheating on a law enforcement test.
Watch: Franklin mayor’s disciplinary record at MCSO shows allegations of sexual harassment and cheating on exam
"He was cheating,” one of Nelson’s classmates told internal investigators. "John's got a credibility problem with me."
Internal records show that while attending a class led by Northwestern University, a classmate of Nelson’s claimed he witnessed Nelson cheat on exams several times.
One of those times, sheriff’s office documents show the classmate notified an instructor who told investigators she caught him with his notes out.
"While I was gone, he pulled the notebook out again and placed it back up in the briefcase,” the instructor told investigators. “At that point, I laid my hand on his shoulder, John's shoulder, and said it needs to go in your briefcase now. I came around again, circled the classroom and it was out again."
Internal sheriff’s office records show Nelson "agreed to take an ‘F’ on the test," but when asked by his department, he denied the allegations.
"There's some blatant, blatant lies in this thing, OK?” Nelson told investigators. “Blatant."
Five years later, records show Nelson was at the center of another MCSO investigation. This time for alleged sexual harassment after a corrections officer filed a complaint.
Sheriff’s office documents said, “Lt. Nelson created a hostile work environment by repeatedly calling [and] texting [the female officer] off-duty, physically touching her, using inappropriate gender-specific language, and attempting to manipulate her job classification."
Lighthouse journalist Ben Jordan asked Nelson about the allegations during an interview last week.
“Is it true? Did it happen?” Jordan asked.
"No, neither of them happened and as far as any discipline, I've never been disciplined for anything,” Nelson replied.
Nelson voluntarily moved to the county parks department and later resigned from the sheriff’s office.
He then took a job with the Waterford Police Department where he retired last year amid an investigation into more than a dozen misconduct allegations.
A TMJ4 open records request found some of them include allegations of sexual harassment along with accusations of showing nude photos of women he had dated to fellow officers, untruthful time records, and doing Franklin business while on duty as a Waterford cop.
Mayor Nelson insists every single allegation against him during his law enforcement career is untrue despite them coming from at least seven different officers about different issues.
"What's going on now is an absolute hit-job character assassination attempt,” Nelson said.
Mayor Nelson is hosting a town hall Wednesday night to defend his record in front of Franklin residents. It’s scheduled from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Franklin Public Library.
It’s about time to watch on your time. Stream local news and weather 24/7 by searching for “TMJ4” on your device.
Available for download on Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, and more.
