In January 2019, the Murray Police Department investigated one of its own officers over his communications with a 15-year-old girl. Officer Justin Swope had told the girl over Snapchat that he dreamed about kissing her, commented on her body and saved photos she sent, according to the department's own investigative file.
The department concluded he had broken no law. It issued him a written reprimand for conduct that could damage the department's reputation, kept him on the force and later promoted him.
Swope, 44, faces 30 felony counts in Calloway County and eight in Trigg County, where he was indicted Tuesday, for sexual offenses involving a minor. The girl described in MPD’s 2019 investigation is the same person Swope is now charged with abusing in both counties, The Sentinel independently confirmed.
The written reprimand, dated Jan. 25, 2019, said Swope’s inappropriate communications with the girl began in December 2018. The Calloway County indictment alleges the sexual abuse started Feb. 1, 2019 – seven days after the reprimand. The earliest of 11 third-degree rape charges allegedly occurred on Feb. 12, 2019 – within three weeks of the reprimand.
A review of MPD's internal investigation records, which were obtained by The Sentinel through an open records request, shows the department documented a pattern of concerning communications between Swope and the girl, examined them and characterized the situation internally as a misunderstanding.
The records show no documented follow-up on Swope in the years that followed, despite a commitment to review his conduct in the written reprimand.
Jeff Liles, who was chief in 2019, did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Chris Garland, the major who conducted the 2019 investigation, declined to comment, adding he has retired from law enforcement. Chris Scott, the major who signed the disciplinary paperwork, told The Sentinel he had nothing to add beyond what was in the report.
The investigation began not with a complaint but with a question. On Jan. 22, 2019, Officer Anna Wicker told supervisors that a 15-year-old family friend had asked whether it was all right for her to communicate with Swope on Snapchat – "he's a good guy, right?"
The girl then showed Wicker messages she said had made her uncomfortable. According to the investigative narrative, Swope told her to be careful using a particular filter because he might “fall for” her, described a dream in which the two kissed and told her she had “nice legs” after she sent a photo of a bruise. When she mentioned swimsuit photos from a trip to the lake that she thought were unflattering, he asked to see them, and then saved them. He also sent her selfies, including one taken without a shirt.
Even as she defended Swope, the girl repeatedly told Wicker the messages made her uncomfortable. "It's weird. And gross," she wrote of one exchange. "But he's my friend," she said of another. More than once, she asked Wicker not to tell her mother.
The department opened an internal investigation the following day. Swope was placed on paid administrative leave, ordered not to contact the girl or her family and required to surrender his weapons and badge while Garland conducted the investigation.
Both Scott and Garland interviewed the girl, her mother and Swope. The girl’s mother said she was initially upset by the messages, but after reviewing the full conversations with her daughter, she came to believe they were fragments of a larger, harmless friendship.
The girl said many of Swope’s comments were intended to make her feel better because she was being bullied and denied that he had ever touched her inappropriately. Although she had gone to Wicker because some of the messages made her uncomfortable, Garland noted she could not clearly explain what she meant when asked her about it.
In his interview, Swope acknowledged the messages looked bad "from the outside looking in" and said he had "blurred the line" between being a friend and an adult communicating with a 15-year-old, but he maintained that nothing he sent was meant to be sexual. Swope said he was trying to encourage her and told investigators he had accidentally saved the lake photos because he was unfamiliar with that part of Snapchat.
Ultimately, Garland concluded that Swope had shown poor judgment, failed to maintain a “bright line professional relationship” with the girl and had become too comfortable in his communications with her. Based on the statements gathered during the investigation, Garland wrote that he found no violation of Kentucky law but sustained a department policy violation for conduct that could impair the department’s efficiency or reputation.
Murray Police Chief Sam Bierds, who did not take office until 2023, declined to directly second-guess the discipline imposed by his predecessors. But when asked how he read the reprimand, Bierds pointed to its language.
“The verbiage used in the written reprimand is verbiage that I have only seen used in my training and experience when it comes to a higher level of discipline – things like conduct unbecoming, inconsistent with mission and values,” he said. “To me, those feel like that's a higher level. Conduct unbecoming is not something that is taken lightly in my administration and in our profession."
Bierds said he and MPD’s current command staff reviewed the file “through the lens of 2019,” before Kentucky created a criminal offense specifically addressing the grooming of minors. The new law, which took effect July 15, includes conduct intended to develop an intimate or secretive relationship between a minor and someone in a position of authority or special trust.
In Bierds’ personal assessment, the 2019 file did not reveal an obvious criminal charge available at the time. He considered harassment a possibility but noted that it would have required a complaint that the contact was unwanted.
“I am fully in support of the laws limiting communication between adults and minors for grooming,” he added. “We have policies and codes of conduct for a reason. We have expectations of how people are supposed to communicate with people for a reason, and that’s probably as telling as I can say.”
He was more direct about how the outcome was handled inside the department: the substance of the investigation largely was not communicated at all.
“There was no official statement on the results,” Bierds said. “Officers were told that it was a misunderstanding and wasn’t what it seemed. And you’re more than welcome to find any of my officers who were here in 2019, and they will tell you that.”
When the department disciplined Swope on Jan. 25, 2019, the written reprimand called for his conduct to be monitored through “periodic performance review.” It warned that further violations could bring escalating discipline, up to termination.
But Bierds could point to no follow-up – prior to 2023 – beyond what appears in the 2019 file. “What you see in ‘19, what you see in the file is what I know,” he said.
Swope was not in his chain of command at the time, Bierds explained, and the matter was not passed on to him when he later became an assistant chief, leaving him no reason to know Swope required additional scrutiny.
In a separate open records request, The Sentinel asked MPD for all of Swope’s “performance reviews” from January 2019 to the present. The department produced three evaluations in that period – one for 2019, one covering May 2022 through May 2023 and one covering the remainder of 2023.
None references the investigation, the reprimand or the conduct behind it. Instead, they chart a steady rise. The records also leave gaps before the 2022-23 review and after 2023.
The 2019 evaluation was completed in February 2020, just over a year after the investigation. In it, Scott, who had participated in the investigation and signed the disciplinary paperwork, described Swope as professional, hardworking and an asset to both the city and the department. He wrote that Swope’s performance exceeded what would be expected based on his years of experience. Liles signed the evaluation stating he agreed.
By the next evaluation completed in May 2023, Swope was a detective. That review, which was conducted by now-Assistant Chief Angel Clere, described him as a future leader within the department.
The final evaluation called him the best performer in the division, recommended him for a supervisory role and stated that his “judgment has never come into question” – a line entered in the same personnel file that already held a disciplinary record raising concerns about his judgment with a 15-year-old girl.
In January 2025, Swope was promoted to sergeant, but his rise through the ranks at MPD ended with his arrest in May.
Swope was not fired; he resigned. Bierds described the distinction as one of process, not leniency: resignation was “quicker and cleaner,” but termination was the only alternative.
“My ultimate decision was he would not be leaving the front of the police department on my books – not under ‘a suspension with pay,’ not under ‘a suspension without pay, pending administrative charges’ – that was the end,” Bierds recalled. “How he chose to do that was: he could have resigned, or he would have been terminated. I gave him the option to resign, and he took it."
Bierds noted that Swope’s resignation would not preserve his certification as a peace officer.
Under state law, when an officer resigns while under investigation, the department reports it to the Kentucky Law Enforcement Council, initiating a process that could result in decertification.
The law exists to keep problem officers from evading accountability by quitting one department and moving to another, Bierds explained. Kentucky also reports decertifications to a national database, so agencies in participating states can check whether an applicant was decertified elsewhere.
That process is already underway for Swope, Bierds said. He also noted that the council considers whether the officer could have been terminated for the conduct had the officer not resigned.
In the days after Swope’s criminal cases became public, Bierds held multiple department meetings because he wanted officers to hear it from him "and not have rumor and scuttlebutt."
He framed that openness as central to how he runs the department. "Transparency begins here first, begins in this office with my people," he said, "because it'd be pretty crappy if I was letting the public know everything, but keeping my own people in the dark."
Bierds acknowledged sending the release announcing Swope’s arrest “made me sick at my stomach,” but public trust requires the department to be open and transparent “when we screw up.”
Asked whether additional training should be required in light of Swope’s charges, Bierds said that he had considered it but came up empty.
“Routine discipline problems – a late report, too many at-fault collisions – can be corrected with training. This was not that,” he said. "How do you ‘train’ somebody to not commit a sex crime?"
Instead, Bierds emphasized the need to continue empowering officers to report misconduct by their colleagues. He acknowledged the perception that police “protect our own,” but noted that the concerns about Swope were brought to him through MPD’s chain of command.
Bierds said his department did not create the situation it inherited, but it is responsible for confronting it openly and professionally.
"We didn't make this sandwich, but we have to eat it," he said. "And we're going to eat it in the most professional way and with as much integrity as we can muster."
The case has also taken a personal toll on the department. Bierds described officers devastated by allegations against someone they had considered a brother, with employees left to process that loss while continuing to serve the public and repair the damage to the badge.
“The betrayal that I felt personally and professionally because of this incident, I can’t put into words,” Bierds said. He explained that he tells every new recruit that three things will get an officer fired: dishonesty, theft and cowardice in the face of danger. Until Swope’s case, it had never occurred to him that the list needed to include committing a sex crime.
“That’s not something,” he said, “that you think you need to say.”
The case also reinforced Bierds’ belief that serious disciplinary matters should be explained to the department once the process is complete.
Bierds pointed to state-law restrictions on what police departments can publicly disclose while disciplinary proceedings remain open. But once a case has been closed and public comment is permitted, he believes officers should be told what happened and why.
“What’s the point of discipline,” he said, “if others don’t learn from it?”
In 2019, Bierds said, officers were told only that the matter was a misunderstanding and “wasn’t what it seemed.”
Individuals charged with crimes are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
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