FORT SMITH (KFSM) -- Fort Smith Police Chief Kevin Lindsey announced his resignation on Thursday (March 10), timed amid an investigation into allegations that the chief made racist remarks.
When asked if the incident is the reason Lindsey resigned Dingman said, "Because of my own speculation, I believe that it probably was."
Chief Lindsey resigned immediately after apologizing to an African-American employee for making an offensive racial slur in front of the employee, according to Jeff Dingman, Fort Smith city administrator.
Dingman confirmed that the comments were made to Major Dean Pitts and city employee Russell Gibson in the ITS office in Fort Smith. The men were there to discuss the process of diversifying the police department.
Dingman also confirmed that during that conversation Lindsey was frustrated and said something along the lines of, "What do I need to do? Put on black face for these people?"
A black city employee, whom we are not identifying to protect, overheard the remarks and reported them to Gibson, who was the employee's supervisor.
The individual was an employee of Fort Smith, but they were not a member of the police department.
Fort Smith ITS director Russell Gibson made an official complaint to Dingman on March 3, saying that the employee was offended by the chief's remarks.
On Thursday (March 10), Dingman told 5NEWS there was not an investigation into the chief's resignation. However, on Friday (March 11) he said that there was an investigation underway.
"I needed to validate for myself before making that type of information available to the public because I want to give the public the most truth that I can when I can do it," Dingman said.
There is no official complaint form yet, but Dingman said he will be making the official complaint, which will be public record.
"The incident happened," Dingman said. "He acknowledged to me that it happened. The only thing left at that point to do on my part was to consider what the outcome of that would be from an administrative standpoint, and I haven't made that determination. Before I could complete that he obviously came in and resigned."
Lindsey will remain the police chief until April 11th.
