Jan 27, 2006  |  By: Kelly Carson  | COMMENTS     

If you talk to the friends of newly promoted D.C. Police Sgt. Robert Schoonover, they’ll tell you he had everything to live for.

Several weeks ago, the openly gay Schoonover, 35, was among hundreds of police officers who took the sergeant’s exam, scoring No. 16. He was one of about 50 officers promoted to sergeant and assigned to new territories throughout the District.

"This was his dream come true," said Dale Edwin Sanders, a D.C.—area lawyer who knew the new sergeant. "He loved police work. He was ambitious and wanted to rise through the ranks."

Why then, five week later, did Schoonover take his own life last weekend in the 1,800-acre Rock Creek Park? His body was found Jan. 21 by a passerby, according to sources. No official report has been released as to the cause of death, but several sources interviewed for this story confirmed that Schoonover shot himself with his service weapon.

The answer, of course, may not come easy to those who loved him. Several sources said this week that a racist, sexist and homophobic culture in the D.C. Police Department’s Fifth District in Northeast Washington may have helped lead the eight-year police veteran to succumb to the pressures of his new position.

Several officers who knew Schoonover were prevented by department policy from discussing publicly the death of their friend. They spoke on condition of anonymity. These police sources alleged that the Fifth District is plagued by an atmosphere of homophobia and a bias against white officers and women.

A letter discovered with Schoonover’s body indicated the police sergeant found it too difficult to struggle with longstanding depression.

"He apologized to his friends and took note to honor the people at the Third District," said Sanders, who read the note before it was sent to Schoonover’s family. "He did not mention the Fifth District."

After his promotion, Schoonover was transferred from the city’s Third District, which includes the Dupont Circle area of the city, to the Fifth District.

"The Third District is known to be more enlightened than in other places," Sanders said. He said Schoonover had been troubled with depression since a young age, and "it became unbearable in recent months."

"He became a supervisor for the first time, which is inherently stressful," said Sanders, who represented Schoonover in a 2004 harassment complaint against a fellow police officer. "When [people] get a new boss, and they find out the boss is white and gay, the first thing some of these guys are going to do is push the new boss and see what they can get away with. It is especially human nature in the cop culture."

But the problems at the Fifth District go even deeper, Sanders said. He is representing another Fifth District police officer—a straight, white female—who in October filed a sexual harassment complaint against one of her supervisors. The officer, Jodie White, is prohibited by policy from talking to the media about the case, Sanders said.

"This woman brought to me from the Fifth District a sample of what was written in the unisex restroom that the police officers use," the lawyer said. "Horrible things have been written that stay up for days at a time—homophobic stuff on the blackboard that stays up for days at a time. It’s hard to be white, gay, or female of any color at the Fifth District."

Fifth District Cmdr. Jennifer Greene said she was unaware of any racial or sexual unrest in her department.

"I am a female, and I am a black American," Greene said. "Clearly if there is any issues that would relate to [equal employment opportunities] I would be sensitive to that."

Calls to District Police Chief Charles Ramsey were not immediately returned.

A life of sharing
Schoonover, a trained emergency-medical technician, was a founder of the Gay Officer’s Action League in the Washington area.

"It was Robert’s idea, blood, sweat and tears that allowed GOAL-DC to grow from a handful of GLBT men and women to a list of hundreds," Sgt. Brett Parson of the Police Department’s Gay & Lesbian Liaison Unit said in an e-mail to gay community leaders. "His legacy to [the department] is the countless men and women he trained, mentored and tutored. All of them have grown into the same caring and professional officers Robert so passionately emulated."

Schoonover was not a part of the GLLU.

Parson said that while Schoonover "clearly had the ability to lead," he was a shy, introverted man ...