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Judge: Analyst fired over racist post must pay back benefits

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October 18th, 2016 by Ric Hanson

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — An Iowa crime lab analyst fired after posting a rant against black people on Facebook has to pay back $3,800 in unemployment benefits. An administrative law judge has ruled that former Division of Criminal Investigation criminalist Amy Pollpeter was fired for work-related misconduct and therefore was ineligible to collect unemployment insurance.

The Department of Public Safety fired Pollpeter in July after she blasted the Black Lives Matter movement and African-Americans on her publicly-accessible Facebook page. In a post prompted by the killings of police officers in Dallas, Pollpeter wrote that she no longer felt safe around black people. She said that African-Americans have brought hatred upon themselves by “rioting, looting stores, and shooting cops” and by demanding “special rights.”

State officials said the post demonstrated bias and violated department policies.