PALM BEACH GARDENS — A police officer who was deemed ethically and emotionally unfit to serve in law enforcement has won back her job at the Palm Beach Gardens Police Department, despite pushback by city officials.
The police department fired Bethany Guerriero in 2023 after her filmed encounter with an unarmed man went viral, spawning a series of "unhinged cop" videos that generated more than 10 million views online. The agency defended its decision to fire Guerriero at a recent arbitration hearing, calling her actions "anabsolute abuse of authority in every possible way."
The local chapter of a police union said the barrage of negative online attention caused Guerriero's supervisors to overreact, firing her in violation of her labor rights. Guerriero's attorney, Rick King, confirmed Friday that arbitrator Richard Miller agreed with the union, ruling in the officer's favor and paving the way for her reinstatement.
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King did not say whether Miller overturned Guerriero's penalty because he found her actions appropriate, or because the department took too long to mete out her punishment. When asked whether Guerriero intends to resign on her own terms, with her benefits intact, King disagreed.
"She's going back to work," he said.
The arbiter's decision is a win for the officer but not the end of her troubles. Ryan Gould, whose arrest prompted Guerriero's termination, accused the officer in a federal lawsuit of excessive use of force and unjustified arrest. The trial is scheduled to begin in a West Palm Beach courtroom on Sept. 9.
There, jurors will decide who was at fault for the brief and bizarre encounter between Guerriero and Gould on May 9, 2023.
Guerriero's account of arrest refuted by video evidence
They met one another in the parking lot of the Sabal Ridge apartment complex along Military Trail in Palm Beach Gardens. Gould called 911 minutes earlier to report his neighbor for threatening him with a gun. Within seconds, he found himself staring down the barrel of Guerriero’s department-issued one, too.
Guerriero said she didn't know when she pulled into the apartment's parking lot whether Gould was the gunman he’d called to report. Though Gould wore only swim trunks and Crocs, Guerriero said she thought he may have concealed a weapon in his pocket or beneath the towel on the ground behind him.
She told Gould to keep his hands out of his pockets and drew her gun after he reached into one anyway to take out his phone. She held him at gunpoint for 12 seconds, appearing to grow angrier the more he insisted that he was a victim, not a suspect.
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After holstering her gun, Guerriero made Gould lie bare-chested on the pavement while she handcuffed him. When asked why he was being arrested, Guerriero called him a "punk," ridiculed his painted toenails and told him repeatedly: "Shut your mouth."
"I've been here for 20 years, punk," she said. "I'm in charge. Not you."
She told her companions later that Gould was "possibly drugged" and kept reaching into his pockets despite her commands to stop — all of which was refuted by footage from the officer's body camera and the apartment's surveillance camera.
Guerriero's colleagues pulled Gould from the Palm Beach County Jail while he waited in line to be booked, still bare-chested, and drove him back home.
Police department declined to comment on Guerriero's reinstatement
According to a transcript of the arbitration hearing, Palm Beach Gardens officials were adamant that Guerriero not rejoin the force.
“She’s not stable," said Robert Norton, the late attorney who represented the city during the hearing. "She cannot run around with the authority of a law-enforcement officer — which is enormous, and we want it to be enormous. She can’t do that. She cannot be a law-enforcement officer in this city.”
In her own words:Ex-officer Bethany Guerriero of viral 'unhinged cop' video explains why she held man at gunpoint
He described a pattern of emotional and ethical lapses that began in 2019, the year "she went into an abyss." This included Guerriero's decision to use a high-security police database to snoop on someone she believed was in a relationship with her ex-wife.
A sergeant who investigated the case found that Guerriero was “prone to becoming enraged and has a history of emotional tantrums," Norton said. He pointed to another arrest Guerriero made in 2019, using language so foul and inflammatory that she was suspended for two days.
"Guerriero should reacquaint herself with the department's core values of respect, accountability and professionalism," the attorney said.
King disagreed. He told Miller that the proper discipline for Guerriero's behavior was “someplace between a stern look and this termination,” quoting Gary Lippman, a former attorney for the Palm Beach County Police Benevolent Association.
Guerriero, like King, maintains she had probable cause to arrest Gould. However, she has said that a cardiac incident likely contributed to her conduct that day. While still at the apartment complex, Guerriero reported worsening pain in her chest and was taken by ambulance to a hospital, where she spent two days on the cardiac floor.
Guerriero earns more than $101,000 annually. Prior to her termination, she belonged to the department's hostage-negotiation team and was praised in several employee reviews for her composure during stressful situations.
Javier Garcia, a major with the Palm Beach Gardens Police Department, declined to answer questions about Guerriero's reinstatement, including whether she would rejoin the hostage-negotiation team.
Hannah Phillips covers criminal justice at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her athphillips@pbpost.com.Help support our journalism andsubscribe today.
