Officer Who Shot Fellow Officer Still Gets Paid $100K

A Pennsylvania police officer suspended six years ago after fatally shooting an undercover cop remains on the city payroll while working as an officer in a nearby borough.

The city of Reading continues to pay James Palange about $100,000 a year in both salaries and benefits while he is suspended for the June 2004 shooting death of his fellow officer.
      
Palange mistook plainclothes Officer Michael Wise II (pictured on the left) for a suspect during a shootout and killed him. Palange appealed his dismissal, saying he didn't know undercover officers were in the area.
      
Reading police Chief William Heim says the city and the police union are trying to settle the matter. Palange says he doesn't know why it hasn't been worked out.
      
Palange has since taken a job as an officer in nearby Mohnton, making nearly $24 per hour.
     
The <a href="http://readingeagle.com/article.aspx?id=243500

">Reading Eagle reports:

Palange said he is happy in Mohnton but would like to be working in the city, where he started his career. He was a six-year veteran with the city police when he shot Wise.

"My wife and I shake our heads every day as why there is no resolution (with his status with the city police)," Palange said. "I'm as baffled as you. I've been in limbo for years."

Palange, 36, said he cannot understand why the city did not settle the matter of his employment sooner, but he said the story should not be about him.

"I just think of the Wise family," Palange said. "It's a horrible thing. It's not about me. It's the Wise family and their loss and that's something I think about every day."

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