Cop who Issued Bob Donovan Old UWM Ticket Supports Him for Mayor

The officer who issued and signed Bob Donovan’s 1992 disorderly conduct ticket for “restroom peeping” at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee told Media Milwaukee that he supports the alderman in the Milwaukee mayor’s election.

“All I got to say about this – I picked the best man for the election,” said retired Officer Burton Williams in an exclusive interview with the student news site. “When are they are going to stop this negative campaigning?”

The Donovan court file. Photo by Matt Campbell.

In fact, Williams ran into Donovan at a fish fry about a month ago and recalled the incident with him.

“I’ve talked to Bob about a month ago at a fish fry,” said Williams. “I told him, ‘One of my guys nailed you!’”

Media Milwaukee has also learned that another officer who was part of the incident (the court file shows him running a background check on Donovan) – and whom Burton recalls as writing the ticket’s narrative after being undercover in the bathroom sting – is now a state Department of Justice special agent.

Donovan has denied saying the statements attributed to him in the ticket narrative within the court file. That narrative is unsigned, but the court file did contain the partial names of the two officers as being involved in the situation. UWM PR confirmed their full names for Media Milwaukee.

The police narrative says Donovan admitted that he has frequented Mitchell Hall restroom at the UWM campus for years for the purpose of either watching men masturbate, or to have sex with men in the restroom. Donovan was observed “peeking through a hole the size of a nickel in a partition between two restroom stalls. Donovan did this continually for about ten minutes,” states the narrative.

Williams issued the citation when he was working at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Police Department in 1992. Williams has been retired from the department for almost 11 years, but Media Milwaukee tracked him down to see what he remembered of the incident. Despite the incident, Williams said his support for Donovan still remains strong.

The news site requested the officers’ names through open records after the old Donovan ticket again became an issue in the news media, with the Milwaukee mayoral election. After not being able to find any media account in which the cops were contacted, Media Milwaukee tracked them down to ask what they recalled of the incident and felt about it now.

The state DOJ agent, Kenneth Peters, at first told the Media Milwaukee reporter that he wanted to discuss the incident in person, but then spent several days ignoring calls and emails to set up the interview. One week later, Peters officially declined to comment on the incident. Media Milwaukee told him that Donovan has given statements in the media denying the narrative’s account and asked whether he stood by it. Williams said Peters was the officer actually in the bathroom and that he believed Peters wrote the narrative that Donovan has questioned. But all Peters would say was: “I am declining to be interviewed regarding a ticket issued in 1992” and referred the student reporter to UWM police, who no longer have records on the incident.

Williams, however, was willing to talk about it.

“I’m a firm believer, if you make an arrest, you do the narrative,” Williams said. “So, I just issued him (Donovan) a citation, and it was up to Ken Peters to fill out the narrative.”

Peters has been with the DOJ for some time. In 2008, he was recognized for his work on a marijuana investigation. At that time, Peters was working with the HIDTA, a high intensity drug trafficking initiative.

Donovan was in his 30s when he received the citation at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in 1992. The citation remained fairly unknown to the public until Donovan’s 2000 election for Alderman. In 2012, blogger Zach Wisniewski, posted a copy of the citation on his website, Blogging Blue. Since then, Milwaukee Magazine and the Journal Sentinel have subsequently reported on the incident, too, but they largely relied on the blogger’s account. OnMilwaukee.com then reported on the actual contents of the court file, which does contain the ticket and the narrative.

Details of the citation, particularly the police narrative, have been circulating on the web for years, but only show a photocopy of the citation and a copy of what the blogger presents as the police narrative of the incident. Donovan also has told news media that he never saw the police narrative of the citation until it was resurrected in his aldermanic election eight years later.

At the time of the incident, Williams was on-duty as a patrol officer. Williams said he received a call from an undercover officer, whom he identified as Peters, and whom he said was working undercover to respond to an incident at Mitchell Hall.

According to Williams, Peters would work “undercover” at the University, “make a bust,” and hand it off to the patrol on duty to make an arrest.

“He’d made a bust and handed it off to the patrol to make the arrest and everything else,” said Williams. “Because I’m going off the faith of a fellow officer, I issued him (Donovan) the citation. I will follow orders.”

In the court file of the citation, the police narrative was the only document lacking an original copy of all the documents in the file. It also appeared to be scanned onto the photocopy of the citation, as the two are completely different documents. The hard copy of the citation did not include space for police narration on the back.

It’s also unclear who wrote the narrative, as it remains unsigned. The police narrative is typed, but not aligned with spaces provided for comment. There is also has no mention on the narrative form of being from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. It just simply listed as “Police Report.” The citation was stamped by the UWM Police Department, but the narrative was not.

Twenty-four years later, Williams still keeps in contact with Donovan, who did not return a call seeking comment.

Why does he like Donovan?

“Go on your platform, like Bob does.”

Donovan faces incumbent Tom Barrett April 5 for the Milwaukee Mayor election.

READ MORE RELATED STORY FROM THIS REPORTER, who is covering the Milwaukee mayor’s race this spring:

Court files contradict Donovan’s account of 1992 peeping ticket

Donovan’s 1992 UWM peeping ticket enters mayoral conversation

UW-Milwaukee Restroom Policy Brings Mixed Reaction