Cop Fired for Giving Poop Sandwich to Homeless Person Reinstated
The Texas policeman was fired twice for the incident.
In the latest installation of WTF, a San Antonio cop who was fired after being accused of giving a homeless man a dog-poop sandwich has returned to the force.
The New York Post reports that Matthew Luckhurst was fired twice for the incident, which happened back in 2016 in what his former Police Chief William McManus called a “vile and disgusting act.” Luckhurst now serves as a cop in Benavides, Texas, which is around 150 miles from San Antonio.
In 2016, the 42-year-old was accused of taking dog feces from the ground, putting it on bread, then placing it in a Styrofoam container. He then left it for an unhoused person who was sleeping.
Luckhurst said that he gave the person the sandwich to throw away, not eat. According to the outlet, the unhoused man didn’t eat the sandwich.
In the same year, Luckhurst was also accused of defecating in a women’s toilet at the San Antonio Police Department and then smearing a brown substance on one of the toilet seats. He didn’t maintain his innocence in this instance.
In 2019, he was successful in appealing being fired for the sandwich incident and came back to work. However, he was officially let go in 2020 when a judge upheld his dismissal. He found work again as a cop in 2022 in Floresville, Texas, but was let go 10 months later.
He was hired by the Benavides Police Department in 2023, with Police Chief Andre Hines saying his hiring “reflects the department’s commitment to honesty and accountability.”
Hines described Luckhurst’s record in Benavides as “exemplary, with no complaints or issues reported.” He also said “a thorough background check” helped guarantee “all aspects of his history were carefully considered.”
