Accusations of fake overtime fly in harassment case against former Minneapolis police sergeant

A former Minneapolis police sergeant accused of stalking and harassing a former romantic partner — who was also a co-worker — is firing back in court filings, claiming the allegations are a ploy to divert attention away from an Internal Affairs Division investigation into the woman’s fake overtime claims.

Sgt. Gordon Blackey was a driver and bodyguard for Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey until May 2024, four months before he was charged with two misdemeanors alleging he harassed and used a device to track the woman’s vehicle. The woman was also an MPD sergeant.

Blackey had worked for the Minneapolis Police Department for more than 27 years before he left in January. The mayor’s security detail is assigned by the department.

The charging documents filed in Anoka County District Court say Blackey and the woman had a brief romantic relationship about a year before she discovered an Apple AirTag tracking device on her vehicle’s wheel, in March 2024.

Blackey admitted to Anoka County sheriff’s office investigators that he tracked the woman’s movements with AirTags and used a state database accessible to police officers to look up personal information about her, according to the criminal complaint. He is charged with two misdemeanors for improperly accessing her personal data.

Blackey’s attorney, Peter Johnson, contends in recent court filings that Anoka County prosecutors made “blatant material misrepresentations” in the charging documents. Among the alleged misrepresentations: that Blackey and the woman had a “had a brief romantic relationship approximately one year prior to the discovery of the AirTag.” Johnson alleges the two continued their “close relationship” for more than a month before she went to the sheriff’s department.

Johnson argues the harassment law is “not meant to criminalize rocky relationships, where parties want to see each other one day and feel differently the next.”

Blackey alleges the woman went to the police to deflect attention away from the Internal Affairs investigation and create a potential defense or mitigating circumstance for her misconduct. She continues to work for MPD.

The woman, whom the Star Tribune is not identifying because she is an alleged victim, declined to comment on Blackey’s allegations, saying, “I was told I cannot per department policy.”

Johnson claims the allegations against Blackey are “inextricably entwined” with the woman’s “employment problems,” and wants the judge to order MPD to release records about an Internal Affairs investigation and false overtime claims.

He argues the information is “relevant as impeachment evidence” related to the woman’s “dishonesty,” and “bias, motivation to fabricate, and interest in the outcome of this case.”

The prosecutor opposed Johnson’s request for an “extraordinary breadth of material — ranging from Internal Affairs files to personal phone records" — calling it a fishing expedition. So far, an Anoka County judge has ordered sealed all court filings that contain or reference the woman’s “confidential medical, mental health, or psychological information.”

Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara has talked about the department’s complaint process being a “ridiculous” problem, telling the Star Tribune last year “there’s a bad history here with people weaponizing the complaint process.”

“Cops have learned to use the system to their advantage, which they will do anywhere we let them,” he said.

Johnson says in court filings that he will present evidence that the woman made multiple overtime claims between November 2023 and March 2024 for work she didn’t do, and that she got angry when Blackey confronted her about it.

Blackey’s lawyer says the overtime issue came up during an argument about the AirTag in March 2024. Afterward, she texted him, “Don’t threaten me again.” Johnson says the woman told a detective that was a reference to Blackey mentioning during the argument that he had “dirt” on her.

Johnson plans to present text messages as evidence during the trial showing Blackey raised concerns about her “submitting false overtime claims for work on the mayor’s security detail.”

He says Blackey’s handwritten notes and cell phone records will prove “on multiple occasions” she falsely claimed overtime for working the mayor’s security detail. Once, she was at the Mall of America when she claimed to work four hours of overtime, he wrote.

The case had been scheduled to go to trial in September, but the presiding judge recently recused herself from the case after discovering a “conflict with my chambers,” so that could delay the trial.