Norman Officer Reinstated After Legal Battle

By Gan Matthews, NEWS 9

NORMAN, Oklahoma -- After a long legal battle, a Norman police officer has his job back. But it might not be the end of litigation in his case.

Last summer, Norman Master Police Officer John Terry received a dangerous call at an apartment complex.

Officer Terry went to investigate a complaint of a naked man sitting in a stolen car in the parking lot.

He found the car and the suspect, 38-year-old Sang Van Nguyen. Nguyen refused to obey Officer Terry and started to drive off, almost running over Officer Terry.

"I was hanging on to the driver's side door and after we jumped up over a couple of curbs, I knew that I was fixing to really get injured and so as I disengaged from the vehicle, I had to discharge my firearm," Officer Terry said. "And I did that into him one time."

Nguyen survived the shooting, and Officer Terry thought he had handled the situation properly. But then after a Board of Inquiry, the Norman Police Chief fired him.

Terry filed as grievance and this week an arbitrator found that he had been fired without just cause. News Nine legal analyst Irven Box read through the decision.

"Here you have people who are charged with protecting the citizens of this community and enforcing laws. And yet on one of their own officers, the arbitrator found, they didn't give him due process in a hearing with regard to his termination," said NEWS 9 legal analyst Irven Box.

But now John Terry has his job back, along with back pay.

"My family and I are just overjoyed that I've been reinstated, that I'm able to actually continue my career," Officer Terry said.

Meanwhile, the man in the car, 38-year-old Sang Van Nguyen, remains in the Cleveland County jail. His trial for assault and battery with a deadly weapon is set for June. He is also charged with unauthorized use of a motor vehicle because the car was stolen.

Court records reveal that Nguyen's case is going to trial because he rejected a plea bargain offered by the state.