{"id":86585,"date":"2026-10-30T17:31:50","date_gmt":"2026-10-30T21:31:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=86585"},"modified":"2026-10-30T17:31:56","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T21:31:56","slug":"lake-hamilton-police-chief-christopher-votour-fired","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2026\/10\/30\/lake-hamilton-police-chief-christopher-votour-fired\/","title":{"rendered":"Lake Hamilton Police Chief Christopher Votour Fired"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img data-dominant-color=\"51464c\" data-has-transparency=\"false\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"399\" height=\"501\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 399px) 100vw, 399px\" src=\"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/images-32.webp\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-86586 not-transparent\" style=\"--dominant-color: #51464c; width:217px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/images-32.webp 399w, https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/images-32-239x300.webp 239w\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Town of Lake Hamilton terminated Police Chief <strong>Christopher Votour<\/strong> effective <strong>October 23, 2026<\/strong>, citing policy violations, administrative oversights, and broader leadership failures.<sup><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Primary Findings Behind the Firing<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Mishandling of Personnel Complaints and Procedures:<\/strong> The town cited procedural errors and administrative failures regarding how internal complaints and high-level personnel investigations were managed within the department\u2014specifically related to an investigation that led to the earlier termination of a police captain.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Town Vehicle Policy Violation:<\/strong> Findings detailed an incident at the town\u2019s December 2025 Christmas party where Chief Votour consumed alcohol and subsequently operated a town-issued police vehicle. The termination documents specifically noted that there was <strong>no finding of legal impairment or intoxication<\/strong>; rather, the action violated town operational policies regarding the operation of municipal vehicles following alcohol consumption.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Departmental Oversight:<\/strong> The decision was finalized following an administrative review by special counsel regarding internal management and operational compliance within the department.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"State Attorney Jerry Hill &amp;apos;amused&amp;apos; by Lake Hamilton&amp;apos;s decision to keep police department\" width=\"1110\" height=\"624\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/43sUL8BaVBA?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Note: This video provides historical background on past oversight issues and discussions involving the Lake Hamilton Town Council and state authorities regarding local police department operations.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Town of Lake Hamilton terminated Police Chief Christopher Votour effective October 23, 2026, citing policy violations, administrative oversights, and broader leadership failures. Primary Findings Behind the Firing Note: This&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":86586,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvbGFrZWxhbmRnYXpldHRlLmluZm9cL25ld3NcL3dwLWNvbnRlbnRcL3VwbG9hZHNcLzIwMjZcLzEwXC9pbWFnZXMtMzIud2VicCIsInR4dCI6Ikxha2UgSGFtaWx0b24gUG9saWNlIENoaWVmIENocmlzdG9waGVyIFZvdG91ciBGaXJlZCIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiZG9pcyIsImZvbnQiOiIiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.8LqdQ1VDnxoHi9gTd9T75dQxkPPGe2w1ZU3aW22XrXwMQ"},"version":2,"media_source":"sig","attached_media":[{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/jetpack.com\/redirect\/?source=sigenerate&query=t%3DeyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvbGFrZWxhbmRnYXpldHRlLmluZm9cL25ld3NcL3dwLWNvbnRlbnRcL3VwbG9hZHNcLzIwMjZcLzEwXC9pbWFnZXMtMzIud2VicCIsInR4dCI6Ikxha2UgSGFtaWx0b24gUG9saWNlIENoaWVmIENocmlzdG9waGVyIFZvdG91ciBGaXJlZCIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiZG9pcyIsImZvbnQiOiIiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.8LqdQ1VDnxoHi9gTd9T75dQxkPPGe2w1ZU3aW22XrXwMQ","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[14],"tags":[18787,18791,18786,15493,18788,18282,18793,18789],"class_list":["post-86585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-christopher-votour","tag-fired","tag-lake-hamilton","tag-local-news","tag-police-chief","tag-police-department","tag-policy-violation","tag-town-of-lake-hamilton"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86585"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86585\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86587,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86585\/revisions\/86587"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}