A Florida police chief is on administrative leave following a police union complaint that he told his officers a sheriff’s deputy died from COVID-19 because he was a “homosexual who attended homosexual sexual events,” according to the Miami Herald.

Dale Engle, police chief of Davie, Fla., was put on leave Saturday pending further review of allegations brought forward by the state’s Fraternal Order of Police, the town’s administrator Richard J. Lemack said in a statement.

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The Miami Herald reported Saturday a complaint written by Mike Tucker, the chief of staff for the Florida State Fraternal Order of Police, said Engle “belittled” officers in a parking lot who expressed concern about the coronavirus last week, and referred to Shannon Bennett, a Broward County sheriff’s deputy who died from COVID-19 just days earlier.

“Chief Engle allegedly yelled about a ‘backstory’ which proclaimed that Deputy Bennett contracted and died from the virus because he was a ‘homosexual who attended homosexual sexual events,’” the complaint read, according to the Miami Herald.

“He intimated that it was because of the homosexual lifestyle that Deputy Bennett first contracted a serious underlying disease which aggravated the Covid-19 virus and lead to his death,” the complaint read.

The complaint said Engle continued to “rant” for some time, with the “presumable desired effect of intimidating the members and discouraging any other department employees from complaining or expressing concerns in the future.”

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Engle later sent an email to officers saying he did not mean to offend them by what he said.

“I made comments concerning the death of BSO Deputy Bennett as reported in the local media. These comments were relative to COVID-19 and personal protective equipment,” Engle wrote. “My intent was to provide as much information to personnel as possible. If my comments were taken out of context, they were not intended to be derogatory.”

Bennett, 39, died from the virus on April 3. He was openly gay and planned to marry his partner later this year. He was a member of the Broward Sheriff’s Office for more than 12 years.

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