EAST LONGMEADOW -- A five-member panel charged with choosing three finalist candidates for police chief voted to suspend the search and continue the current police chief's contract.

On Wednesday evening, the committee's last scheduled meeting, members favored keeping the body intact after two of the three candidates they chose to replace Chief Douglas Mellis pulled their applications. Several bristled they that they were not notified that one candidate had removed his name for consideration before they voted for him.

"It was upsetting that we didn't have that information," committee member Anthony Tranghese said in front of about 50 people crowded into the East Longmeadow Town Hall hearing room.

At their last meeting on Feb. 26, the committee named Hampden Police Chief Jeffrey Farnsworth, former West Springfield Police Captain Daniel O'Brien and East Longmeadow Police Sergeant Jeffrey Dalessio as finalists.

Committee members first heard of Farnsworth's decision to withdraw when the Board of Selectmen interviewed O'Brien and Dalessio the following Monday, when board members said that Farnsworth had pulled out hours before. Farnsworth told The Republican that he alerted Interim Town Administrator Gregory Neffinger to his decision three days before the interviews took place.

Neffinger was the West Springfield mayor, serving one term until he was defeated in a bid for re-election in 2013 by Ed Sullivan, who decided not to seek a second term.

During Wednesday's meeting, Neffinger denied intentionally withholding information about Farnsworth's intentions, and said that Farnsworth had told him that he was unsure whether he wanted to move to East Longmeadow, adding that Neffinger had told him to go to the interview and see if the residency requirement was "hard and fast."

Neffinger then questioned Farnsworth's motive for speaking with The Republican about the matter.

"Has Chief Farnsworth been harmed?" Neffinger asked on Wednesday evening. "And why did he go before the press?"

Hours before the committee's meeting Wednesday, O'Brien rescinded his application, amid revelations regarding his record and a questions about a corrupt police chief search process.

O'Brien's decision came after hearing from a reporter that East Longmeadow Board of Selectmen Chairman Paul Federici said in an interview Wednesday that former Springfield City Councilor and convicted felon Francis G. "Frank" Keough III had approached him around the beginning of January.

Federici said Keough sought his support for O'Brien for East Longmeadow police chief and East Longmeadow interim Town Administrator Gregory Neffinger as permanent Town Hall head. Keough told Federici that his cooperation would be repaid with a yet-to-be-created position in Town Hall, Federici said.

"I was told once they got this all settled, they were going to create some finance manager (job)," Federici said.

The selection process for East Longmeadow police chief has been so dirty, Federici said, that "when I get done with this whole (process), I want to take a shower."

Keough on Wednesday said he had no recollection of the conversation Federici described.

"I hardly know Mr. Federici ... that is absolutely inaccurate," Keough said.

The Board of Selectmen had been scheduled to appoint a new chief on Thursday, but has since cancelled the meeting and will instead meet next on March 16.

As people in the crowd commented on what they called a poorly conducted police chief search process, and questioned the motives for replacing Mellis to begin with, Neffinger defended his actions, many of which have come into question.

"It's time to say let's take it from here, reset and take it from here," Neffinger said. "I had no authority here to choose any of the candidates."