Baltimore Sheriff Sam Cogen directed his staff to use a code on electronic timesheets to boost their wages, triggering an improper calculation that cost the city more than $2.2 million, the city’s inspector general has found.

The “incorrectly issued” payments, which have not been returned to the city, were made after Cogen instructed sheriff’s office employees to enter hours in the city’s online timekeeping system as “city detail overtime,” according to a report from Inspector General Isabel Mercedes Cumming that was released Wednesday. The coding was intended to pay deputies an additional $31,200 annually, Cumming said.

However, the pay code was misconfigured in the city’s timekeeping system, a detail that Cogen told the inspector general he was unaware of, the report said. As a result, 94 deputies who followed Cogen’s instructions were paid triple the amount they were due for a standard workday.

Cogen told the inspector general that he gave the pay code order as a “stopgap” measure to increase salaries until top city officials agreed to discuss pay increases.

“We were looking for a legal way to give these guys some more money so they would come to work and so we could recruit people and so we could serve the city,” the report quoted Cogen as saying.

According to the order, employees were instructed to use the “city detail overtime” code when they were engaged in work that assisted city police with crime suppression. Suppression activities detailed in the order included a wide range of actions such as carrying a radio, wearing a uniform, traveling to an emergency and serving warrants.

Cogen told The Baltimore Banner Wednesday he would take the same action again if given the chance.

“It was the only option,” he said. “Either that or not work at the sheriff’s office, not cover my constitutional mandate.”

The inspector general found that the sheriff’s office “did not exercise due diligence” in monitoring the order’s impact on the department’s budget. Cogen did not notify city finance officials or human resources and financial staff within his own office, the report found.

“The use of the city detail clause as a mechanism for salary increases impacts the effective use of city funds,” Cumming wrote.

A dispute over the improper pay is currently before an arbitrator. The local Fraternal Order of Police chapter representing sheriff’s office employees asked for Cogen’s order to be reinstated and requested back pay, according to a response to the investigation from Baltimore Solicitor Ebony Thompson.

The de facto pay increases for the sheriff’s staff were enacted after Cogen failed to get approval for pay increases following standard procedure. After his election in 2022, Cogen, a Democrat, sought Mayor Brandon Scott’s blessing to use about $2 million in available funds within the sheriff’s budget to pay for increases.

Cogen implored the mayor to sign off, according to an October 2023 letter detailed in the report. Scott did not respond until January, writing that the city would not address requests for salary increases until the next round of labor negotiations. Scott told Cogen that he could not use the available funds for increases and noted that the city already agreed to cost-of-living increases for deputies through 2025.

By then Cogen had already sent a memo to staff in November 2023 directing them to file hours using the “city detail overtime” pay code.

“Sheriff Cogen took it upon himself to issue the detail order after being advised by counsel that statutorily, the mayor did not have the authority to increase the salaries of BSCO employees as Sheriff Cogen requested,” Thompson wrote in her response to Cumming’s report.

The report, which has not been referred to law enforcement as some reports from the office are, said Cogen was cooperative throughout the investigation and waived attorney-client privilege to allow Cumming’s staff to interview an assistant attorney general who works for the sheriff’s office.

Cogen told The Banner he explained his plan for the detail order to the assistant attorney general and was told that use of the code was legal.

Sheriff’s office employees continued to use the pay code until it was deactivated in February 2024. By then, officials in both the city’s finance department and the sheriff’s office had become aware of the increased overtime expenditures, according to the report.

Shauna Carroll, a retired sheriff’s deputy who is president of the FOP lodge, told The Banner that she had alerted Scott to the pay issue in 2023. The inspector general’s report notes that a senior labor official flagged the issue in December of that year.

“It felt like the deputies were in the middle of a fight between City Hall and the sheriff,” Carroll said.

Attorneys for the FOP said the order was legal, and that employees had to follow the sheriff’s orders, she said.

“He put out a memorandum of understanding that told the deputies to basically take the money, and he made them. It was an order,” she said.

Now, with the issue in arbitration, Carroll said it’s unclear whether deputies will have to give back money that they may not have been entitled to.

Cogen took office in late 2022 after unseating the city’s longtime sheriff, John Anderson, with support from a broad swath of city elected leaders. He pledged to reform the office’s eviction process, one of several responsibilities the sheriff has in addition to providing courthouse security. He has since worked to expand the office’s responsibilities, running speed traps, assisting with towing and offering staff to city events.

In Maryland, sheriff’s offices are established under the state constitution but funded by local governments. Employees of the office technically work for the state.

Cogen said Scott is overstepping his authority.

“The mayor doesn’t have control over the sheriff’s office the way that he thinks he does,” he said.

The fight over pay increases for the sheriff’s office spilled into public view during the 2024 mayoral campaign. Cogen endorsed Sheila Dixon, Scott’s opponent, citing Scott’s refusal to budge on the proposed increases as part of his rationale. Scott prevailed and was reelected last year.

The sheriff’s office finished fiscal year 2024, which ended in July, with a $4.5 million deficit, city budget officials recently reported.

Baltimore Banner reporter Justin Fenton contributed to this story.