Chandler police documents obtained by The Arizona Republic through a public-records request show repeated incidents of police failing to collect evidence, interview witnesses and document cases.

Chandler Police Chief Sherry Kiyler said it is unusual to have four people aggressively reprimanded for not following leads and investigating cases in one year.

She said the problem is limited to those individuals and does not represent a widespread problem in the department.

In the past three years, the department found at least 44 cases that were mishandled to the point that officers were reprimanded.

Navajo Nation president Joe Shirley Jr. (AP Photo/Cable Hoover, Gallup Independent)

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Navajo lawmakers voted Monday to place the tribe’s president on administrative leave, pending an investigation into allegations of ethical, civil or criminal involvement with two companies that had been operating on the reservation.

The Tribal Council voted 48-22 in favor of the measure during a special session in Window Rock, Ariz.

The vote to place Navajo President Joe Shirley Jr. on leave comes a week after council members discussed investigations and alleged legal violations arising from tribal contracts with Utah-based OnSat Network Communications Inc. and Shiprock, N.M.-based Biochemical Decontamination Systems. Shirley’s spokesman says the council has yet to specify what the accusations again Shirley are.

The measure originally included tribal Vice President Ben Shelly, but delegates amended it to exclude him.

Council spokesman Joshua Lavar Butler said the reports the council heard last week in closed session revealed serious impropriety and violations within the executive branch.

Six others besides Shirley are targeted as part of the investigation, including his chief of staff and the directors of the tribe’s divisions of economic development, community development and public safety.

The council referred the reports on the two companies to tribal Attorney General Louis Denetsosie to consider the appointment of a special prosecutor.

Shirley’s spokesman, George Hardeen, said the council has not given the two-term president an opportunity to respond to the reports, nor have the allegations against him or others been made clear.

“All he’s hearing is hearsay,” Hardeen said. “He can’t dispute any wrongdoing when any particular wrongdoing has not been made clear to him, and he hasn’t been given a report. He hasn’t been told what he’s accused of.”

OnSat had provided satellite Internet services on the Navajo Nation. BCDS was created to seek large federal government contracts for the sale of metal fabrication products.

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.