First Selectman Paul Formica said Saturday that Dunn was given a letter Friday morning that outlined allegations against him and asked him to relinquish his badge and gun. The letter also requested that he not go into the town's public buildings.

Formica said he couldn't comment about the allegations. The letter from Formica, who also acts as the town's chief of police, was unavailable Saturday.

Dunn, 54, has worked at the East Lyme Police Department for 31 years and was president of the police union for 15 years. He wouldn't share or comment about the specifics of the allegations in Formica's letter but said they are false and are “definitely interesting.”

“I've been discriminated against since I walked in the door,” Dunn said, speaking about his return from medical leave in 2006 when he was injured at work. “The truth will come out that these allegations are totally false.”

Dunn said he has worked hard for the union and was very active when he was union president, winning many cases for the town. He said he still works as a union representative.

“My union activities may have something to do with it. That might not have made people happy,” Dunn said. “The complaints I made recently may have been a part of this.”

Resident State Trooper Sgt. Richard Crooks could not be reached on Saturday, and union President Paul Renshaw did not return phone calls to comment.

In November, Dunn was openly critical about a delay in reinstatement of the department's Taser policy. D

unn complained in a letter to The Day that the nearly year and a half it had taken to have a policy approved was unacceptable for the safety of the town's officers.

“How long does it take to review this document and put it in place, especially since it is a document that will help protect officers, innocent bystanders and violent offenders from injuries?” Dunn wrote. The town approved a policy for Taser use later that month.

In June Dunn drove a police SUV onto a closed and flooded street, where it became stranded and filled with water. The vehicle and its contents were destroyed.

A report said Dunn drove the 2005 Ford Explorer onto a flooded section of Atlantic Avenue in the beach area of town, according to Crooks. Crooks said the town's highway crews had put up signs to block access to the street and that other vehicles, too, had driven around the signs.

Crooks said Dunn later reported that he had seen an object in the water and drove to investigate.

In 2006 a local woman, Gayle Blair, filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the East Lyme police officer, alleging that, after responding to a late-night call at her house last month, Dunn slammed the door on her feet, hit her and threw her to the floor.

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Bridgeport. Only Dunn was named in the lawsuit.