'A great officer and a better friend': Officers, friends and family recall Bonnie Werntz
Photo provided by Chad and Laura Gregroy
Feb. 24, 2024
SOUTH BEND — Bonnie Werntz, a pioneering female officer with the South Bend Police Department who successfully sued the department on a claim of sexual discrimination, died Tuesday, Feb. 20 after days in hospice care in her South Bend home.
She was 82.
A memorial visitation takes place from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday, Feb. 26 at Palmer Funeral Home Hickey Chapel, 17131 Cleveland Road.
"Her claim to fame wasn't being a secretary, it was being a pioneering cop," said retired Tribune editor Ray Leliaert, who knew Werntz as a secretary for the detective bureau when he was a police reporter for The Tribune in the 1970s.
In those days, the police force was different and treatment toward female officers was different, Leliaert recalled. Female cops wore skirts and carried their service revolvers in their purses.
“Back then, some of the younger cops were sympathetic," he said, "but the old guard found it hard to accept that women were doing something besides being meter maids."
A woman before her own time
Despite those odds, Werntz rose from a stenographer from 1970 to 1973 to an investigator of sex crimes from 1980 to 1985 and to a training director from 1988 to 1992, according to her biography in Prabook. She retired from the department in 1996. During her time as a training director, she trained current Chief of Police Scott Ruszkowski and Patrol Division Chief Joseph Leszczynski.
"She was an outstanding lady," Leszczynski said about Werntz. "She was always polite and was always there to help you with what you needed to do."
Leszczynski described Werntz's role at the time: working with recruits, getting paperwork ready and lining up appointments.
At the time, Wertnz was the highest ranking woman at the department — a distinction, he said, that lasted for 30 years. Currently, Capt. Kathy Fulnecky is the highest ranking female at the SBPD, promoted from lieutenant in 2022.
“There’s a lot more females on the department now,” Leszczynski said. “The police job is accepting females with open arms.” He doesn’t know what happened “way back then,” he said, “but it was probably harder for them to get on.”
Back then, Leszczynski presumed, it was a male-dominated culture, he said. “Now, it’s not that way anymore. I think we have eight to 10% of the officers who are female,” adding that it could even be more. “It’s getting to be more every year,” he said. “Back when she was on, there weren’t that many. It was a tough job for a female because it was a man-dominated profession. Not many females wanted that profession at the time and it was probably hard to get in.”
Leszczynski remembered Werntz's character and dedication.
"I've never heard anyone say anything bad about her," he said. "She was just that kind of a lady. I was sad when I heard she passed away. Everyone who met her, liked her."
St. Joseph County Prosecutor Investigator Charles "Chuck" Stokes didn't hear about Werntz's death until Thursday night. As a former patrol sergeant, Stokes knew Werntz as a "great officer and a better friend." He recalled working with three female officers in 1985, one of them being Werntz.
"She talked your ear off, just like myself," he said. "She was a good person."
Former police officer Lynn Coleman remembers working with Werntz during his time with the SBPD from 1977-2000 as someone who carried her own weight and made major contributions to the department.
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, they were the leaders of the pack for female officers, Coleman said, referring to the three female officers at that time.
“Bonnie did it all,” he said, recalling she was the first female lieutenant.
“She was tough,” he said. “Especially back then (when the) police work was different. Not only did she have to stand up to the public, but she had to stand up to other police officers who didn’t think that she could or should go on.”
Sexual discrimination lawsuit
That need to stand up for herself eventually resulted in a lawsuit against SBPD for sexual discrimination.
“I think there was a lot of conversation among the female officers," retired Tribune editor and reporter Deanna Francis said. "Bonnie was a pretty strong woman. I don’t know if it was something that came out of a conversation with other officers or whether she, on her own, chose to do that. It was a pretty bold move at that point, because it was early, when women were beginning to speak up."
An Oct. 31, 1990, Tribune article headlined, "Police lieutenant accuses department of sex discrimination," details a charge of sex discrimination filed with the South Bend Human Rights Commission against the SBPD by Werntz.
Werntz, who at the time was in charge of the department's training office, said in the complaint that she'd been repeatedly passed over for promotion in favor of male officers. At the time, Werntz was the only female ranked lieutenant.
"The complaint alleges that Werntz has applied for seven positions at the rank of captain since February 1988," the article said. "Each subsequently has been filled by a man, even though Werntz claimed she was qualified for the posts. The most recent instance was in August when an opening was created by the retirement of Captain Norbert Turczynski, who headed the records bureau. The post was filled in September by Paul Jewell who was promoted from lieutenant. Jewell who has been on the department since 1967, previously was commander of the afternoon-evening shift in the detective bureau."
Another article from Jan. 4, 1996, shows the city of South Bend paid Werntz $40,000 from the city's self insurance fund due to a 1992 agreement that if she was not promoted to the rank of captain by March 28, 1996, they would pay that sum. During this time, Werntz was not the only female lieutenant, but there wasn't any female officer higher than lieutenant.
The article, "South Bend pays $40,000 to close sex bias case," said, "Werntz was not promoted earlier this year when a number of officers were promoted or shifted to different jobs after Darrell Gunn was appointed police chief. 'The chief (Darrell Gunn) felt the payment was the way to go,' Nussbaum said Thursday. Werntz said she didn't seek a captain's rank at the time because no applications were taken. She still would like to be a captain, Werntz said. Werntz currently is assigned to the juvenile aid bureau, where she supervises investigations of child abuse and sex offenses."
'Emboldened' by her position as a rape investigator
From 1996 to 1997, Werntz was a supervisor for juvenile sex crimes, after having been an investigator of sex crimes earlier in her career.
"She was the first female rape investigator," Francis said.
As an investigation supervisor, Werntz described the process of gathering evidence within a victim's body, as "the most objectionable part," in an Aug. 9, 1996, Tribune article.
"She had a lot of sympathy and empathy as a female rape investigator," Francis said. "I think, for women, it was easier to connect with a woman officer."
Chad Gregory, Werntz's grandson, said he didn't recall the job taking a toll on Werntz's life.
“A lot of it emboldened her more than anything to really fight,” Gregory said. “It was always a big thing to fight for the under served, the under appreciated women in bad situations and to deal with (issues) of domestic abuse.”
Her first marriage, he said, ended in a “combustible situation. That was always something, I think, that pushed her very hard, too, for other women."
“In ways that she wasn’t advocated for,” Gregory’s wife, Laura, added.
“It was very hard to shift gears,” she said. “To go from that kind of work and then go home and be a mom. I'm not sure (the job) took a toll. I’m sure all it did was fuel her.”
Werntz's family and friends remember their last moments with her
Born on March 28, 1941, in Pine Grove Mills, Penn., and a graduate of Indiana University South Bend, Werntz also made long-lasting friendships outside of the police department.
Francis knew Werntz by reputation from when she worked the police beat for The Tribune, but after the two met, they became friends and talked about literature and photography.
“It was immediately a very comfortable friendship," Francis said, calling them both country girls. "We both moved into those careers at a later age because women were not just necessarily police officers and newspapers were slow to put women on police coverage beats."
They met regularly for dinner, kept in touch after Francis moved and lived in Washington state for 15 years and had long conversations about the past.
Chad and Laura Gregory reminisced about their favorite "Gram recipes" — oxtail soup and ground meat over rice — and said that they were always learning new things about her.
“You couldn’t ask for a better Gram,” Laura said. “That’s it in a nutshell. No better person, no better human, no better Gram.”
A few days before Werntz went to the hospital, her great-grandson, Cameron, gave a presentation at school about her, filled with her memories, pictures of her time in the department and a list of fun facts about her:
Her favorite food was ground meat over rice
After she retired from the SBPD in 1996, she became a professional photographer
She enjoyed RV travel all over the country for 10 years
She was South Bend’s first woman to patrol alone
“In her last week, those are the stories she gave up the most, by far,” Lauren Callender, Werntz’s granddaughter, said about Werntz's time with the police department. Her time there “brought her the most pride.”
Werntz would tell her nurses, “Google my name,” when they were irritating her, Callender said. They found stories on her and then they would run back and talk to her about it, she said. “It lit her up so much.”
“Something I didn’t fully understand growing up,” Callender said, was that Werntz was far beyond her time. Now as an adult, Callender is amazed. “It’s insane, what she stood up to or pushed through. She didn’t just give up. She made sure she saw it all the way through the end.”
Laura Gregory remembered being able to have “lengthy conversations” with Werntz until 36 hours before she died. “When she went into the hospital, we didn’t know that would be the beginning of the end,” she said.
Francis, who recently moved back to town, recalled toeing the line between seeing her friend and giving her space.
"When I first came back, I talked to Bonnie every other day or so," she said, recalling that Werntz would be anxious to see her, but the two weren't able to arrange it before Werntz entered hospice care Friday, Feb. 16.
On Monday, Feb. 19, Laura Gregory called to say hospice and the doctors had recommended Werntz not receive anymore visitors.
"It was not going to be easy, and so, I didn’t get to see her," Francis said. "She was a very strong friend; that’s all I can say.”