There is much we do not know. Someone mentioned and it seems that I also read in an article that Cochran was directed not to publicly discuss the issue during his 30 day suspension. Apparently Cochran did violate that directive.
It has also been reported that he did not receive permission from the Mayor to write the book that he published. That appears to be a factor in the chief's suspension and dismissal.
Something I read in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution newspaper related that Cochran was put on
suspension without pay. That's telling. I interpret that it could mean that between the initial communication between the mayor and Cochran about the issue(s) and the time the suspension went into effect something was said or done that warranted "without pay" while the allegations were being investigated.
As I said in previous post I have been down this road a few times and I absolutely hated every minute of it. Ending someone's career and taking away their livelihood is a very serious matter. You owe them every possible consideration. In some ways they can make their own situation worse. I'm not saying that is what Cochran did, but putting him on 30 days suspension
with or without pay was most likely an option. The fact that Cochran got the without pay suspension cannot be ignored. What happened? Who knows. We likely never will know.
Lawyers are all involved and HR is involved and you go to meetings concerning the alleged violations and complaints. You have to meet with and talk to a lot of people. Lawyers and HR, in my experiences, also advise you to look at the possibilities of tangental and even non-related areas of possible wrong doing. Doing so makes you feel dirty. It takes up and inordinate amount of time, but again you owe to the employee and to all employees to do it.
The first time, when I told the HR director that looking at other possibilities made me uncomfortable and that I wasn't going to do it. He responded by saying that I owed it to the employee (a guy I really liked who had almost 20 years of productive employment and a guy who was going to close on a new home 2 DAYS before the scheduled end of his 30 day suspension with pay). HR said, "Look, if you want to help him, and if in other ways he has a clear slate, you may be able to use that to justify something less than dismissal." Unfortunately, I found and documented things I didn't found hard to believe. He was manager and a nice guy. In the end I had no choice.
Lastly, HR and lawyers
always advised that I provide a list of reasons why action was taken when other reasons were discovered during the 30 investigation. Think of it like police always arresting people on multiple charges. Often times there is more than one justifiable reason a person is terminated.
As the termination of even someone as prominent in the community as the city fire chief is a personnel matter, the public is not at all likely to know all the reasons or the specifics. Foremost, for me anyway, you want to respect the dignity and the confidentiality of the dismissed person as much as you can. Secondly, a public "he said, she said" benefits no one, including the employer - government or private. Finally, the legal department will tell you that there is always the possibility of being sued and it serves no purpose to say more than is necessary. PR will advise you, often specifically, how to respond and not to belabor the issue; stay on point and repeat when you must.
There is a reason we do not have a great deal of information about the OP. I doubt we will for a long time. What we may hear will be one-sided. Don't look for the City of Atlanta to engage in a "he said, she said". The quickest was to stop the public discussion is not to respond not respond once the issue is concluded.
Sorry for the text wall.