OP-ED | CT Police Need Serious Reform
by Terry Cowgill | Apr 22, 2011 11:40am
(6) Comments | Commenting has expired
Posted to: Opinion
Cognitive dissonance? Thy name is the cops — or at least thy name is Connecticut’s finest.
The news of the last few months has served as a stark reminder of the culture of conflicts so prevalent in Connecticut’s police forces — both state and municipal. The picture that has emerged over the last several years — indeed over the last few decades — is that law enforcement authorities cannot be trusted to investigate themselves, especially if nepotism or politics are involved.
Last October an off-duty Windsor Locks police officer who had been drinking for six hours, crashed his car and fatally injured a young bicyclist. The officer’s father, a sergeant in the same department and president of the local police union, was briefly in charge of the crime scene. The young officer was eventually charged with manslaughter, while the father will face obstruction-of-justice charges. To make matters worse, the young man was only marginally qualified to wear the uniform, having struggled for a year to get his certification after being hired.
Earlier this month, the police union in Meriden asked state police to investigate whether the police chief in that city showed favoritism by going light on his son, an officer in the same force, after the latter was caught on video engaging in an apparent act of police brutality. Last week, we learned that the FBI is taking over the investigation.
Police and their advocates will tell you these types of incidents are isolated. If so, they’re not isolated enough.
Harken back to 2006, when a scathing report was issued by state and outside authorities on the internal affairs division of the Connecticut State Police. The 168-page report completed by then-Attorney General Richard Blumenthal’s office and the New York State Police painted a picture of an Internal Affairs unit that was out of control and not doing its job. Authorities in whom we had invested our trust to police the police were either looking the other way or failed to follow-up on obvious leads. And often they were directed to do so by superiors.
At one troop, The Hartford Courant reported, “an ‘open competition’ existed among some troopers over who could make the most drunken-driving arrests on the midnight shift” — with little care given as to whether the arrests were legitimate or not. Not surprisingly, Internal Affairs failed to properly investigate this matter as well.
And sometimes internal affairs investigations become politicized and vindictive. Many Northwest Corner residents recall the case of Mark Lauretano, the Salisbury resident state trooper who was the subject of an internal probe into his handling of the investigation of an alleged rape in 1997 at the Hotchkiss School.
Lauretano was suspended for two months without pay, removed as the town’s resident trooper and transferred. During the investigation, Lauretano was gagged by a state police media policy while his superiors bellyached to the press about his character and alleged incompetence. Thankfully, Lauretano challenged the media policy in federal court and won on First Amendment grounds while collecting a $450,000 out-of-court settlement and winning his old job back.
It goes without saying that you can’t trust any organization to investigate itself properly and fairly. The police have an obvious conflict of interest in having their IA divisions look into allegations of misbehavior. And not only because investigators are reluctant to report unflattering truths to their superiors.
I have a relative who worked a relatively short stint in Internal Affairs for a big-city police department. He said good, honest Internal Affairs investigators are typically detested by the rank-and-file. When Internal Affairs officers walk into a roomful of cops, silence is the order of the day, often followed by baleful glances.
It stands to reason that the best way to avoid being treated as a pariah by crooked fellow cops is for the Internal Affairs officer to gain a reputation as someone who won’t look seriously into allegations and complaints. Case in point: it took an outside investigative agency in this case, troopers from neighboring New York to expose the appalling chicanery in the Connecticut State Police Internal Affairs unit.
Some big cities have civilian review boards that look into allegations of police misconduct. But that’s not a perfect situation either, as board members are tempted to politicize the process in an attempt to make a name for themselves. Or in some cases, they’re insufficiently informed about police procedures.
How about forming a state agency, separate from the state police and headed by the lieutenant governor — who, to my knowledge, has nothing else to do anyway — whose charge is to look into major allegations of police malfeasance as they arise?
Look, no solution to this problem is perfect. But telling the cops to investigate themselves isn’t just unfair to us; it isn’t even fair to the police.
Terry Cowgill blogs at terrycowgill.blogspot.com and was an award-winning editor and senior writer for The Lakeville Journal Company. He is host of Conversations with Terry Cowgill, an hour-long monthly interview program on CATV6 on Comcast’s northwest Connecticut system.
Tags: Police, Internal Affairs, investigation
(6) Comments
posted by: Henry Berry | April 22, 2011 2:03pm
It’s not only uniformed state law-enforcement people, but state’s attorneys themselves and also some judges and corporate lawyers who need to be investigated. I was surprised to hear that Blumenthal was involved in a report on problems in state law-enforcement agencies since when I contacted him some years ago about crimes of state’s attorneys, I got back a note saying he wasn’t interested in hearing about the matter, and besides there was nothing he could do. But I see now, Blumenthal eventually did take the option of the typical bureaucrat—namely, a report. I read the article to see if Cogwill was on to something—but then when I got to the part calling for a “state agency” to look into and deal with crimes and corruption, I recognized he wasn’t. At minimum what is needed are independent sources such as serious, committed, competent investigative journalists. I know from threats I have been getting over my years of exposing crimes and corruption with state’s attorneys and their accomplices that I’ve been on the right path. Cowgill’s recommendation is so routine and innocuous however that I expect he’ll even get some state law-enforcement people and politicians to agree with him.
posted by: Terry D. Cowgill | April 22, 2011 5:25pm
Henry, thanks for your comment. I have addressed the problem of other sectors of the criminal justice system, including the state’s attorneys, in a previous column about the wrongfully convicted:
http://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/ctnj.php/archives/entry/op-ed_please_please_pass_the_bill_on_mandatory_taping_of_police_interrogati/
Now let me get this straight: you want the police to be investigated by journalists? Only one problem with that. Journalists do not have the power of subpoena. Journalists cannot recommend to prosecutors that charges be filed.
And just because some cops and prosecutors might like my idea doesn’t mean it’s a bad one. Perhaps if the agency investigates aggressively, those folks will change their minds. Sounds like you think my proposed agency will be milquetoast. But we will never know until we try it.
posted by: Henry Berry | April 22, 2011 8:29pm
You’re talking to someone—a freelance writer doing investigative journalism—whose phone has been illegally taped by state’s attorneys—followed by serial entrapment attempts for drug and/or sex crimes to retroactively make the illegal wiretap appear justified, followed by witness intimidation including threats of physical violence and worse when I began exposing this vicious scheme, with a concocted harassment arrest coming up in the course of this (case dismissed). The grounds for this?—a criminal complaint for theft of thousands of dollars of medical films of mine by lawyers at a prominent state law firm supported by several pages of incontrovertible evidence. The targeting of me enabled the criminal lawyers to collude with criminal judges in tampering with evidence, witness tampering, forgery, and subornation of perjury, among other crimes. I have evidence ranging from conclusive to compelling in support of all this. Your recommendation assumes people in government act in good faith, have the public’s interest in mind, and are not venal and easily corrupted—none of which are true. As for the proposal you cite, how is it that you assume that law-enforcement people will not tamper with a video tape of an interrogation? And apparently you don’t know, but police can be investigated by competent journalists; and journalists can present cases with evidence to prosecutors, as I did. In my case, the prosecutors recognized the case was so solid and so damning that the only recourse they were left with was to work assiduously to try to get me in jail while ruining my reputation as an open, honest, and law-abiding citizen, posing themselves as masterful and heroic. What Pollannaish planet do you come from that you think people in government can be trusted?
posted by: hawkeye | April 23, 2011 5:30pm
There are no law enforcement problems that need reform—before they occur. Once a problem occurs—involving police—they should, and are being investigated, and have been resolved—individually!
Connecticut Police do not need any blanket, reform movement.
posted by: Specter | April 25, 2011 7:31am
The system of cops and state’s attorneys is a corrupt mess. There are many cases showing them working hand-in-hand to railroad people into jail. And then you get into the ridiculousness of the DOC system…
I know of a case where a local cop, upon being told that there were other explanations for an alleged crime, told the person reporting it: “It’s not my job to prove him [the accused] innocent.” This was a captain on that local police force. He ended up admitting on the stand that after the accused was named that he didn’t do any further investigation - including talking to purported witnesses! That’s great police work! But it’s endemic in our Law & Order society (yes - that’s a direct reference to the show. So many abuses of people’s rights shown over the years and so many young folks brainwashed into thinking that behavior like that is OK).
