Ex-officer sues
His manner of exit led to police certification being revoked.
A former Albany police officer who fatally shot a Syracuse man who tried to rob him while the off-duty officer was allegedly patronizing a prostitute in Utica is suing his one-time department for reporting to the state Division of Criminal Justice Services that he had resigned under a disciplinary cloud last year.
The former officer, 36-year-old Christofer M. Kitto, alleges the city of Albany had agreed to withdraw the disciplinary charges against him, but then reported to DCJS in June — more than a year after Kitto’s resignation — that he had left the department due to incompetence and misconduct. That notification by the department resulted in Kitto’s police certification credentials being invalidated.
The fallout, Kitto’s lawsuit alleges, is that he has been prevented from obtaining a job with another police agency.
Under state law, DCJS maintains a central registry of police officers and peace officers that lists the officers’ name, date of birth, Social Security number, rank or title, employer and date of successful completion of training. The certification, generally, remains valid for four years after a police officer leaves a department.
But in 2016, the state amended its regulations to require departments to report when officers had been removed from duty for cause. The amendment was intended, in part, to clamp down on a common practice in which police officers facing pending investigations for misconduct or criminal allegations would retire or resign from an agency — thereby heading off any discipline — and then land a job with another department.
But Kitto’s lawsuit alleges that the disciplinary charges against him were dropped by the Albany Police Department. Two days after he resigned in May 2019, Chief Eric Hawkins signed a letter confirming Kitto’s resignation, but the letter did not include any information about the officer being removed for incompetence or misconduct, according to the lawsuit.
In the Utica case, Kitto pleaded guilty to driving while ability impaired. But Oneida
County District Attorney Scott Mcnamara declined to pursue charges that Kitto had patronized a prostitute, and determined the off-duty officer was justified in killing 35-year-old Shatelle Hooks, who rushed at him with a knife after Kitto met with the prostitute at a local residence.
Mcnamara said last year that Kitto’s decision to meet a prostitute warranted the end of his police career, and that Kitto’s resignation from the Albany Police Department was a requirement of the plea deal.
“I believe what he did that night, by going to where he went, that he should not be a police officer,” Mcnamara said.
Kitto subsequently resigned, ending his five-year career as a patrol officer in Albany.
Following Kitto’s guilty plea, Hawkins stated that the shooting and what led up to it “was under investigation by (our) department. The investigation was nearing conclusion, and we received notice from his representatives yesterday that he intended to resign.”
But Kitto’s lawsuit contends that a day before Hawkins made those statements, the officer and his attorneys had received an email from the department informing him the disciplinary charges had been withdrawn.
The lawsuit alleges that in return for Kitto agreeing to resign, the department would withdraw his disciplinary charges and “not take any further action to hinder or prevent (Kitto) from seeking employment elsewhere.”
According to the criminal complaint regarding the January 2019 incident, an apparently intoxicated Kitto left Turning Stone Casino before dawn and paid the woman $50 for unspecified sexual favors. The meeting at the Lincoln Avenue residence in nearby Utica ended when Hooks arrived clutching a knife. Kitto, armed with an off-duty weapon, shot Hooks. The former officer and the woman both called 911.
Hooks, a former Syracuse resident with a criminal history that included a conviction for attempted robbery, was taken to St. Elizabeth Medical Center in Utica, where he died from his injuries.