Group calls for civilian review board
Thevenin probe brings response from group formed after summer shooting
TROY, N.Y. » A group organized in the wake of the shooting last summer of an unarmed black man by a city police officer is calling for the formation of a civilian review board in the wake of a blistering report by the state attorney general on the investigation into a deadly police-involved shooting a year earlier.
In a statement issued late Tuesday, the group Justice for Dahmeek also called on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the Aug. 15, 2017, shooting of Dahmeek McDonald, 22, during a controntation with police as he sat in his parked car along 8th Street.
“We condemn the shoot-firstand- come-up-with-a-story-afterward behavior of the Troy police in the case of Edson Thevenin,” the group said in its statement. “We believe that if the police officer who shot Edson Thevenin had been held accountable, Dahmeek might not be struggling to recover, physically and emotionally, from his own near- death experience at the hands of a different Troy officer.”
In a report released Tuesday, state Attorney General Eric
Schneiderman said an investigation by his office into the April 17, 2016, shooting of Thevenin at the foot of the Collar City Bridge found, among other things, that French was not pinned between Thevenin’s car and his police vehicle when he opened fire, as the veteran officer had claimed during the initial probe. While Schneiderman said his investigation could not determine whether Sgt. Randy French was justified in shooting Thevenin eight times, he ripped Troy police, implying investigators were more concerned with clearing French than finding the truth.
To help prevent such behavior in the future, the group called for the city to not only implement recommendations from Schneiderman that included not to use prejudgment in future investigations, adopt a policy banning officers from shooting at moving vehicles and outfitting officers with bodycams or dashcams, but also to create a civilian board to oversee police policy and action.
“Since neither the police themselves nor the officials elected to represent us have shown themselves able or willing to monitor the TPD, we demand the creation of a genuine Civilian Review Board with the power to oversee the actions of the TPD,” the statement reads.
City Council President Carmella Mantello pointed out such a body already exists in the form of a Police Objective Review Committee established in 1997. The eight-member group, she said, is to include a representative cross- section of city residents, but has been vacant since Mayor Patrick Madden took office in January 2016, despite regular requests by Mantello to repopulate the board.
“The mayor is the only one who can fill the positions,” Mantello said by email. “The committee has certain functions and duties already prescribed by the [City] Code, and the mayor, as I’ve been requesting, should resurrect this dormant committee. It would certainly be a good step moving forward.”
Justice for Dahmeek was formed after McDonald was shot in the shoulder and had his head grazed by a second shot fired by Officer Jarad Iler, a five-year veteran of the force. That incident, which remains under investigation, sparked protests in the city’s North Central neighborhood and a march to City Hall after which Madden sat down with representatives of the group.
The group was critical of Madden on Wednesday, however, for his response to Schneiderman’s report, in which he said city police were caught in the middle of a jurisdictional dispute be- tween Schneiderman and Rensselaer County District Attorney Joel Abelove.
“We are outraged that the Mayor of Troy, instead of moving to correct the deeply flawed policies and practices of the TPD that the AG’s report revealed, attacked the bearer of the bad news instead,” the group’s statement reads. “The AG’s report showed plainly that forensic and witness evidence contradicted the story told by Sgt. French, the shooter of Edson Thevenin, but the po- lice investigators, the police chief, the city, and the DA closed ranks behind that false story so fast there was never a chance for the truth to come out.”
Madden declined comment on the statement Wednesday through his spokesman, John Salka, referring to the statement issued Tuesday after the release of Schneiderman’s report in which the mayor criticized the state investigation but also vowed to continue to work with Schneiderman’s office.