So Long, Laurie Partridge.
By Jim Conley • Apr 10th, 2008 • Email This Post to a Friend •
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I haven’t been this excited since I first saw Susan Dey play Laurie Partridge on my television screen (in Technicolor). Word out of last night’s meeting of the Citizen Police Complaint Panel has me giddy. Well, hopeful anyway.
I’m not sure that the direction in which this panel is heading is what (some of) the Brookline Selectmen, Police Chief Daniel O’Leary and Town Administrator Richard Kelliher had in mind. (Mea culpa: I called the panel a sideshow at its inception, and damned if they’re not proving me wrong.)
The chairman of the panel, Superior Court Justice Peter King (ret.) is putting the panel on a productive course, including presenting a new “charge” from which to operate.
Also, many members are seemingly aghast over aspects of the current policy that gives most process control to the police. Some find it hard to believe that complainants are not furnished a copy of the investigative report (clearing the officer) or given notice as to when an appeal—their appeal— of the police chief’s findings will be heard by the selectmen.
King, I’m told, shone when panel member (and civil rights fraud) Martin Rosenthal teed up an attempt to keep Arthur Conquest from addressing the panel during its public hearing on April 30th. According to Rosenthal, some of the selectmen want to speak at the public hearing. But there’s a problem says Kelliher, Conquest has filed an action with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (and the parties can’t parry in public).
This led O’Leary’s other ringer on the panel—Attorney Douglas Louison—to advise Conquest that he ought not to appear, as long as his case with the Commission was pending.
King shanked the drive when he said, “Arthur Conquest can appear and say whatever he wants.”
Folks, this is how fair-minded, indeed broadminded, people conduct themselves in matters of public import. Who knows where this will end up? But with just this one episode we’ve come along way from Nancy Daly cutting off Conquest on his plea for an appeal (which had already been decided in the police department’s favor). Daly then let the head of the police union prattle on for twice as long as Conquest.
It’s called putting away childish things. The very things that appear likely to boot Daly from office…and not a moment too soon.
Update: What is it about Arthur Conquest that has these knuckleheads (Rosenthal, et. al.) so knotted up? The poor guy gets roughed up by police, nearly charged with assault on a bogus charge, obstructed by the town’s lawyers and administration when aggrieving his treatment, and now this.
Conquest is running for Brookline School Committee, and some are saying he’s using May 24th as a platform. They say this because it occurs to them as having potential. Or they say it out of fear of what it means to have him on the Committee when issues of racial equity and diversity are raised.
Jim Conley is publisher of On Brookline.
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About Nancy Daly, at the Candidates’ Debate, in her reply to my question about neighborhoods standing up for property rights and limitations on development, she answered, “You won’t get my enthusiastic support.” My reaction was, “Yes, you took the words right out of my mouth — YOU won’t get my enthusiastic support.” Or any from me.
The Panel is not quasi-judicial in nature as is, say, the ZBA. But the Panel is fortunate to have as its Chair a retired Superior Court Judge, Peter King, who has experience with jury and jury-less trials. The formal rules of evidence in the judicial system are not required in quasi judicial proceedings, but such proceedings should be fair. Lt. Burke’s internal affairs investigation was not in any sense a quasi judicial proceeding. So judging Lt. Burke’s report of October 10, 2007, requires that the Panel consider whether, based upon the raw information and evidence presented in the course of Lt. Burke’s investigation, his report was fair. If it wasn’t fair, then the system that gave rise to the investigation may need a lot of tweaking to ensure that the system is fairly applied in the future.
I have expressed my views on Lt. Burke’s report in comments on this Blog. To me the most telling part of Lt. Burke’s report that indicates that his report was not fair is his statement that suggested, in effect, that Conquest brought all this upon himself by not exiting Town Hall on the evening of May 24th and instead speaking to Officer Ford about his involvement in the incident that resulted in the BPD being called to Town Hall. If indeed Conquest had just walked out, without making contact with Offficer Ford or other responding police offiers, what might have been the result? Might the BPD have after obtaining information on the Sixth Floor gone in the middle of the night to Conquest’s home to confront him? Conquest, with the experiences of African Americans, wisely chose not to slink away, as there were not only bright lights but many witnesses in the lobby of Town Hall for his contact with Officer Ford.
While the Panel most likely will not require formal judicial rules of evidence, this post’s report of the recent meeting suggests that with the guidance of Chair King the Panel will be permitted to hear from Conquest and others in the performance of its charge. Then the Panel members can make their determinations, including whether Lt. Burke’s report was fair.
Larry Solum’s LEGAL THEORY BLOG at
http://lsolum.typepad.com/legaltheory/
has posted an entry for April 13, 2008 titled “Legal Theory Lexicon: Procedural Justice” addressed to law students but which may be of interest to some Panel members.