Fairfax supervisors should supervise their cops

By:Barbara Hollingsworth05/10/11 8:05 PM
Local Opinion Editor

Nicholas Beltrante is a former D.C. homicide detective with more than five decades of law enforcement experience. Two years ago, he founded the Citizens Coalition for Police Accountability after Fairfax County cops shot and killed David Masters in Beltrante's Mount Vernon neighborhood.

The 52-year-year old Masters' capital crime was stealing flowers on his way to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

Beltrante knew that the Fairfax PD's regulations forbid the use of lethal force to apprehend a person accused of a misdemeanor. He was also troubled that the department refused to release the Nov. 13, 2009, incident report under the Freedom of Information Act.

It took a year -- and the threat of a lawsuit -- before the department finally released the name of Officer David Ziants, who shot Masters in the back of the head while his SUV was stuck in traffic at a Richmond Highway intersection.

So now the cop's cop is spending his golden years trying to force the Fairfax PD to be more transparent and accountable. During the past six years, he says, 13 people have been slain and 13 wounded by Fairfax police officers, some under "highly questionable circumstances."

When challenged on these matters, the department hides behind a wall of silence. Later, taxpayers learn they have to pay millions of dollars to settle cases they knew little about.

In January, for example, the Fairfax Board of Supervisors agreed to a $2 million settlement with the family of Dr. Salvatore Culosi, an unarmed optometrist who was killed by a Fairfax SWAT team during a 2006 gambling raid.

Court documents debunked Officer Deval Bullock's version of events -- that his .45-caliber automatic pistol accidentally discharged after the door of his police car bumped his elbow -- because the spent cartridge was found halfway between the vehicle and Culosi's body.

Did the officer lie, I asked? "Absolutely," Beltrante says.

Another $1.5 million out-of-court settlement was paid to the family of Ashley McIntosh, a 33-year-old teacher who was killed by another Fairfax police officer who ran a red light with no warning lights or sirens on.

"I am pro-police," Beltrante told The Examiner. "I have police blood in me. Ninety-nine percent of police officers are wonderful, but every police department has that 1 percent that taints its image. The era of the police policing the police has ended."

Beltrante wants the county to set up a civilian review board to monitor police activity, but such boards have been used in the past by people with political axes to grind. And Fairfax County already has a civilian review board. It's called the Board of Supervisors.

However, supervisors have not been doing their job, perhaps because the Police Association of Fairfax County is a major campaign donor to both Democrats and Republicans on the board.

And Virginia's FOIA law, which makes release of police reports optional rather than mandatory, needs to be strengthened.

Beltrante says that since 1942, "Fairfax County is the only jurisdiction in the United States in which no police officers have ever been charged with misconduct after a shooting death." How does this happen without ongoing coverups at the top levels of county government?

On March 29, Police Chief David Rohrer and County Attorney Tony Griffith insulted the public's intelligence by suggesting that an auditor who reports directly to them be in charge of reviewing all police misconduct complaints. The board's public safety committee, which meets June 14, should reject this "solution" out of hand.

So should voters. Supervisors who don't supervise don't belong on the board.

Barbara F. Hollingsworth is The Examiner's local opinion editor.