By JESSE McKINLEY and J. DAVID
GOODMAN
ALBANY — Attorney General Eric T.
Schneiderman of New York asked Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on Monday to immediately
grant his office the power to investigate and prosecute killings of unarmed
civilians by law enforcement officials.
Mr. Schneiderman also challenged
state legislators to pass new laws to repair public confidence in the criminal
justice system, which he said was badly damaged after grand juries in Missouri
and on Staten Island declined to bring criminal charges against officers in
fatal encounters with unarmed black men.
But he seemed unwilling to wait
for new powers to investigate the police in the event that another killing
occurred before new laws were passed. “When the trust between the police and
the communities they serve and protect breaks down, everyone is at risk,” he
said.
The grand jury’s decision not to
indict in the case of Eric Garner, who died after a police chokehold during an
arrest on Staten Island in July, has renewed and strengthened calls for special
prosecutors to handle such cases.
While Mr. Schneiderman was joined
by local and state political leaders during his announcement in Manhattan, the
prospects for quick legislative or executive action seem murky at best.
While the Assembly, dominated by
Democrats, has passed bills in the past allowing the attorney general to
investigate and prosecute alleged police misconduct, similar measures have
failed to advance in the Senate, where Republicans were recently elected to a
clear majority. On Monday, Scott Reif, a spokesman for the Senate Republican
leader, Dean G. Sklelos of Long Island, had no immediate comment on the
attorney general’s proposal.
The governor’s office also had a
measured response to the attorney general, who has had an often chilly
relationship with Mr. Cuomo. In a statement, Melissa DeRosa, Mr. Cuomo’s
communications director, said the attorney general’s proposal was being
reviewed, even as the governor pursued a “broader approach that seeks to ensure
equality and fairness in our justice system.”
The proposal received immediate
pushback from police unions and several district attorneys in New York City,
particularly in Brooklyn, where a grand jury will soon be impaneled to hear
evidence in the fatal shooting of an unarmed man by an officer patrolling with
his gun drawn.
Describing himself as “adamantly
opposed,” the Brooklyn district attorney, Kenneth P. Thompson, said in a
statement that the voters elected him “to keep them safe from all crimes,
including those of police brutality.”
District attorneys in the Bronx
and Queens also defended their ability to prosecute cases involving police
officers, while the Manhattan district attorney has said, in general, he would
remain open to discussing the idea but has expressed reservations about special
prosecutors’ lack of accountability.
A spokesman for the Staten Island
district attorney, whose office presented Mr. Garner’s death to a grand jury
but did not secure an indictment, declined to comment.
Michael J. Palladino, president of
the detectives’ union, said the attorney general’s proposal “insulted the
intelligence and the integrity of the grand jurors who examined the facts” on
Staten Island.
Calls for special prosecutors have
often followed fatal police encounters, particularly from relatives of the
victims who believe that the close working relationship between local
prosecutors and the police prevents them from robustly presenting cases against
officers accused of wrongdoing on the job. The calls, however, are seldom
answered.
The family of Sean Bell, killed in
a volley of 50 police bullets in 2006, urged the state to appoint a special
prosecutor to investigate the officers. None was appointed. The Queens district
attorney secured an indictment against three detectives involved in the
shooting, but they were acquitted after a trial on charges of manslaughter,
assault and reckless endangerment.
The debate over the police and
prosecutors seems more likely to percolate through the next legislative session
and Mr. Cuomo’s second term, both of which begin in January. Senate Democrats
planned to meet in Albany this week, and late Monday introduced legislation to
create an Office of Special Investigation within the state attorney general’s
office, which would “investigate any criminal offense or offenses committed by
a police officer” that results in the death of an unarmed civilian.
