Re: 5/31/00 - Two top officers put on leave in wake of grand jury probe
Two top officers put on leave in wake of grand jury probe
By William Kaempffer, Register Staff May 31, 2000
Clockwise from top left: Wearing, Sullivan, DeStefano, Kendall.
NEW HAVEN ? Police Chief Melvin H. Wearing Tuesday placed Capt. Brian Sullivan, head of the department?s detective bureau, and Sgt. Edward Kendall, head of its forensics unit, on paid administrative leave amid allegations that members of the detective bureau hid evidence from North Haven police investigating a murder.
The leave will be indefinite, according to Wearing.
"Information provided by both men during an internal investigation calls into question the integrity and credibility of how the case was handled and suggests that there was information which should have been turned over to North Haven police," Wearing said in a press release.
After a meeting with Mayor John DeStefano Jr., Wearing spoke with Sullivan and Kendall before noon Tuesday and informed them of his decision. He secured the keys to their city vehicles and sent them home.
They each kept their badge and gun, Wearing said.
The allegations have prompted a state grand jury probe, which is running parallel to a separate internal New Haven police investigation. Both were initiated to determine whether evidence was suppressed and, if so, why.
Wearing said Tuesday that the decision to place the supervisors on leave was difficult. He said he made the move to preserve the integrity of the department.
"The (internal affairs) investigation provided me with enough information to feel there were credibility and integrity issues," he said. "I felt it best that both supervisors be put on administrative leave."
Sources in the department said Kendall cleaned out his office.
Sullivan could not be reached to discuss the leave, while Kendall?s attorney, Joseph M. Wicklow III, declined comment.
Meanwhile, New Haven police internal affairs investigators went to North Haven Tuesday as its investigation expanded. New Haven Capt. Bryan Kearney and Sgt. John Minardi interviewed North Haven Capt. Thomas Habib at police headquarters.
Habib runs that department?s detective bureau and confirmed that he was interviewed about the "sequence of events" connected to the case.
He would not comment on whether either he or other North Haven officers were subpoenaed to testify before the grand jury.
"Our focus still remains the same: to be able to solve this homicide. That?s the most important thing to us," Habib said.
At the center of the controversy is the 1996 murder of Philip S. Cusick. North Haven detectives are investigating the slaying, but police there believe he was shot in a soured drug deal in New Haven. Police said an acquaintance, William Clark, dumped his body outside Cusick?s parent?s house in North Haven. No one has been arrested in the case.
In February 1998, two New Haven detectives interviewed an informant who named a possible suspect.
They took a taped statement and the alleged witness picked out the suspect from an array of photos.
North Haven detectives, however, never were told of the evidence. The original audio tape is now missing.
The transcript sat in Kendall?s desk drawer for about two years until State?s Attorney Michael Dearington began inquiring, sources said.
In the internal probe, Kendall, the two detectives who took the statement, Stephen Coppola and Edwin Rodriguez, and another supervisor, Sgt. Direk Rodgers, recounted a 1998 meeting in which Sullivan ordered the investigation of the Cusick case halted on orders of the chief. At the time, Kendall was second-in-command in the detective bureau.
In a May 10 statement to internal affairs, Kendall said Sullivan told him in 1998 to forward the evidence to North Haven but he forgot after getting involved in other murder investigations and later going on injury leave.
But last week, he changed his statement, indicating that Sullivan never told him to forward the evidence. The new statement is contrary to Sullivan?s.
Wearing said Tuesday that he never told Sullivan to halt the probe.
"Obviously that is not true," he said "I will never stop an investigation. I never did, never had a reason to."
Wearing said supervisors routinely ? and often without his knowledge ? invoke his name to lend credibility to an order.
DeStefano said Tuesday that he supported the chief?s decision to place Sullivan and Kendall on leave. He said it was the chief?s decision and not his.
"The personnel actions were at the chief?s initiation and were, I feel, reasonable," he said. "And I related to the chief that I think that he is handling this in an appropriate fashion and he has my confidence in completing this matter."
Sgt. Louis G. Cavalier, president of the police union, criticized the action, noting that no wrongdoing has been proven against either person. And he questioned the timing of the internal probe and whether Wearing himself would be called to give a statement.
"I don?t see how the chief can avoid giving a statement," Cavalier said. "His name has been mentioned. He ordered this (internal) investigation that he?s now a part of."
Matthew Cusick, brother of the murder victim, said revelations that the murder could possibly have been solved two years ago are particularly hard on the family.
"I hope all the truth comes out," he said. "What this is most about is who shot my brother. My family is distraught every day ? this could have been solved."
A state grand jury, exceedingly rare in Connecticut, is hearing evidence in the case to determine if any members of the detective bureau acted criminally.
Judge Carmen Elisa Espinosa was appointed to act as a one-person grand jury and is hearing evidence in her New Britain courtroom.
Dearington launched an investigation earlier this year after New Haven Police Officer Keith Wortz brought allegations of wrongdoing. When his investigation stalled, Dearington applied for a grand jury and transferred the case to the chief state?s attorney.
¸New Haven Register 2000
zwire.com |
