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Use-of-force cases should be transparent

The NAACP is right to demand transparency in the investigation of last week’s police-involved shooting in Niles, but calls for transparency should not begin and end with this incident.

In fact, we’ve been demanding it for years, seeking public access to details of all incidents involving police use of force as the cases evolve. Sadly, no one has gotten on that bandwagon with us until now.

No one took up the cause for Cody Dempsey, the 25-year-old Vernon man shot eight times by a Weathersfield police officer in September 2014 after a high-speed chase on state Route 11. Never once was there a call for transparency or answers involving his death, including the names of the officers placed on administrative leave while the investigation was underway. Public answers came only after prosecutors closed that case six months later, ruling it a justifiable shooting.

Our repeated calls for transparency during those six months were ignored, and there was no backing from any other civil rights organization like the NAACP.

When Girard police Officer Justin Leo was shot and killed Oct. 21, 2017, in the line of duty, his fellow officer returned fire and shot the man who had gunned down Officer Leo. In that case, state investigators and Girard Police refused to confirm the name of the other officer involved.

For months our calls for transparency went unheeded, and no other organization repeated those demands.

It was more than five months later when the officer’s name was finally released by a state legislator who proclaimed Leo’s partner, Officer Mathew Jamison, was a hero.

What was served by withholding Officer Jamison’s name for all those months? In the days and weeks following the shooting, the public had no ill will against the officer who opened fire, and in fact, many viewed him as a hero!

In another unrelated case, the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation refused to release the names of two Howland Township police officers involved in the Feb. 7, 2017, shooting death of Richard Latimer in the Howland Township Giant Eagle parking lot.

Following our call for release of the officers’ names in the days following the shooting, Howland officials, however, did the right thing and on Feb. 11, 2017, released names of the involved officers. Again, no other person or civil rights organizations backed our call for release of the officers’ names.

In none of these cases was our call for release of public information an attempt to cast aspersions on the officers involved. Certainly, we did not intend to imply guilt or innocence before the investigations were complete. Everyone in America is presumed innocent until proven otherwise, after all. That’s one of the things that makes America such a great nation!

Another is the public’s right to know what its government is doing.

We believe strongly in the need for transparency and the public’s right to know details involving officers who serve them as soon as those details are available.

On Wednesday, following demands from both the local NAACP and the Tribune Chronicle, Niles Police held a press conference about last week’s police-involved shooting. Police Chief Jay Holland released a written statement detailing what his officers say triggered the shooting. That’s a step in the right direction, but still falls short of releasing the names of the involved officers.

Holland’s release pledges that the department will be fully transparent after the investigation concludes; however, that realistically will take months.

Transparency is crucial in all matters of government, and the public’s right to know is especially critical in matters involving use of force by our law enforcement officers. Without it, we go down the very slippery slope. There is no place for secret police operations in America. In these cases, the public’s right to know always should trump the right to privacy by those involved.

That must always be the case — no matter a suspect’s race, ethnicity or gender — when use of force by law enforcement officers comes into play.

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