Liberty chief calls report accurate
Says former chief ‘got a bad rap’By RAYMOND L. SMITH Tribune Chronicle
LIBERTY - Interim police Chief Richard Tisone called the Kent State University report on the circumstances surrounding the death of Mary Rush factually accurate and said the department would follow many of its recommendations.
Tisone, however, added he believes the KSU report was a little hard on former police Chief Anthony Slifka.
"The ex-chief got a bad rap," Tisone said. "There were things that happened that were out of his control."
Rush, 87, 229 Mansell Drive, was found on April 28 outside her home in her nightgown, bleeding from wounds and suffering from hypothermia. She is believed to have locked herself outside of the small, single-family home sometime between 3 and 7 a.m. She died later that day at St. Elizabeth Health Center in Youngstown.
Slifka would not cooperate with the KSU committee when they were interviewing witnesses and members of the police department, according to the report authors. He resigned in June. Efforts to reach him were not successful.
Local 911 dispatcher Joe LaVaglio, who also was criticized in the report, is expected to resign later this month. Tisone said LaVaglio's resignation has nothing to do with the report.
The department already has hired Cara C. Croyle to be LaVaglio's replacement. Croyle has worked as a dispatcher at the Trumbull County 911 Center.
The 28-page report also was highly critical of the lack of supervision and training in the department under Slifka's leadership. It described the Liberty police department at that time as being "... unprofessional, confused and lax."
It states several staff members and supervisors indicated they stopped bringing complaints to supervisors' attention because the officers believed nothing was being done to respond to the complaints.
Tisone, who has worked with the police department for most of his career, said that has not been his experience, so he could not comment on the criticisms.
Law Director Mark Finamore said he and township Administrator Pat Ungaro would lead the effort in making sure many of the recommendations in the report are implemented.
"The key issues that must be addressed from the report are training and supervision," Ungaro said.
Another criticism in the report noted that the department sometimes leave officers on duty without proper supervision. This is especially a concern during weekday evenings and weekends.
Tisone said the department plans to send all of its officers through supervisory training courses, so they all will have the skills to run a shift and make proper decisions.
It expects to spend twice the $8,000 that was spent last year for officer training.
To pay for the training increase, Tisone said the department is taking several actions to reduce its costs, including ending a program that allows officers to take their patrol vehicles home. The department will eliminate nine cars from its fleet as well as the mobile data recorders that are in each of the cars. Some of the savings also will come from lower insurance premiums and lower cost for cell phone subscriptions.
Trustee Jodi Stoyak said the township must accept some of the blame for the incidents that led to Rush's death.
"This was a horrible, horrible thing that happened, and we have to accept the responsibility of the actions of our employees," she said.
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milm1025
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10-08-08 8:16 AM
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I bet they will get sued as have other police depts. who neglected to do their job.
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Dschweck
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10-08-08 7:35 AM
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"Lack of Supervision and Training in Liberty".Now this is news.At least they admit to the findings of the report.Will give them some respect for that fact.Most area PD's hide their trash or pretend it is not happening.This cound be a good new beginning for LPD?
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