Albany’s Community Police Review board is looking at its first three cases, after months of organization toward reviewing complaints and conducting independent investigations into incidents of alleged misconduct by city police officers.
San Francisco-based consultant attorney Andrew Lah joined the March 9 meeting remotely to update the board on organizational issues. Lah says he and his associates have been thinking "about structurally how to address cases that the board has to review."
"We conducted a training last month going over relevant policies and procedures and look forward to a training that we have scheduled for April that will go over some Fourth Amendment, and constitutional basics that can come up in these types of cases," Lah said. "Our team continues to work with the board on mediation, on bylaws, and on other issues as they come up and we continue to look forward to a series of projects that we have planned for this coming month."
The board met for three hours, sifting through a lengthy agenda that included three cases. The first incident occurred August 2018 where an individual claimed an officer approached him in the parking lot of the Delaware Avenue Price Chopper. The complainant said the officer pushed him to the ground and took his tote bag, later tossing it out the window of a police car. Board member Matt Ingram reviewed surveillance video footage, noting the man was never pushed to the ground. He added video shows the man putting his tote bag down in the parking lot.
"Originally the officer said that since the complainant was leaving the bag in the parking lot he was gonna book it into property at South Station and let the complainant come pick it up there, but eventually returns it," Ingram said. "I concur with the original findings in the OPS report. But I would make a motion that both of those complaints, both of those elements of the complaint be found as unfounded."
Ingram asked Albany Police Commander Joshua Laiacona why no body camera footage of the incident was available.
"Commander, I'm not understanding what is what's the reason you can't discuss the body cam issue," said Ingram.
"The case is currently under investigation. And until it's complete, and and done. I'm not going to discuss it in a public meeting," said Laiacona.
The second case up for review combined two separate incidents that occurred 10 days apart in early 2020, involving a woman who claimed she had gotten into an argument with a man who called the police on her "for no reason." She alleged responding officers dragged her out of a house shoeless then banged her head while putting her in a patrol car. The woman further claimed she had been placed in handcuffs that were too tight and suffered other injuries that landed her in the hospital for treatment. Ten days later she says she was "attacked by multiple officers for no reason" on Clinton Avenue.
Police records including video footage disputed much of the information the woman reported, but Ingram said the board didn't have all of the information it needed pertaining to the report. Board Chair Nairobi Vives spoke to Laiacona about problems related to electronic information sharing.
"Our expectation, no matter how the information is parsed out, if a board member is saying, 'oh, well, the link is going to expire in three days, I'm only going to get through the body cam, that's fine.' But our expectation is the full, the full range of information that is available to OPS, that's what we want," Vives said. "So in this case with Matt, if there was other pieces of information that wasn't there, we would expect that whoever is in charge of sharing the information to provide that to Matt. That's the expectation. We want everything. It doesn't have to come all at once. But we want everything."
In the third case a complainant said she was attempting to receive care at Albany Memorial Hospital when an officer choked and strangled her. She alleged, among other things, police searched her vehicle, stating they were "looking for drugs."
The board found a laundry-list of allegations the woman provided "unfounded."
The panel says there are still hurdles to clear as it flexes its investigatory powers. A technological challenge arises because surveillance, booking and bodycam videos run on individual systems, complicating access to footage. There's also the problem of not having all materials pertinent to a case readily available. Again, Laiacona:
"The way our system currently is set up, we it is it is not reasonable or feasible for a detective to upload an entire case file at once and put it on there. It needs to be pieced out," said Laiacona.
As the meeting was about to conclude, contract investigator Julie Schwartz told the board she too has had a lot of difficulty obtaining documentation for cases.
"We're trying to get everything but it's been a constant battle, " Schwartz said. "I think we've made some headway, but we're, you know, we're fighting to get everything."
The next board meeting is set for April 13.
