In an August 22nd interview with Andrew Siff of NBC's New York affiliate, Staten Island (Richmond County) District Attorney defended his office's handling of the police choke hold killing of Eric Garner, in the face of "crys" to hand the case off to the feds.
No one has said there is a blemish on my record. No one has said that we're incapable of doing this, so I don't understand where that cry is coming from.
Unable to embed video. Link
here.
Well Mr. Donovan, there's a big blemish on your record now.
More Below the fold.
The television interview cited above, was done before a special grand jury was empaneled to do exactly what Dan Donovan wanted it to do: Refuse to indict police officer Daniel Pantaleo for causing the death, by asphyxiation, of Eric Garner with an illegal choke hold.
According to Jeffrey Fagan, a Professor of Law at Columbia:
It’s politically costly for Dan Donovan to indict a police officer on Staten Island. He can easily shift the political and legal burden to the Department of Justice to decide whether to pursue criminal charges. He’s washed his hands of it.
This
dog and pony show took four months and included testimony from 22 civilian witnesses, and in an unorthodox move similar to the Ferguson grand jury, the officer responsible for Garner's death was allowed to testify before the panel. A judge has yet to rule on whether documents from the grand jury proceedings will be released to the public.
Dan Donovan has been endorsed for election and re-election by multiple New York area police unions. In 2011, Patrick Lynch, president of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association had this to say when endorsing the D.A.:
Dan Donovan understands the importance of working as a partner with police in the streets.
Well Patrick Lynch and the PBA quickly showed their appreciation for Dan Donovan and the grand jury's failure to indict "Eagle Scout" Panaleo. From
NBC News:
The head of the New York police union said Thursday that a grand jury made the right call when it declined to indict an officer in the chokehold death of Eric Garner, an unarmed man, in July.
"We feel badly that there was a loss of life," said Patrick Lynch, president of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association. "But unfortunately Mr. Garner made a choice that day to resist arrest."
He praised the officer, Daniel Pantaleo, as a good man, a mature policeman and an Eagle Scout who "went out and did a difficult job, a job where there's no script, and sometimes with that there's tragedy that comes."
"It's also a tragedy for this police officer who has to live with that death," Lynch said.
Dan Donovan, a republican, has been the District Attorney for Staten Island (Richmond County) since he was first elected in 2003. In 2007 and 2011, he was resoundingly re-elected over Democrat Michael Ryan with 70% and 68% of the vote respectively. Donovan was the republican party's nominee for Attorney General of New York, in 2010, where he lost to democrat Eric Schneiderman. He goes before Staten Island voters again November, 2015 and has also been
rumored to be interested in republican Rep. Michael Grimm's Staten Island based congressional seat should the congressman be convicted of corruption charges in federal court.
Another travesty foisted on the public by a "public servant" more interested in maintaining his own power, and moving up the political ladder, than he is in doing his job. Seriously folks, this District Attorney had a video of the killing, and a death certificate that gives the manner of death as homicide. Pantaleo should have been easier to indict than a ham sandwich.