DOJ PLAYS POLITICS IN GARNER PROBE

Is Attorney General Loretta Lynch putting her thumb on the scale of justice? After two years of investigating the Eric Garner case, FBI agents are being replaced by agents from outside New York in a bid to prosecute NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo

By Tom Wrobleski

Staten Island Advance
October 26, 2016

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – Somebody sure wants to make certain we get an indictment in the Eric Garner case.

Why else would Department of Justice officials in Washington, D.C., take the investigation away from New York?

They should be careful what they wish for.

The federal investigation of Garner's death has dragged on for 22 months. The probe was launched after a Staten Island grand jury declined to indict NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo in Garner's death.

With no criminal indictment coming from the grand jury, it was up to the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's office in Brooklyn to decide whether Pantaleo had violated Garner's civil rights.

And after all these months, it's been reported that they have decided that there's not enough evidence to bring an indictment. They do not feel it would be a winning case to bring to trial.

Normally, you would think that that would be enough for the bosses in Washington. After all, the local folks are the men and women on the ground here. It's their job to make these determinations. They have done the investigating.

But the DOJ, under the leadership of Attorney General Loretta Lynch, herself a former U.S. Attorney in Brooklyn, has decided for whatever reason not to accept that decision. They're going to do their own investigating now.

It takes them almost two years to make that determination?

An unusual development, but not really a surprise. There had been reports for a while now that officials in the DOJ's Civil Rights DIvision in Washington felt that there was plenty enough evidence to go forward with a civil rights prosecution of Pantaleo. And that officials in Brooklyn disagreed.

So now it looks like the clock is going to start all over again. FBI agents from outside New York have been assigned to the case, according to published reports. Brooklyn prosecutors have been removed. Witnesses will have to be re-interviewed, evidence re-examined.

But it looks like a foregone conclusion is being sought: Get an indictment. If Brooklyn won't do it, Washington will.

Is that justice or politics?

Even if there is an indictment in the case, we're sure that the feds are aware that these civil rights cases against police don't always result in convictions.

For example, the NYPD cops involved in the Sean Bell, Amadou Diallo and Ernest Sayon cases, three hot-button, high-profile cases, were cleared after federal investigations determined that the victims' civil rights had not been violated.

And let's not forget that the DOJ also cleared the Ferguson, Mo., officer in the Michael Brown shooting of violating Brown's civil rights after after a grand jury had declined to indict.

The Rodney King cops in Los Angeles did do time on civil right charges, but the track record for prosecutions in these cases is dicey.

Part of the difficulty, according to legal experts, is that finding an officer guilty of violating somebody's civil rights means getting inside the officer's head and determining their intent. A high bar to get over. Pantaleo has said he meant to do Garner no harm.

And add to that the fact that this profound disagreement between Washington and New York is now out there in the open, and you see how a defense attorney could have a field day. The FBI and Brooklyn prosecutors themselves have provided reasonable doubt.

Meanwhile, nobody in the Garner case gets the closure that they've been looking for. Not Garner's family. Not Pantaleo and his family. It's just going to drag on and on.

We hope Washington knows what it's doing.