Despite the news of a gateway entrance ground breaking, an agreement with the Lower Bucks YMCA to move back Bristol, and the work having gone into preparing for Historic Bristol Day, the specter of two federal lawsuits recently settled still hangs over the Bristol Borough Council and its police department.
Council sanctioned Borough Manager Jim Dillon at last Monday’s meeting to prepare a proposal to hire a consultant to review and make recommendations about police department policy.
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The proposal, suggested by Councilman Gregg Pezza, is to restore the confidence of the community back into police department.
Specifics of the proposal have yet to be hashed out since the suggestion is still preliminary stages.
Credit: Tom Sofield/LevittownNow.com
Republican mayoral candidate and current north ward councilman Pat Sabatini supports the review of policy and procedure by an outside expert but he wants to take it one step further.
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Sabatini reading from a prepared statement, invited local media outlets to setup an open forum at a date and time yet to be determined that all parties and litigants be invited to.
“I have questions, taxpayers have questions and we’re not getting answers.” If there is something wrong lets fix it, if not we can move on,” he said Wednesday night in a phone call.
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Sabatini is not convinced at all by public statements made by fellow council members answered any questions, because he’s only heard talk of letter from Bucks County District Attorney David Heckler stating the borough police department was cleared.
“Transparency is needed here,” he said, “that’s what I’m asking for.”
Talk of the letter and about its existence has been brought up several times in recent council meetings.
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Council President Ralph DiGuiseppe insisted there is “nothing wrong with downstairs I can tell you that right now” when discussing the authorizing of Pezza’s proposal.
“The DA’s office completed a 18 month investigation and found nothing wrong,” DiGuiseppe, said shortly after Sabatini made his statement.
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A Right-to-Know request to the District Attorney’s office by LevittownNow.com for a copy of the letter was denied because “the information requested is protected by the Pennsylvania’s Criminal History Records Act and is not considered public record.
Bristol paid $440,000 to police Officer Ritchie Webb in August and $385,000 to Joanne Cipressi in July to settle federal suits filed against them.
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Cipressi called police for an incident involving a domestic dispute and one of the responding officers Sam Anderson forced her to engage in a sex act, which he performed, against her will. She sued in U.S. District court in Philadelphia in 201o.
Anderson was fired from the department and pleaded guilty to official oppression – using his badge for sex- in Bucks County Court in 2009. He was sentenced to serve three to 23 months in Bucks County Jail. Anderson served three months in prison and was ordered to be assessed by a mental health clinician.
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“What doesn’t make sense to me and many taxpayers a lawsuit that asks only for $100,000 settle for over $400,000?” Sabatini said.
“That doesn’t make sense to me or my constituents at all.”
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