Monday, April 12, 2004
The city of Winston-Salem plans to ask citizens to help review the police department's investigation of the 1984 rape and murder of Deborah Sykes.
The city council's public-safety committee is expected to vote today on whether to create a citizen- advisory committee to assist the city manager's office in reviewing the department's handling of the Sykes case.
The citizen committee would provide recommendations to City Manager Bill Stuart before his report is sent to the public-safety committee, according to a copy of the proposal.
The city would name seven people to the committee.
"The citizens will be neutral people," said Council Member Vivian Burke, the chairwoman of the public-safety committee. "If these people are not comfortable and they don't feel like they're getting the right kind of report, then we'll have to take another look."
Burke initiated the latest review of the Sykes case after a new suspect emerged. Darryl Hunt was twice convicted of the murder of Sykes, who was raped and killed in August 1984 as she walked downtown to her job as a newspaper copy editor.
But Hunt was freed from prison in December and his conviction was overturned Feb. 6 after the State Bureau of Investigation, Winston-Salem police and District Attorney Tom Keith determined that Hunt had been wrongly convicted.
Willard E. Brown was charged with rape and murder in December. Keith and investigators say that Brown acted alone.
Assistant City Manager Lee Garrity is in charge of the review, the second done by the city manager's office in the case. Police Chief Pat Norris, police department attorney Julie Risher and Assistant Police Chief Louis Saunders are helping in the review.
None of them has ever worked on the Sykes case.
But Burke said that adding citizens would make the review more credible.
Anyone who had involvement in the Sykes case or the other investigations will not be considered for the citizen committee, according to a copy of the proposal.
The city would look for at least two members with experience in law or criminal justice and pick one person from the city's Human Relations Commission and one person from the Citizen Police Review Board.
"Members shall be representative of the diversity present in the community," the proposal says.
Citizens would serve for one year - the amount of time that the public-safety committee is giving the city manager to complete his report.
If the citizen panel is approved, the city will begin talking with people interested in serving, Burke said. The public-safety committee will decide who the committee members will be, based on recommendations from Burke.
The citizen committee would hold public meetings, be briefed periodically by the city manager's office on its review, and make recommendations on the city manager's report before it is sent to the public-safety committee.
Stuart's office in 1985 reviewed the way that police handled Hunt's case, and found mistakes in the department's investigation. A detective was demoted and two supervisors received sanctions.
As part of its investigation, the city manager's office also is studying the killing of Arthur Wilson in 1983.
Hunt and his friend Sammy Mitchell were named by a third man in the Wilson murder, and both were convicted of the crime after Hunt had already been convicted of the Sykes murder. Hunt, however, won a retrial and was acquitted in the Wilson case.
In addition to the Sykes and Wilson murders, the city manager's office will review the police investigation of a downtown kidnapping and rape in 1985 that was similar to the attack on Sykes. Brown was a suspect in the 1985 rape, but neither he nor anyone else has ever been charged. Police have said that the victim did not want the case prosecuted. One question that has arisen is why the police did not link the 1985 case to the Sykes killing based on the similarities of the cases.
Patrick Wilson can be reached at 727-7286 or at pwilson@wsjournal.com