Tuesday, April 13, 2004
Wanted: Clear-headed individuals with no baggage who are able to evaluate others.
Winston-Salem City Council Member Vivian Burke said that those are essential criteria for anyone chosen to serve on a citizen-advisory committee as the city reviews the Winston-Salem Police Department's investigation into the rape and killing of Deborah Sykes in 1984.
The public-safety committee of the city council voted 3 to 1 yesterday to form the committee, which would work with the city manager's office on its review.
"We don't want a repeat of what we had last time," said Burke, referring to the 1985 review by the city manager's office. Burke voted in favor of forming the committee. "We want to avoid any doubt in the minds of the citizens."
Council members Nelson Malloy and Wanda Merschel also supported the idea. Council Member Vernon Robinson voted against it.
Robinson pointed out that Darryl Hunt and his attorney, Mark Rabil, said last month that they thought that it was acceptable to have city officials themselves review the investigation.
"It's not clear to me that we pick up a lot by having a citizen panel," he said.
Burke and others argued that resident comment is important.
"I don't see that we could not open it up to citizens," Merschel said. "To do anything else is insulting to our bosses (the citizens)."
The full council will consider on Monday whether to approve the citizen-advisory committee.
In 1985, City Manager Bill Stuart's office reviewed the way that police handled the Sykes case, and found mistakes in the police department's investigation. A detective was demoted and two supervisors were given sanctions.
Hunt was convicted twice of murder in the death of Sykes, who was raped and killed in a downtown park on her way to her copy-editing job at The Sentinel, which was the afternoon Winston-Salem newspaper.
Burke started the latest review of the Sykes case after a new suspect, Willard E. Brown, was identified through DNA testing.
In December, Brown was charged with rape and murder in the Sykes case.
Hunt was freed from prison in December. 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. They say that Brown acted alone in the attack on Sykes.
Assistant City Manager Lee Garrity is in charge of the new review.
Police Chief Pat Norris, police department attorney Julie Risher and Assistant Police Chief Louis Saunders will assist. None of them has worked on the Sykes case.
The citizen-advisory committee would have seven members with no connections to the Sykes case. Its members would be chosen through an application process established by the public-safety committee. The panel would hold public meetings, be briefed on progress in the city manager's review and provide recommendations for the final report.
Yesterday, the committee agreed that the citizen-advisory group should have at least two members with experience in law or criminal justice, someone from the Winston-Salem Human Relations Commission and a former member of the Citizen Police Review Board, rather than a current member.
Burke asked Robinson if his dissent would be used to "drag out the issue" in a "display of attention-getting" during the council's meeting at 7:30 p.m. in City Hall.
Robinson said he didn't "imagine" so.
"This is serious business we're talking about," Burke said. "It should be handled that way."