City Council mulls changing the way cops are punished

By Katie Kerwin Mccrimmon, Rocky Mountain News
April 17, 2004

Denver City Council President Elbra Wedgeworth will push for city charter revisions to change the way officers are disciplined in police shootings.

Wedgeworth and other council members want changes in what is known as the comparative discipline language in the city charter, which requires the city to mete out similar penalties in different cases.

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Wedgeworth would like to see proposed language go to voters in November, but admits that time frame may be unrealistic. Any amendment would have to be approved by the council, Mayor John Hickenlooper and the city attorney's office.

The shooting of 15-year-old Paul Childs by officer James Turney prompted the proposal. On Thursday, Turney, who killed the knife-wielding developmentally disabled teen last summer, was suspended without pay for 10 months.

"What's broken here is the system," Wedgeworth said Friday. "What it comes down to is accountability. We want to hold police officers responsible for their actions."

She called Turney's actions extreme.

"He is basically getting the same discipline that another officer got in different circumstances," Wedgeworth said. "The accountability is skewed."

Councilman Michael Hancock also favors new language.

He says the comparative discipline policy was written decades ago and is outmoded.

"It's a policy that's out of step with police officers and how they're dealing with society," Hancock said. "We need to make sure that every officer-involved shooting is looked at on an individual basis. The sooner the better, but we don't have a timeline."

Hancock fears Turney's 10- month suspension could be overturned. Turney's lawyer has vowed to appeal and claims his penalty is far stricter than punishments handed down to others in similar circumstances.

"That doesn't stop us from looking at changes," Hancock said. "We need to keep this from happening again. We'll have to work collaboratively with the mayor to see what language works."

Michael Bennet, Hickenlooper's chief of staff, said the mayor's office has been focused on the proper discipline in the Childs case. He said the mayor has not yet decided what to do about the comparative discipline requirement.

"We're focused on the decisions that we just made," Bennet said. "We worked hard to try and reach a conclusion that we thought would be upheld by the Civil Service Commission.

"Our view is it ought to be upheld. If it's not upheld, we're going to have to look at why."

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