E-Mail This Article to a Friend The Snelgrove case Unanswered questions

Reports that police officers and their commanders will face no criminal charges in the shooting death of 21-year-old Emerson College student Victoria Snelgrove outside Fenway Park on the night the Red Sox won the 2004 ALCS Championship only hinted at the dismal performance of the Boston Police Department in this matter.

We can accept Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel Conley’s finding that police did not act with intent to commit a crime. Although ordinary citizens responsible for unintended deaths are often charged and convicted of manslaughter, a different standard applies to police acting in the line of duty. But we cannot accept his failure to condemn in strong, forceful, and unequivocal language the reckless disregard for public safety that the BPD displayed that night. And we still wait for Mayor Thomas Menino to do the same.

We will not, however, hold our breath.

It is true that the crowd that night had become unruly and dangerous, but the rule of law, public safety, and private property are neither preserved nor protected by killing an innocent bystander.

But it is a pathetic commentary on our political culture that neither the mayor nor the district attorney has had the guts to say what needs to be said in bold and unequivocal language. Indeed, public officials of all stripes live in fear of the Boston police union, and not even the senseless death of an innocent bystander will shake them out of their cowardly stupor.

In a model of clinical institutional understatement that fails to register shock, let along outrage, or grasp the larger significance of the events of that night, the DA concluded: "The officers’ actions were the result of an inadequate operational plan devised by commanders."

What responsibility does Police Commissioner Kathleen O’Toole bear for the events of that night? She appointed the officers in charge. Did she choose the right ones? Or did she merely pick the best available from a sorry lot? Whatever the answers, her department’s performance was unacceptable.

And how about O’Toole’s boss, the mayor? Does he realize that either his top cop failed, or she was failed by a department that favors inadequate commanders?

Just as disappointingly, the DA did not address the apparent obstruction of justice, suggested by the inquiry led by former US Attorney Donald Stern, that began immediately after Snelgrove’s death. Right after Snelgrove was shot in the face by a pellet gun, people around her waved over Deputy Superintendent Robert O’Toole (no relation to the superintendent). Snelgrove was on her back, bleeding from her eye, and motionless. Police practice requires that specific procedures be implemented immediately following a civilian shooting. A crime scene should be established at once; instead, O’Toole made no attempt to secure the area to protect evidence. All officers’ weapons should be secured as evidence; instead, the officers quickly returned their pellet guns, FN303s, to the equipment truck, where they were reloaded and stored, making it impossible to determine which were fired and who handled which weapon. In addition, information about other injuries caused by the FN303s before Snelgrove was shot were not reported to the Unified Command Center as required.

The Stern report says, "Police claim to have not immediately understood that Ms. Snelgrove was injured by a projectile discharged by police," and thus did not realize they should have secured the scene and the weapons. The Stern report does not discuss the believability of this claim. Given the fact that police had just fired dozens of rounds in the area, and there were no weapons other than bottles seen in the hands of anyone else on the street, it seems dubious at best.

The Stern report also suggests that three officers involved in the shooting gave investigators false versions of their actions. Robert O’Toole claimed that he used his FN303 in a disciplined fashion on Lansdowne Street, firing twice at specific individuals, while the commission found that O’Toole fired repeatedly from the hip, without using the gun’s sights, "like a spray and pray type of thing" in the words of one witness. Officer Milien, who fired the fatal shot, told investigators that he sighted his weapon before firing, and that he never fired in the Snelgrove’s general direction. The commission found both claims contradicted by video and witnesses.

Meanwhile, the superintendent of internal affairs, who has yet to issue his own report, has told the press that two other, unnamed officers lied to investigators.

None of this proves criminal conspiracy to obstruct justice, but it sure raises the question — and yet Conley did not say whether such charges were ever considered, or why they will not be brought.

The only way we can feel confident that the Snelgrove tragedy will not be repeated is by coming clean — completely — with what went so wrong that night and holding those involved fully accountable.