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Virginia Beach — The majority of the Virginia Beach council supported an effort Tuesday create a task force that will review the impacts of extending investigative powers to a citizens board that reviews complaints against police.
Just hours after a jury in Minneapolis convicted a police officer in the murder of George Floyd, the Virginia Beach council approved creating an 11-member task force that would study citizen review panels. The council voted 6-5.
Council members Sabrina Wooten, Aaron Rouse, Guy Tower, Louis Jones, Jessica Abbott and John Moss supported the task force, while Mayor Bobby Dyer, Vice Mayor Jim Wood, and council members Barbara Henley, Michael Berlucchi and Rosemary Wilson voted no.
The majority of the speakers urged the council to support the effort, put on the agenda by Wooten. She has advocated for reforms to the review panel to improve transparency, accountability and trust.
This was a step forward for the community, especially Black residents, who have been frustrated by the council’s opposition to form a truly independent review board to evaluate allegations of police misconduct without police involved. But it may not provide the outcome activists are seeking.
During a March council retreat, six of 11 council members said they were not in favor of extending subpoena and investigative powers to the city’s citizens review board — called the Investigation Review Panel. Several council members reiterated on Tuesday they do not think the oversight group should have the power to conduct independent investigations.
The review panel, a five-member advisory board, was created in 1991 to evaluate the outcomes of Police Department Internal Affairs investigations involving accusations of police misconduct or abuse of authority. Wooten said the Investigation Review Panel is ineffective because it has no power to investigate independently of the Police Department.
On July 1, a new law will allow cities to create law enforcement civilian oversight panels to independently investigate complaints by civilians.
The council already has received recommendations on ways to improve the city’s existing citizens review board from the mayor’s African American Roundtable and the Human Rights Commission, but the groups didn’t agree on what to do.
The mayoral African American Roundtable recommended subpoena powers, audit powers, allowing the board to investigate any cases it wishes, allowing cases with pending legal proceedings to be heard and increasing diversity of the membership of the board. The Human Rights Commission did not recommend subpoena or investigative powers.
Several speakers at the council meeting mentioned the recent killing of 25-year-old Donovon Lynch by a police officer at the Oceanfront as one case that should be investigated by an independent citizens group.
Despite pressure from the community, the city has not identified the officer who shot Lynch or addressed allegations from the family’s attorney that police shot a second person in the hand. The officer was wearing a body camera but it was not turned on during the shooting, and police said no other video cameras captured the incident. The officer involved told the Police Department Lynch was brandishing a gun, but his family does not believe that is true and said that has damaged his character.
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“We the citizens must get answers that have gone unanswered for far too long,” Gary McCollum, an African American activist and minister, told the council. “... We the citizens must take immediate steps to restore trust in our police — that begins with creation of citizens review board with full investigatory and subpoena power.”
Kate Loring, 74, of Virginia Beach, also urged a strengthening of the review panel.
“If I were Black or had a Black child, or spouse or loved one right now, I would simultaneously terrified, enraged and exhausted all the time and I would be very wary of the police,” Loring said.
The task force members will be appointed by the council later and will be expected to report back to the council by June 1 with its findings.
The initiative approved by the council instructed the task force to study five topics:
- The difference between investigatory power and subpoena power, and whether investigatory power can be utilized without subpoena power
- The purpose and designation of a budget for the citizens review panel
- The impact of a citizens review panel on the Police Department
- Identifying the best model that the City of Virginia Beach should adopt
- Any other pertinent topics regarding the development of the citizens review panel
The council also voted to provide $1.87 million for more security cameras, lighting and a gunshot detection system at the Oceanfront to improve safety after a string of shootings.
Alissa Skelton, 757-995-9043, alissa.skelton@pilotonline.com