Tucson's police chief thought the Nov. 29 killing by an officer was so egregious that he started firing the officer the next day.ย
Considering criminal charges is taking a lot longer.ย
As of Sunday, it's six months since Officer Ryan Remington shot Richard Richards in the electric scooter he was using, outside a Lowe's on the southwest side. It was a shocking incident in which the officer fired at Richards nine times from the back as Richards, 61, motored slowly toward the garden center entrance, carrying a knife and refusing to stop.
Video of the incident aroused anger around the country. Still there's been no announcement of a decision on whether the officer will face any criminal charges.ย
The delay has been frustrating enough that people have protested outside Pima County Attorney Laura Conover's office. But it's especially disappointing, even to some of her supporters, because this was one of the criminal-justice reform issues that Conover took a strong stand on during her campaign.
She committed to establishing an independent prosecutorial entity to review and prosecute police use-of-force cases. That hasn't happened yet, though she has tried.
The longstanding concern is that prosecutors have too close a relationship with the police they work with daily to also be able to decide fairly whether police officer deserve to be prosecuted when they commit a possible crime.ย
The connections are even closer in Conover's case.
Conover is the sister of TPD Sgt. Jason Winsky, who is a leader of the Tucson Police Officer's Association.ย
The family relationship brings up a potential conflict of interest in any case involving a TPD officer, especially TPOA members like Remington.ย
Her office says she and her brother have a "screen" in place. Conover's spokesman, C.T. Revere, said in an email:ย
"They do not discuss the facts of these cases and would always be ready to testify to that under oath. A screen like this is effective, as evidenced by the fact that Winsky recused himself off the TPOA endorsement process in 2020, and TPOA then endorsed Conoverโs opponent and gave the campaign one of his more sizable donations."
A former Pima County prosecutor who has become Conover's nemesis, filing repeated public records requests and criticizing her performance, said that's not nearly enough.ย
"TPOA funds the defense of the officers and is supportive of their position," said David Berkman, who was chief criminal deputy in the office under the previous administration. "Conover's brother is an officer of that organization, and the only appropriate action by the county attorney would be to send the case to another agency."
Potential for reforms
But it's not just the police cases that have consternated some of Conover's one-time supporters. Conover is one of a wave of criminal justice reformers elected to prosecutors' jobs across the country in recent years.ย
Some say she hasn't done enough on other, standard reform issues such as eliminating cash bail. Conover, has, though, followed through on other promises for criminal justice reform, such as no longer pursuing the death penalty in any cases and prosecuting children only in juvenile court, unless the law requires an adult prosecution.ย
Most prominent supporters I've contacted who are disappointed with how things have gone are local lawyers who fear criticizing Conover openly.
Former Pima County Public Defender Joel Feinman, a strong supporter of Conover's campaign, would only say that the office gives her the power to follow through on her promises.
"The Pima County Attorney is the most powerful position south of the Gila River," said Feinman, on the phone from British Columbia where he recently moved. "It is a position unlike any other. You donโt have to get approval from the Legislature or the U.S. Congress to change criminal justice policies. You can change criminal justice policies with a pen or an email."
But some activists are more direct, saying they've lost faith.ย
"The community had an appetite for what she was promising," said Lola N'Sangou, executive director of the activist group Mass Liberation. "The problem is she hasnโt delivered on what she was promising."
N'Sangou, whose group supported Conover's campaign, shared a 10-point platform that Mass Liberation asked Conover to sign onto while she was campaigning. Conover did. It includes items such as "Stop punishing poverty: Instruct prosecutors not to seek cash bail as a way of inflicting pre-trial punishment and/or coercing a plea."
The group also met monthly with Conover after she took office until getting frustrated at what they considered Conover's lack of progress.
'Looking for a unicorn'
While the bail issue was perhaps N'Sangou's top critique, she was specifically unhappy that no independent prosecutorial unit had been established to hold police and corrections officers accountable.
In an interview Friday, Conover said she has tried to hire a prosecutor, investigator and legal assistant, but has been unable to so far. Her office advertised the prosecutor's job last year and interviewed a candidate, she said, but that didn't work out.ย
"Hiring for this position in COVID has been like looking for a unicorn," Conover said. "We came close last summer."
As to the activists, Conover said, "When we talk to an organization that is seeking abolition of prisons and the police, a prosecutor is always going to disappoint."
"I can sleep at night knowing that I didnโt get it all done in the first year, but thatโs not OK with a lot of people."
At the same time Conover was seeking to form an independent prosecution unit to review police use-of-force cases, local agencies banded together to form a separate unit to investigate shootings by police and other use-of-force cases. The Pima Regional Critical Incident Team, made up of officers from nine agencies, intends to remove perceived conflicts of interest when police agencies investigate their own officers.
In the Remington case, Conover has taken it to outside attorneys for review -- longtime Maricopa County prosecutor Don Conrad and former Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley. But she will ultimately make the charging decision.ย
Conover's commitment to independent reviews of police cases was tested from the first month she entered office. Pima County Sheriff's Department Deputy Gilbert Caudillo shot and killed 19-year-old Bradley Lewis, whom deputies had pulled over and suspected in another crime. The object the officer thought was a weapon in Lewis' hand turned out to be a key fob.ย
Initially, veteran prosecutor Rick Unklesbay was given the task of reviewing the shooting, and determined charges should not be filed. Unhappy with Unklesbay's review, and how it was presented to the sheriff's department and public, Conover ordered a second review. That also concluded no charges were warranted.ย
Substantial likelihood of conviction
In a more recent case, the office reviewed an incident in which off-duty TPD officer Robert Szelewski took two women to the ground in the parking lot of the Culinary Dropout restaurant on East Grant Road.ย
It was Chief Criminal Deputy Dan South who announced no criminal charges were warranted, because one of the women had walked aggressively toward Szelewski before he took her down.ย
Echoing a phrase often used when prosecutors decline to press charges against police, South said in a letter โThe facts do not support a substantial likelihood of conviction at trial."
South, by the way, has announced he is joining the many departures from the office since Conover took over. In a May 2 letter, he said he would leave on July 8.ย
Conover was new to political office when she won the race for Pima County Attorney in 2020. She was also a career defense attorney, not a prosecutor. Rep. Raรบl Grijalva, a supporter of her candidacy, said that there are some things that even a reformer can't change about a prosecutor's office.
"Reality bites," he said. "You're a prosecutor. You can't get away from that."
But within that role there is a lot you can do โ and establishing truly independent, no-conflict-of-interest reviews of police shootings seems like one of those things.ย
