Saturday, June 19, 2010

InsolvenCity Taxpayers Confront Huge Bill As Their Boy Mayor Plays With New Set Of Puppets

Unless Luke Ravenstahl is able to fire Vic Walczak as legal director of the ACLU -- and he and mouthpiece Joanna Doven are sufficiently short on judgment and character that one can envision them making such an announcement -- it is difficult to believe the placement of five new marionettes at the Citizen Police Review Board is going to accomplish much.

One could catalog the specific reasons this maneuver is unlikely to shield the mayor -- or the InsolvenCity residents who elected him -- from accountabilty for the police brutality associated with the G20 event, but this segment of the Post-Gazette's report is sufficient to illustrate why the payout is likely to be measured in millions:
But Judge Wettick ignored that comment and instead repeatedly asked Mr. Krepps why the documents -- which generally contain public information like the name, date and date of birth of the subject -- were so heavily edited.

"Why would you redact something and then say you can't explain why it was redacted?" the judge asked.

Mr. Krepps said he was not prepared to address that.
Judge Wettick set argument on the contempt issue for Aug. 26.
Ravenstahl could appoint a dozen new CPRB members (or maybe he could not), or even disband the CPRB, and Stephen Zappala could ignore his duties for a decade, yet they still wouldn't slow (let alone stop) Vic Walczak and his co-counsel. This one seems destined to resemble the Sol Gross case, the Robert Swartzwelder case, and the Jordan Miles case, rolled into one fat payday for plaintiffs.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Infy - these are civil rights lawsuits that will inevitably come.

Nothing will shield the taxpayers from that if the City is found guilty.

Maria said...

Photo of The Puppet Master in action here

PK said...

Lukey's machinations are beginning to read like a Shakespeare farce.

Actually, that would be an insult to the Bard.

Infinonymous said...

Infy - these are civil rights lawsuits that will inevitably come.
Nothing will shield the taxpayers from that if the City is found guilty


Agreed. The courtroom antics with Chief Wiggum -- er, Harper and the CPRB shenanigans are impotent (but telling) gestures.