Mount Vernon police whistleblower Murashea Bovell demanded Westchester County District Attorney Anthony Scarpino recuse himself from the ongoing investigation into allegations of rampant corruption in his police department.
“Here we are, we have officers engaged in criminal activity and nothing is being done,” Bovell said on Friday, standing on the steps of the Westchester County Courthouse. “And these are the same officers I gotta call for backup. Anything can happen.”
Last February, Bovell, an officer with the Mount Vernon Police Department since 2007, provided Scarpino’s office with hours of recordings of several of his fellow officers describing numerous incidents of corruption, brutality, and false arrests. But for months, the DA’s office continued to quietly prosecute residents, accused by officers implicated in the tapes, while seeming to do little to probe the allegations. The recordings became public in June when Gothamist/WNYC published its first in a series of investigations examining the allegations.
“He needs to recuse himself because for two years, he’s known about the corruption that’s been going on and he’s done nothing,” said Joseph Murray, Bovell’s attorney at the press conference. Murray wants Kathie Davidson, an administrative judge for New York's 9th Judicial District, to install a special district attorney to take over the probe.
"The allegations that District Attorney Scarpino and this Office are not conducting a full and thorough investigation are false,” said Helen Jonsen, a spokeswoman for the DA’s office. “This Office continues to investigate but will not jeopardize the work by commenting publicly on the substance of the investigation."
Prosecutors have thus far not brought against the officers accused of misconduct in the tapes. Earlier this month, in response to a Gothamist/WNYC investigation into brutality allegations, the Mount Vernon Police Department put one of its detectives on desk duty and announced that several of its officers were under active investigation.
In a statement, Lucian Chalfen, a spokesman for the Office of Court Administration, said, “Any applications made to the Court regarding the appointment of a special prosecutor will be handled in due course as all similar matters are considered.”
Incumbent Westchester District Attorney Scarpino’s term will conclude this year. In June, DA Scarpino lost the Democratic primary race to Mimi Rocah, a former federal prosecutor, who hammered him repeatedly for his alleged inaction following Gothamist/WNYC’s initial stories on the Mount Vernon police tapes. Rocah is now running effectively unopposed in the November general election and has promised to probe the allegations within her first hundred days in office.
