Spitzer Running Mate Ends Effort To Require Police To Use Minimum Force

ALBANY – A Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor, David Paterson, has dropped his bill that would have required police officers to use minimum force necessary against suspects – a bill that arose from the fatal shooting of Amadou Diallo in 1999.Last week his running mate, a Democratic candidate for governor, Eliot Spitzer, opposed the measure. A Republican candidate for governor, William Weld, a federal prosecutor from 1981-88, said Mr. Paterson’s bill was a prescription for dead police officers.“The Spitzer ticket is displaying not only an element of indecisiveness, but also a lack of good judgment,” Mr. Weld’s spokeswoman, Andrea Tantaros, said. “Senator Paterson’s bill showed us he second-guessed New York’s cops. Now we see he actually second-guesses himself,” Ms. Tantaros said yesterday.Mr. Paterson issued a statement yesterday that he changed his mind on the proposal after meeting with the executive director of the New York State Association of Chiefs of Police.“I’m thankful to have received this input today,” Mr. Paterson, the Senate’s Democratic leader, said. “We have to rely on the expertise of the skilled professionals to improve our proposals and make them as effective as possible.”Mr. Paterson said he hadn’t received that input in the five years since he first introduced the bill.Mr. Spitzer is the state’s two-term attorney general and has proposed several measures to aid police. He wouldn’t comment on Mr. Paterson’s decision.The bill would have prohibited police from “using excessive force either defensively or in furtherance of making an arrest or preventing an escape.” Police, for example, would have to try to stop some suspects by shooting them in the arms or legs, rather than the chest. Any police found violating the measure, had it been passed, could have faced a crime of second-degree manslaughter.Mr. Paterson, who is black, introduced the bill after Diallo, an unarmed West African immigrant, was shot 19 times in the Bronx by four police officers who, while searching for a suspect, said Diallo moved and appeared to reach for a weapon. The officers, who shot their weapons 41 times, were acquitted of all criminal charges in the racially charged case.“I think most people felt the police officers had acted inappropriately and I wanted to try to ensure that such a tragedy would never happen again,” Mr. Paterson said.“While that is still my goal, I realize on reflection that this bill was not the best way to pursue it.”Mr. Paterson, aside from his remarks in his prepared statement, would not comment further on his decision.“The mark of a thoughtful leader is the ability to learn from experience and the attorney general supports the minority leader’s decision,” a campaign spokesman, Ryan Toohey, said. “Another part of being a leader is being a good listener.”One of the co-sponsors of Mr. Paterson’s bill, a state senator, Rubin Diaz Sr. of the Bronx, said there is still a need for the bill, but he doesn’t question Mr. Paterson’s decision. “He’s his own man,” Mr. Diaz said. “He’s the leader.”

Spitzer Running Mate Ends Effort To Require Police To Use Minimum Force

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