City Council calls on Suffolk sheriff to change policies for officers involved in fatal incidents

The Boston City Council overwhelmingly adopted a resolution Wednesday calling on the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department to change its administrative leave standards following the death of an inmate in the department’s custody. The resolution pushed for changes that would require officers involved in incidents where inmates die and there is a use of force to be automatically placed on leave. 

The move marks a change from April, when the council rejected a resolution calling on the sheriff’s department to place the staff involved in the incident on leave. 

The inmate, 32-year-old Shacoby Kenny, died last December following an altercation with corrections officers. Surveillance video obtained by the The Boston Globe appears to show Kenny confronting an officer before running through a common area in the jail. He was eventually surrounded by officers near a stairwell. Witnesses told the Globe that officers punched Kenny, kneed him in the ribs, and kneeled on his neck while he was on the ground. 

The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner announced last month that Kenny’s death had been ruled a homicide. Kenny died from “hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy due to resuscitated cardiac arrest during physical restraint by correction officers,” the office said. Hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy means that Kenny’s brain did not receive enough oxygen and blood. 

The Medical Examiner’s finding does not determine criminal liability. The “homicide” determination simply means that Kenny’s death was caused by another person. Attorney General Andrea Campbell’s office is investigating, but has not yet filed any criminal charges. 

In April, Councilor Miniard Culpepper introduced a resolution calling for the “temporary suspension” of the staff involved in Kenny’s death. Six councilors voted in favor of the resolution, just short of the threshold needed for adoption. 

At the time, multiple councilors voiced concerns that the resolution could run afoul of the Boston City Charter, which prohibits the council from “directly or indirectly” taking part in the appointment or removal of a city or county employee. However, the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department is actually an independent state agency, Culpepper said this week as he introduced his new resolution.

The council did previously pass a separate resolution calling for an independent investigation into Kenny’s death. 

The sheriff’s department has said that all officers involved in Kenny’s death have been reassigned to posts that do not directly interact with detainees pending the outcome of the investigation, according to Culpepper’s resolution. But, in a letter sent last week to Sheriff Mark Lawhorne, Culpepper said that officials have not provided details about when the reassignments took place, how many officers were reassigned, and whether any officers involved in the incident remained in positions that interacted with detainees following Kenny’s death. 

Culpepper requested a meeting with Lawhorne and the general counsel of the sheriff’s department to further discuss their response to Kenny’s death. The council is expected to hold a hearing on the matter in September. 

A spokesperson for the sheriff’s department did not return a request for comment Thursday. 

The resolution passed Wednesday urges the sheriff’s department to “take action to place on administrative leave all correctional personnel directly involved in the physical restraint and use of force against Mr. Kenny.”

It advocates for correctional institutions to adopt administrative leave standards that trigger formal reviews after incidents like the death of Kenny and the “immediate removal of directly involved personnel from regular detainee-contact assignments.” 

The resolution directly calls on the sheriff’s department to “adopt and apply critical-incident administrative leave standards following in-custody deaths involving use of force.”

“Such standards should help ensure that investigations proceed with the highest level of integrity, protect incarcerated witnesses and other detainees, preserve public confidence, and respect the due process rights of employees,” Culpepper said at the Wednesday meeting. 

Councilor Julia Mejia, who co-sponsored the resolution, acknowledged that the council does not have the power to conduct thorough oversight of the sheriff’s department. But resolutions like this one have an important role to play in “applying public pressure,” she said.  

“When we think about our incarcerated loved ones, they are our care and custody,” Mejia said. “I think it’s really important to uplift the ‘care’ piece of it. I think that we have an opportunity here to set the bar higher in the accountability factor.”

The resolution ultimately passed with 11 votes in the affirmative and one “present” vote, cast by Councilor Sharon Durkan, who again cited concerns about the measure violating the city charter.