Harp: Fighting Wrongful Imprisonment Suit Could Have Cost $18M

It could have been worse — an $18 million bill rather than a $9.5 million bill to compensate a man for the 18 years he spent locked up on charges fabricated by a crooked New Haven police detective.

So Mayor Toni Harp said about the news that the city has settled a lawsuit with former inmate Scott Lewis for $9.5 million. Which means New Haven will now go $9.5 million into debt to pay off the bill.

“It’s a lot. It could have been more though,” Harp said on the WNHH radio show ​“Mayor Monday.” ​“The judge could have decided that a million dollars a year is reasonable for the 18 years [Lewis] spent in jail. That has happened in the past.

“We felt we had to do it [settle]. When officers do something like that, and it impacts someone’s life, the judicial system is going to exact a price. It’s unfortunate. And we’re paying for it.”

Lewis was one of two men convicted of having committed a 1990 double murder in the Hill of former Alderman Ricardo Turner and his lover. An FBI investigation soon revealed that a detective named Vincent Raucci was heavily involved in New Haven’s cocaine trade and allegedly set up Turner based on fake evidence. It took more than a decade for Lewis to be freed from jail, and only after state and then federal appeals prepared with the help of pro bono attorneys and law students. Lewis was finally freed from jail in 2014. (Click here, here and here to read prior stories about his case. Click here for a detailed account of the FBI revelations and the specifics of this case, from a 1998 exposé in the now-defunct New Haven Advocate. And click here to read the full FBI report, which covered wide ground about New Haven’s drug trade.)

Lewis subsequently filed a federal suit against the city. After the judge, Stefan Underhill, denied a city request to dismiss the case, city lawyers negotiated the $9.5 million settlement. This week the Board of Alders received a Harp administration request to bond for the $9.5 million. (The settlement was first reported by the New Haven Register’s Mary O’Leary.)

Harp was asked on the radio program what the city is doing to prevent such expensive lawsuits in the future. She said — and Police Chief Anthony Campbell subsequently confirmed — that the department had hired a consultant to help screeners notice police applicants who could turn into rogue officers. ​“We’ve got to find ways to identify these people and root them out,” Harp said. She also said that the department’s ​“command structure” must ​“assure that all of the officers … are honest. If they’re not, we’ve got to help them find another form of employment. It’s that simple.”

Scott Lewis told the Independent that on the advice of his lawyer he will not comment on the pending settlement until it’s finally approved.

Say It’s So, Joe

Also on the ​“Mayor Monday” episode:

• Harp supported Bridgeport Mayor Joe Ganim’s bid to participate in the public-financing system for his 2018 run for governor.

Because Ganim spent seven years in prison for taking bribes and kickbacks (in his previous term as mayor; he won the seat again after leaving prison), he does not qualify for the system under the current rules. So he decided to file a federal lawsuit in an effort to strike down that part of the system, the Citizens Election Program, as unconstitutional.

“I would argue that if he’s a politician and he meets all the qualifications, why would you use that to hold against his actually participating in something that would be a clean way — and difficult, by the way — of raising money for a statewide campaign? I think we do it all the time,” giving people a second chance to participate in society after completing criminal sentences.

Harp equated Ganim’s bid to use public financing to ex-cons’ bids to regain voting rights.

She was asked about the special argument made in this case, that a politician who has abused the public trust shouldn’t get the special privilege of receiving taxpayer money to regain elected office. ​“That’s a decision that the legislature should make, and not a body that is not elected. And it should be debated,” Harp argued.

• In the wake of another homeless encampment appearing on the east side of town, Harp said, she has asked her community services chief to explore the underlying causes. The city earlier this year ordered a similar camp disassembled.

Harp said she has learned that part of the reason the camps pop up is that addicts from elsewhere in Connecticut come to New Haven for its plentiful methadone programs, some of which, unlike programs in other communities will provide the antidote even if a user has dirty urine. Addicts are coming here from as far as Willimantic, she said.

She also criticized state rules that have hindered the opening of clinics in towns that don’t have them.

• Unlike some other Connecticut municipalities, New Haven will not consider delaying the start of school, even if the state legislature fails to pass a new (overdue) budget this month, Harp said. A listener asked if any teacher layoffs loom if New Haven ends up millions of dollars short of promised state cash. ​“We will absolutely not do that unless the teachers are not teaching in the classroom and are funded by a grant that has been terminated,” Harp said.

Harp said her finance team has directed all departments, including the schools, ​“that any of the contracts that we have out there that we don’t have to negotiate right now and are not needed to start school or any of the work we have to start on — we are going to slow-walk the contracting process, hoping they will have a budget” soon. The city’s good for cash through Sept. 30, she said. If the state somehow still doesn’t have a budget at that point, she said, ​“we’re going to have a cash problem in this city.” The city could be as much as $60 million short at that point, she said.

Click on or download the above audio file to hear the full episode of ​“Mayor Monday” on WNHH radio. Click here to watch a Facebook Live video of the program.

This episode of ​“Mayor Monday” was made possible with the support of Gateway Community College and Berchem, Moses & Devlin, P.C.