Transcription
Sure that it never happens again. When someone enters police custody, they deserve the dignity, respect, and safety that any of us would want for any family member of ours. And when Randy Cox was arrested, he entered a police van able to walk, and now he is not able to walk. We need to ensure that this never, ever happens again.
From day one, we've been committed to transparency and accountability in action. As you all know, within 24 hours, we notified the public of the incident. Within 48, we had shared the videos with the press and the public as well. We alerted the appropriate State authorities, and they took action. We fully cooperated with the State's Attorney's criminal investigation into the matter and cooperated with their eventual decision to bring criminal charges against the five officers.
We've issued a comprehensive set of new departmental policies, including around prisoner transport, including around the requirement to ask if individuals in police custody require medical support, including additional training, which the entire police department has received at this point, both in duty to intervene and active bystander training. And, uh, today is yet another important, uh, moment in this process of accountability and action. Uh, as you know, the criminal investigation, once it was completed, we immediately initiated the internal affairs investigation. The internal affairs investigation is run by the police department, and the integrity of that internal affairs investigation is very important. It's important to me, and it's important to Chief Jacobson. There should be no outside influence into that process from me or anyone else.
Some have been asking why we are doing separate press events, and I want to make clear that while I support and stand by the chief, ultimately, as required, this is his decision and recommendation to the police commission. The next steps here are that the police commission will review and assess the chief's recommendations and ultimately make the final decision on the actions that are necessary for discipline, whether to accept the chief's recommendation, they also have the power to ultimately alter it or, uh, or reject it.
And I, I want to just finish by, um, by expressing my, uh, my deepest condolences to, uh, Miss Doreen and, uh, and Randy and your family. I, I can't imagine the challenges that you have, uh, experienced over, um, these past many, many months. And I know, uh, that because I've heard this from you and, uh, from Randy's sisters, that you want to ensure that justice occurs and occurs expeditiously. Um, and I know that you, I believe you share with me, uh, the urgency and oftentimes the frustration that these processes take longer than any of us would like. Um, but, uh, I, I'm, I'm grateful that you have continued to hold us to a high standard. And, uh, my deepest condolences to you for the struggles that you and Randy have in your family have experienced. Um, I can take any questions that folks have.
The federal, you're talking about the civil case. Uh, so, uh, we had one settlement conference where, uh, the parties were involved and the judge was involved. Uh, the discovery process has ensued now. It is very important, and the judge was very explicit to the parties in the settlement conference that the, uh, the, the conversations in the settlement are kept confidential. Uh, and so I can't share any details about the, the conference, the conference itself. But we stand ready and willing to continue to engage with the other attorneys representing Randy and his family as his process ensues.
Process. I don't, it, these things, it's a complex case. These things take quite a long time. The insurance companies have been monitoring the lawsuit, but there have not been, at this point, to the best of my knowledge, any further conversations with them. The parties are now engaged in the discovery process, which will go out according to the schedule that was filed by the parties back in, I think, December. The process goes until October or thereabouts of 2024. So it is a long process. Though it's a complicated case, there'll be lots of witnesses, expert witnesses, depositions, so it'll be a long process for the discovery. And as, as you'll recall, both parties have agreed to that schedule on paper, as to how this, these discussions of settlement discussions and discovery in the case will, uh, will move forward. That's until October 2024. Yes.
Discovery. I'm sorry. Discovery until, until October. And I believe the trial date is, just as of now, is December 15, 2024. That's correct. And, and to, but to be clear, that throughout this entire time, uh, in any case, uh, both parties can, uh, come to a voluntary settlement if we come to, if we arrive at the same place, right? And so, uh, that is the timeline that both parties have agreed upon. My hope is that we don't have to get to trial on this, and I think we've all been explicit about that goal.
When you look back on, you know, how everything is sort of transpired over the last few months, um, and I asked this question particularly in the wake of, you know, the Tyree Nichols. I know, um, uh, some kind of a statement are, but, uh, you know, State Attorney, you know, Jack Doyle took six months, I think, to bring criminal charges against officers in that incident, and it's been another, since nine months in total now that we're getting now just the recommendation of the fires. I mean, I know you don't have your separate from those respective processes, but when you look at the timeline, knowing that other places have set a precedent, bankrupt, who's involved in this has said, I mean, what do you sort of, what comes to mind? How do you? Yeah, I mean, I, I can't speak to Memphis. Uh, I would presume that they have quite different, uh, rules, a quite a different contract, uh, with, presuming they have a police union, I don't know. Um, but we, uh, we've been, uh, moving through this process, process, I believe, as fast as we can in a way that is responsible. Obviously, we don't have any control over the State's Attorney side of things, as you acknowledge. But the internal affairs investigation, I mean, if you look at the, uh, the internal affairs, and if you haven't already received it, I know that the police department's working to provide that to you, it is a very, very thorough document. We're required, uh, through the contract that we have with the union, uh, to follow certain steps to provide due process to the officers, and we also need to make sure that in the end, this case is a good one, that it will stand up in court if it needs to get to that point. So while I think we all share the emotion, or I'll speak with myself, I, I find it frustrating that these things take longer than any of us would like, than I would like, but we have to do it in the right way and ensure that at the end of the day, we have the right result.
In different states that are completely different, but I just think just the notion of when you factor in the video, you know, all ethnic, you and the chief have been very clear on record on how, you know, how the, how the video affected you all and how you want, what you saw and how you felt about that. So I guess I wonder when you factor in the fact that there is video that has documented pretty much a lot of you, we've even seen video of how fast that value is going to think eight miles over the speed limit. Does that, does that change anything about the timeline? I mean, I just, I, I can't, I'm back.
That part of the video. I, I hear your frustration. I hear your frustration. Uh, the officers are required to have due process as a part of the contracts, and we needed to see this process through. And, uh, in every moment where we had control over things as a city, uh, I can say that we did things as fast as possible, and that's everything from releasing the videos to implementing policy changes to implementing training, and now working through the internal affairs investigation. And then lastly, I asked you, uh, is Chief Jameson alerted us earlier too, that the vans in this particular scenario are except when it comes to court transportation? I mean, what did I wonder if this incident? So my understanding is that all the vans that, uh, would be used in the case where there needs to be a transport of many individuals have been equipped with seat belts now. So it's very different than before when they did not have seat belts. Um, but only in the circumstance where there's, uh, multiple individuals that need to be transported would we use those vans, and again, they have seat belts now.
Yeah, I stand by the chief. I pointed the chief. I've seen the videos like everyone else here, and what, what happened was totally unacceptable. And so I stand by the chief in his decision. Any other questions? Okay, thank you, everybody. Yes.