##VIDEO ID:NsubNLx0Da8## please join me for a moment of silence please now join me for the plge of Allegiance I Ali to the flag of the United States of America stand one nation so we're going to proceed with uh public participation and we have one person that have signed up for public participation H Mali uh please uh refer to this Council as a whole not to any not not to any individual counselors you have two and a half minute to speak at the two minute rule at the two minute mark You're going to hear a bip indicating that you still have 30 seconds homay Mal 53 Chester Street good evening honorable me members in this historical meeting with the citizen are united to support Lawrence police officers Union Lawrence Police this Union of Pride and honor with the impecable leadership by honorable Chief Bonia doing excellent job to protect our citizen Lawrence is a safe City because of our best police officers our journey to have a permanent leadership for our awesome Lawrence Police Department is the Journey full of a struggle and obstacle but we the Laurentian are united and strong to overcome these Police Department we are proud of your hard work We Stand United to to say blue Liv is matter the best example of protect and serve protecting us in this great nation when the blue lives matter we the Laurentian overcome this obstacle in attaining the goal of hiring a permanent leader for Lawrence Police Department we the citizen are united to support this champion of the first responder in the nation tonight in this historical meeting with the lenan is stand up United and strong to say blue lives matter Lawrence police officers thank you for excellent job thank you for making Lawrence a safe City we are proud of you right this name is going to be submitted for the record and we're going to um proceed with the item that we have uh on the old business um like we table this item so we have this item table and I'm going to entertain a motion to table table there's a motion to on table item 28 uh 25 properly second all please say I I any name there's nobody on soon so the motion carries so item 2825 which is the review and discussions of the October 2024 uh 2024 Benet report uh now including uh and related investigation which include uh the second report which is the Maverick report we uh we are um very pleased to have every uh a couple of members from each organization that is here with us tonight uh thank you for accepting our invitation uh to come over to discuss uh this with us and uh to uh respond to a specific question that the council might have so at this time counselors we're going to proceed with that with that uh discussion that we previously have we since then we um we have received uh the second the second report uh for this investigation which is from the Maverick and uh the Maverick report uh during the same this during the same night of the meeting um this report uh was available in um media source uh for everybody to download perhaps and um and everybody downloaded uh there uh readit and then subsequently we we receive an an official um report from the uh from the from this the the administration the City attorney uh but passing that over uh to uh other conversations we are going to proceed with entertaining uh the venet report uh the the continuation of the discussion of the discussion of the vet report and uh also uh having uh the Maverick report which which is uh also important for us to include into this discussion so councelors at this time uh proceeding with a conversation that we previously have are going to entertain any particular questions that we have uh for for either one of the investigations Council thank you through I actually I have a a question for the City attorney first before we proceed uh with the two investigations report council president mentioned um the how that mer the mer uh mer report was released to a media Source an unredacted version of it uh you did sent out an email public email saying that you were that your office was going to investigate this where are we at with that investigation well I've not been authorized to do any investigation I I said it should be investigated I don't have the power to engage in investigation email says that you were going to conduct an investigation as to how that report was quote unquote um uh I understand that but I I cannot expend money just based on my own I have to be authorized money I inquired on my own about who or it got leaked I I found no information mayor's office I I questioned people up there um they have no one I got no information so anything beyond that I would have to expend money and expending money my office does not have the authority to do that to hire any agency or whatever but based on my U just just to give it a quick what the timeline was uh while I was here before you the and you know we've given kind of names for these reports I don't actually mean that's the names that's the name of the the company but the um the second report which was done by Maverick uh was in the mayor's office I did not have a copy I had not seen a copy I had not seen the document I believe it was being photocopied at that time um at the sometime after the end of our meeting um I believe the a um and again this is all heay I have no actual knowledge of any of this a thumb drive was dropped by uh Tom duin's um paper U Mr Dugen the next day or that night I don't know when published online a copy of the unredacted version um I learned about it first thing in the morning from the police department um obviously the police were quite upset and um were asking me how this happened I said I had no idea I immediately called Mr Dugen and sent him an email telling him that um he had published an unredacted version I asked him to remove it which he did um I then um got a copy of the report myself that morning and began redacting it once it was redacted I sent it out to all people that would have received the unredacted version but C vice president uh at this point what the city churn is telling us that we as a council can ask for an investigation on this so we you proceed with making a motion or essentially we would like to make a motion I'm looking for motion to uh order the City attorney for investigation to order the City attorney to investigate how this this report was leaked um during I was I'm going to say during a city council meeting second there's a sec there's a motion on the table probably second discussion on this mod discussion ccil I will not be supporting this motion I don't it is important I don't want to dismiss that the most important things that we should be discussing this evening should be what is the contents of the report report this building has been circling around focusing on these reports my fear as I represent the people that I represent is that there's so much Focus going on on this stuff that other things that are really important as well are not being dealt with and to add one more layer to this I don't think does are the people that we represent Justice that I think this is what the intention of this is and I don't want to diminish it so much but I do want to be pragmatic about this and I do want to look at what we want to get accomplished so I will not be supporting this this evening because tonight what I want to do is find out more about more about the allegations that I read I want to figure out what's happened with the Maverick report as it deals with the Bennett report and then I want to get to a place where I can go back to the people that I represent and said this is what we're hearing regarding the true substance of the matter thank no problem uh at this time if it is no discussion on the matter I will enter I will call them uh call the question any other any other question president do you have a question uh let's let's let's stay on the question and then we can proceed it's about okay coun inant thank you I understand this this whole thing is important which includes how this investigation got leaked prior to proper procedures um us not doing something about it sends a message that if there's anything else pertaining to allegations like retaliation against employees that it is okay for the city to just be irresponsible with documents like this and I'm telling you we are municipality so something like this may not be the first time that occurs within this city or any City so is that the message you you want to send to the public that it is okay to be irresponsible with documents and names of person personel that we should be protecting uh thank you councelor Vice presing at this point if it is know other the questions I'll going to call the call the questions all those in favor please say I for the investigation I I any nay Ro call please Council re that with you Council Rees yes Council mamos noted as absent councilor Santiago yes Council Del Rosario abstain Council Lon yes Council plant no council Levy yes Council vice president fonte yes Council Rodriguez I vote Yes motion carries so you have all the power now to investigate this matter and just just to be clear I I because there are as you know power in words I personally am not going to investigate this I understand I will hire someone to do it there is an inherent conflict with me investigating we understand something happens proceed proceed the proper way thank you so much all right no problem so now let's go to the contents of the report which is basically how we as of last time that we were here we discussed this and then now we have more information and and and proper information to be discussed so counselors when it comes to the report either or uh there is any questions for uh for the parties present here or the city attourney that is here or any question in general council president councelor M sorry Council L thank you council president I would like to add to um all the documents that we receive a letter from po uh that it was sent that I requested U earlier today um to our Madan chair and the letter was sent from post to our um attorney to the attorney the City attorney and also CC uh to melis uh Bon yeah and if I may Cil president can I ask the attorney to read this letter uh I will have the city clerk to read it for the record okay thank you counil president no problem there no it's it's going you're going to have it in a second it's not you don't have it yet but Madame cler do you mind reading the letter please I do this is a letter this is a letter dated February 4th it's um via email only from the post commission to attorney Timothy hooton and acting chief of police meix Bonia the reline is report of Maverick Investigation Services and the letter reads as follows attorney hooton and acting Chief Bonia I write on behalf of the post commission pen commission and Pen regarding a report prepared by Maverick Investigation Services pen Maverick and pen on behalf of the City of Lawrence a copy of which the post commission recently received from the city having conducted in an official an initial review of the Maverick report I wish to bring to your attention the commission's concern regarding one aspect of the report what Maverick describes as a quote significant procedural misstep allegedly committed by the supervisor of the Lawrence Police Department's internal investigations unit Lieutenant Paul Rossi in its report Maverick alleges that Lieutenant rousi violated the commission's regulations when he provided information to the commission about alleged misconduct by former provisional Police Chief William Castro Maverick Justified its findings by saying that Lieutenant rousi was quote not the head of the agency end quote his duty was not to was his duty was to report the complaint only to the Lawrence mayor Brian depa and it would have then been the responsibility of the mayor to report it to post end quote see Maverick report at Pages 28 and 29 Maverick then concludes that quote Rossi took it upon himself to ensure the memorandum was emailed to post and in doing so made a significant error which violates 55 CMR 1.03 on behalf of the commission I wish to inform you that the commission finds no factual or legal basis to support these findings on the contrary the information available to the commission supports a finding that Lieutenant Rossi Act acted properly and commendably when he reported information to the commission Maverick observes that Lieutenant Rossi was not quote the head of the agency that fact however is irrelevant while the quote head of the agency certainly has significant responsibilities to report complaints to the commission and to take care of those complaints are properly investigated no provision of any statute or regulation bars any other officer for making a good faith report to the Commission in fact m General Law chapter 6E Section 3 A5 provides that the commission may receive complaints from any source and there is no merit to Maverick's additional finding that Lieutenant Rossy somehow committed a quote significant error end quot in violation of 555 CMR 1.03 that provision pertains to the confidentiality of proceedings and the records of the commission's preliminary inquiries and Maverick's report does not explain how Lieutenant R's Act of reporting information compromised that confidence confidenti that confidentiality in any way finally Maverick's report in the nature of its allegations also raised a reasonable concern as to the potential retaliation against Lieutenant Rossi or any other officer who may have reported information to the commission or who might wish to do so in the future to be clear Massachusetts law specifically protects law enforcement officers who report information to the commission from retaliation by their public employer Mass General Law chapter 6E section 12 quote no officer or employee of the Commonwealth or any County City town or District shall discharge an officer or employee change their official rank grade or compensation deny a promotion or take any other adverse action against an officer or employee or threatened to take such action for providing information to the commission or testifying in a commission's proceedings the commission wishes to State most emphatically that it will take whatever steps are necessary to protect the ability of any law enforcement officer in the Commonwealth to make a good faith report to the commission freely and without fear of retaliation and the Commonwealth will forcefully act in response to any evidence of actual or threatened retaliation such action may include making referrals to the appropriate prosecutorial entities for the above reason the commission hereby informs you that it finds no basis to support a finding that Lieutenant Rossi violated the commission's regulations in any way way to the extent you or that City to the extent you or city officials May benefit from additional guidance on any aspect of the commission's reporting requirements we urge you to seek guidance from the commission directly given the nature of this correspondence we are providing a copy to Lieutenant Rossi very truly yours Matthew P Landry director div division of police standards and it's copy to Lieutenant Paul Rossi this uh this letter will be submitted for the record of these uh of this item um councilors any other questions in regard to this matter Council Council all with Mr hooton but I do want to ask Mr Moren who was here from Maverick to to come before the the microphone please through you good evening Rob Moren CEO co-founder Maverick Investigative Services I believe my business partner Ryan Saro has joined us by Zoom as well as Rob budrick from RCB and Associates has also joined us by Zoom yes they're here uh yes your address for the record well my address yes home address or business address business uh 26 Irma Road Salem New Hampshire okay um CC thank you so like I said earlier I want to get into the meats and potatoes of this of of the issue um help me understand why you were hired in May I address the post letter first since that's a fresh off because there's nowhere in my report where you will see that I said he didn't have the authority he claimed he was required to it's the head of the agency that's required to so we just need to clarify that so my my colleague here thank you for that I believe my colleague is going to challenge you on that and I'll give her the when she's got the time I'll let her do that um but I want to go back to my original question which is in your words why were you hired to do what what to do this report SL investigation Maverick was first hired to do a forensic extraction investigation on two city-owned devices a cell phone and a laptop the extraction U part of it uh was several text messages that without proper context uh could be viewed as something that's um there was collusion there was interference and basically required uh more in-depth investigation which was done through our subsequent investigation which was to entail whether there was any collusion or interference that would have compromised the investigation done by um Daniel B that again that last part again if there was any collusion that would have compromised the investigation by Daniel Bennett we were not tasked with nor did we reinvestigate what Mr Bennett did so were you were looking to add information to the Bennett report is that what and I'm going to use Bennett report I realized it's actually cices a different but for shorthand purposes we're going to call the benett report and we're going to call your report the MAV report for shorthand purposes so for the m so so so you're essentially adding more information to what Bennett apparently H that report did not have when the understanding was that the the initial investigation was for a policy violation Pursuit policy violation it then expanded to several other allegations so we were first we were also asked to determine how that happened how it expanded where that came from want to get to the conclusion which I have here and I'm going to read what I read in your report and then I'm going to because because what we're doing here is we're trying to figure out I'm trying to figure out why we have the mayor's office do an investigation then we have the Bennett investigation then we have the Maverick investigation and I'm thinking to myself there's a heck of a lot of Investigations going on here why can't we figure out what we're doing and we're spending we're spending some money to make this thing happen and spending time to make this thing happen it's time is going forward and we're not getting to a resolution meanwhile we are paying individuals who are administrative leave over $200,000 a year among and with with the current chief so there's money that's being taxpayers money that's being obligated because of the time so that the these investigations I'm just trying to figure out why you were here and you're telling me that because you had to add something to the Bennett investigation and you wanted to see if there was collusion and you wanted to you were being asked to kind of double check to make sure there wasn't that that investigation that Bennett had was thorough enough no okay say it again we were tasked with with first determining how the investigation expanded from the initial complaint about a policy violation and then if there was any collusion that would have somehow um interfered with Bennett's investigation and what were those findings there was no collusion there was no collusion and in your your conclusion I'll read however these issues you mentioned some issues some discrepancies and such and you went into some detail on that not to diminish it it's here we're not going to rehash every small detail I'm I'm not going to however these issues did not compromise the investigations the Bennett the Bennett investigations my words Integrity correct so you stand by that correct okay so that's what I need to hear from you thank you very much I would like to through you Mr President I like to ask secretary Bennett or someone from his staff to come forward please good evening Mr morning I want to thank I didn't thank you I want to thank you for being here this evening and I know the mayor released you from being here and we're I'm thankful that you're here and being able to provide some information same goes to you secretary Bennett thank you for your years of service uh in the police department I need to know more about you I've read the stuff inside this book I've heard it I think it's more powerful if I hear from you what you bring to the table with respect to the report with respect to your experience and why I should trust what you've written down in this report certainly uh 1985 I graduated from Harvard I then went to suff law school graduate Mr Mr Mr Bennett just just for the record uh can you stay your name and address for the record please yes uh Daniel Bennett d a n i e l b n n e t My office address is 15 Foster Street quinsey Massachusetts you might proceed thank you and I apologize no don't wor um after that I went to work for the middle sex District Attorney's office where I prosecuted uh cases in L at a certain point uh a prosecutor Paul mofin was shot and the suffk County District Attorney's Office were're looking for prosecutors who had prosecuted gang cases to come and do a joint investigations with the gang unit from the Boston Police Department um I got a job with the suffer County uh District Attorney's Office in their gang unit I prosecuted gang cases and did gang investigations in Boston say something then after that I went into private practice for eight years then I was hired as a senior trial counsel for uh the middle sex District Attorney's office where uh I was a senior advisor to Jerry Leone and as senior trial counsel most of uh I shouldn't say most of many of the important murder cases were cases that I did the investigations on and then tried in my career I've tried over 30 murder cases and done the investigations on them after uh I was at middle sex for four years Joe early called me up from Worcester County made me senior trial uh excuse me made me first assistant which is the number two person in wer County I went up there out there uh really managed the office for uh da early uh and continued to try murder cases in the first uh two years there I tried 11 murder cases that I investigated and tried and um continued there for four years uh then uh Governor Baker um I got a call from Governor Baker's office was I interested in applying to be the Secretary of Public Safety I met with Governor Baker um and then I was offered that job that job entails being in charge of the Mass police training commission which oversees all police in the state and how they are trained you oversee the Massachusetts State Police uh you oversee the Department of Corrections um you oversee uh parole uh the National Guard um and all of those uh a number of other different agencies including Mima um I was there for four years uh after I left there I started uh comprehensive investigations and Consulting to do investigations and originally um the company who my two partners krie Gilpin who was former Colonel of the State Police and John benon who has made primarily Al though I knew him from the AG's office has primarily been a defense attorney but it was a mixture of people who could look at cases that had done investigations but at the same time had different points of view um I've had comprehensive investigations and Consulting I've been the CEO and one of the founding partners for the last four years and since then um we've investigated I'm going to say close to 100 police departments and School departments well suffice to say and Sheriff's departments sorry and and in in our city you've done some work what work have you done in our city I've kind of done two different things one the the and this is away from cic I'm I'm still hired by different District Attorney's offices um to uh do investigations so with regards to that the uh Essex County DA's office who had hired me to do two murders for them uh asked me to do an investigation of an internal um incident that happened at the police dep department so I did that for the Essex County DA's office then I was hired by the City of Lawrence to do another investigation um with regards to a um a individual who overdosed inside the jail cell um and then after that um uh Mr Owens sent me a request to to make a proposal with regards to four different incidents that involv um Chief Castro and when you say Mr Owens you're talking about the former Personnel director for the city that's correct and any of your exper any of your experience especially in the City of Lawrence did you get a negative rating or any kind of negative feedback about your performance no I did not thank you that's what I am hearing from those who are saying that your report is inadequate is that you failed you failed to inter to interview Mr Castro I would like for you to comment on the importance and the the background with respect to allowing someone who is a principal in the report um you're not having an opportunity to to conduct an interview okay certainly um uh Mr Castro was a difficult person for the city to actually serve with the the complaint they were having difficulty doing that uh they finally were successful in serving him with the complaint um his attorney acknowledged that he had received the complaint at that point um his attorney um requested a large group of documents which I sent to his attorney I also sent his attorney an email I said what a good days for you just give me some days that are good for you and we'll do the interview on one of those days he didn't respond back to me I picked October 8th as I'm sorry yes I picked October 8th as a day he sent back that uh he was unavailable I then moved it to the next week October 15th I sent that to him as a date he said that he was unavailable finally he said late in the month of October that he would be available so I sent him the date of October 25th at that point Mr Castro's attorney started to say I had no right to question his client at that point I went back to Mr Owens and I said I've never had this happen before because I'm an independent investigator he's he's gotten that paperwork from you but he's saying I don't have a right to talk to his client at that point Michael Owens served him to come to quiny uh and I believe it was for October 8th that we were going to do the interview in the meantime Michael Owens got fired that's what it says in my report and I'm standing by that because on October 5th Michael Owens called me up and said I've been fired then I waited in my office for uh M Mr Castro and his attorney to show up on the date that he had been served by Michael Owens he at that point did not show up so I sent him an email telling him you didn't show up we're going to continue our investigation and as we continue our investigation we will then write a report for the city of law that was essentially what was in the in that letter there was also some verbiage about informing him that uh of the correct things he was actually were there the correct um documents so then what happened was on October 10th I came up to the city of to motion to resist uh we have some interference with the with the with the music and then that's being I guess that is being like as you hear certainly going out of control once uh motion Rees there's a motion to re properly second all in please say I guys have [Music] it for [Music] [Music] [Music] but not when the M spoke not when the M spoke only afterward and honestly speak I something C e it's off right now J e e e power for well that's what I say yeah for for spee e e e [Music] spe [Music] [Music] spe hist I'll I'll entertain a motion to come out of res so moved motion to come properly second please say we apologize for the inconvenience is technical issues that we've been having lately with an interference uh with a local radio station that come in especially during the night it's it's very awful so Mr uh Mr bannet uh thank you for providing us with the answer um you might continue with the conversation so we were we in the middle of answering the question the question was the it seems like it's a central point of this entire investigation at least part of it at least from from sides that that if you don't have the principal Mr Castro interviewed then there's a discredit to the report so I wanted to hear more about how we got to CASRO not giving and you were giving a timeline so correct um I sent uh on the 8th an email to his attorney saying you didn't show up um the the investigation continues and the there'll be a report done at the end of the investigation on the 10th I came up to interview more witnesses and at that point Internal Affairs for Lawrence was in a separate building I don't know where it is now but it was in a separate building um I got there at 10 o'clock in the morning to interview the witness I was going to interview in Internal Affairs at that point I got a pH phone call from Octavian spanner um as I walked in to do the interviews on the 10th he then texted me but I was doing my interviews when I got done with my interviews I sent back a text to him essentially saying that all our uh all all correspondents nothing can be oral I want everything in writing going back and forth between the two of us at five o'clock that evening he sent me an email saying that uh on instructions of the mayor I was to Halt my investigation and that attorney hooton would be in touch with me later to discuss uh to to discuss other issues at that point my investigation was stopped uh attorney Castro's attorney had said I had no right to question him the mayor's office had told me that I was not to I was to Halt my investigation and halt by Websters actually means stop my investigation so there was nothing further I could do except write my report so I got that notice on the 10th to Halt my investigation I started writing my report Sunday night on the 13th I sent my report to the City of Lawrence I sent it to an individual I'm not going to use police names here I sent it to a police officer I sent it to attorney hooton and I sent it to the mayor um I did not send it to post I don't know why that has people are saying that but I know where I sent the Senate and it was not to post it was to those three individuals now I think you always want to be able to interview the respondent in investigation but it is not necessary to interview the respondent if you've got other circumstantial evidence which will lead you to a conclusion that's not to say you're dismissing what the respondent would say to you if he would talk to you but in this case I wasn't given an opportunity to talk to the responded his attorney said he wouldn't talk to me and the mayor's office dictated that I couldn't continue my investigation further when I sent back the email to his attorney saying that my investigation was continued he never got back in touch with me saying gez we weren't good for that day we can go to another day can you do late October I probably would have I would have given him the time to do that but that's not what he was saying he was saying you don't have a right to talk to my attorney and that's what he was saying so I'm sorry you don't have a right to talk to my client that's what he was saying in his emails and then uh uh span now I've done prosecutions and investigations for over 30 years now there are many times that you don't get to talk to the suspect or the respondent as a matter of fact in this case where our findings were that he uh that that uh Mr cast Castro lied in his report he had a fifth amendment privilege he could have come in and refused to answer my questions and I still would have written a report you get you have to give the Carney uh uh warnings to an individual that you are conducting an investigation of he didn't even have to answer my questions if he came in so the reason I'm bringing that up is you don't just because a respondent refuses to talk to you or for one one reason or another won't talk to you that doesn't end your investigation what you have to do is look at all the evidence find the evidence and take that other evidence evidence and come to a conclusion if you can if you can't come to a conclusion based on all that evidence then you come back and you say well this allegation is not sustained I can't sustain this allegation and that's the end of it but that was not the case in this situation I had substantive evidence involving the video involving the dispatch calls and involving other police officers testimony and all of it fit together to give a very strong circumstantial case and direct evidence case that Mr Castro was in a highspeed Chase when he didn't have a right to be in it and then he went and lied on his police report which is in my mind far more serious because you can't have a dishonest police officer Mr Bennett Council BL do you still have do you still have questions I do okay coun I do know there other counselors who wish to speak so I'm going to try I I ask short questions I think I do and there's longer answers so apologize no but it's important that we hear what you have to say and I think you may be answering what other colleagues may be asking or thinking so I think I think you're in a good place um so what I'm hearing I I kind of want to regurgitate just a little bit is that while it's preferable to have someone in this particular case Castro available for a for an interview based on the experience that you've had and you've given some examples of times when you don't have the respondent there or the the um the defendant there you're you're going forward with what you have and in this particular case what I'm hearing is that you have so much other information whether it's videos or other correspondents or records of such that you felt comfortable to go ahead and provide the report that the city paid you for and compl the report even though and because of the reasons you mentioned the whole thing etc etc so I just want I want to make sure that I I understand that that's the the basis of your of your response that's correct okay um I do have a question for um and by the way is there a requirement that that c that that someone like Castro be present with an attorney must he be there with an attorney can he say I'm not there because my attorney's not available is that is that I'm not is that a rationale or a basis for not attending a um um a an inquiry or question or investigation he has the opportunity uh to show up with a union official if he's part of a union but he has to show up but I just want to point out that him not showing up was not held against him in the tiniest I didn't consider it at all that he didn't show up I made my basis on all the evidence that I had but yes he had to show up if for no other reason to say I can't answer questions today I want my attorney here with me I'm G have one more question and I want to go back to Mr Moren for a question in your experience and you've already described how long you've been involved in public safety at various levels at the highest level quite frankly in our Commonwealth can you when these kinds of allegations and someone of of a serious uh report such as yourself and you're not the only one in town there are others that are who do fine jobs as well but you from what I'm told are in the top tier of these individuals who who or in this in this practice in this business um when that happens do the individuals who are um that you recommend for in this particular case termination do they somehow survive or in most cases do the folks who are the leaders of those various communities do they do they do they do they resign is action taken I just want to get a sense to where we fit because right now our this individual is now no longer a police officer or serving as a chief of staff not Chief of Staff but serving as a police chief but is currently serving in in in city government so I just want to get a perspective from you so I have context what's happening not just in Lawrence but lacrosse I I hate to make a generalization on that to be straightforward do I think that most cities and towns accept our recommendations whatever they may be uh yes but there are plenty of times that there are other things that a city or town takes into consideration and they make a different decision than the recommendation that cic has made thank you and I have one more question for Mr Moen and then I'm G to wrap it up because I I do want to hear my colleagues questions Mr Moren thanks again uh and I read the report your I read both reports in your report want uh Mr Castro did go um and did respond to you yes and so I just want to get a sense it it this seems a little odd from where I'm sitting that not going to one but saying yes to another and didn't bring an attorney there was reasons that we heard from Mr Bennett saying he didn't want to go without an attorney or the attorney said he wasn't going to really allow his client to go there but yet he went with you any insight there yes why because nobody was a target of my investigation Mr Castro wasn't a Target Mr Owens wasn't a Target none of the police officers were a Target nobody at City Hall was a Target our job was to determine how the investigation expanded and with then if there was any collusion amongst any of the stakeholders that would have compromised what Mr Bennett did final question am my final question one second while they touching on that cuz and then the question is not going to be yeah you you still have the floor you're working on [Music] it I don't know [Music] you might continue last question so just so I'm clear again in your findings do you dispute any of the Bennett reports findings we didn't reinvent investigate with Mr benef did but all that you did is there anything that you would on all the stuff that you have done in your report are you disputing any of can you repeat your question like I wasn't able to hear sure so my question to Mr Moren was based on in his report and his investigation is there any part of his investigation that would dispute the findings of the Bennett commission the Bennett report excuse me again we were not tasked with reinvesting tigating what Mr Bennett did and I'm not going to question what he did would I have done it the same way no but that doesn't mean that the way he did it is incorrect so just so I'm clear so based on the narrow scope that you're talking about I understand that you made it clear twice now that narrow scope that you're not disputing the Benet report again we we didn't reinvestigate what he did so no I don't he made his findings and the city as he stated in his conclusion or at the beginning rather the city uh is can accept or dismiss his findings those are his findings he stands by them and we were not tasked with um reinvestigating what he did or evaluating what he did that wasn't the scope of what we did at all thank you council president yeah uh just to clarify from the do you have the your report with you I do okay do you mind reading the introduction so we can have the full scope of what you what you were hiring for reading the what the introduction of the report page [Music] one Maverick Investigative Services and RCB and Associates were engaged by the City of Lawrence Mass to investigate the circumstances surrounding the expansion of the William Castro investigation initially sented on a motor vehicle Pursuit policy violation the investigation extended to allegations of untruthfulness unethical hiring practice practices intimidation and retaliation the primary purpose of this investigation was to determine whether collusion among specific parties compromise the Integrity of the investigation conducted by Daniel Bennett of comprehensive investigations and Consulting all right uh I'm going to pass I going to pass this counil do you have I mean Council Lan do you have any other question not right now I may have some later thank you so any other councilors C president oh thank you council president um oh thank you for being here uh who hire you the City of Lawrence who hire who was your contact person from the City of Lawrence we met with and it's in here um mayor depena and Octavian spanner interesting uh and I have a question for the attorney but uh another question that I have for you sir is uh it it seems like you interview less individuals than the other investigation how many did you interview uh well I can tell you we interviewed William Castro Michael Owens um Lieutenant Razzo sergeant samard lieutenant Rossy um attorney hton attorney Foley uh Mark ianello um again we were trying to determine how this expanded we weren't trying to we hit didn't have a target of an investigation and I think what's important for you folks to know is that at no point in time did anybody from the city not the mayor not o Octavian spanner uh neither attorney hton or Foley or Mark inel did anyone try to direct us or interfere with our investigation every time we visited city hall it was welcoming It was friendly it was professional phone calls were returned uh materials that we asked for were provided immediately so it looks like that they were more friendly with your company find is a company with your Consulting agency than with Mr benett uh Consulting it looks like according to what you just said and I didn't ask that you mention it my other uh concern is that you interview more people from the city than the actual individuals involved in this case is that accurate you just gave me a count of how many city employees you interview we weren't investigating any individual we were investigating how the investigation expanded that was it that was all we were doing nobody was the target of our investigation we weren't asked to investigate this person or that person or reinvestigate what Mr Bennett did we were asked to determine how it expanded and if there was any collusion that would have interfered or um somehow invalidated what Mr Bennett did that's what we did can you repeat how many people you interview from the city I lost count okay I didn't give a number I named yeah I was counting probably seven seven seven seven we got eight more than that we got eight eight eight that was close and and how many people from the police department how many officers three wow just for the record that's a lot of C's employees and once again I'm going to uh mention that the administration was more friendly with you than the other Consulting agency could be thank you uh council president president Council vice president inant thank you um this is actually for both um Mr Rob I can't think of your last name right now and Mr Bennett so can I have both of them in the at the podium please [Music] I want to start with off with you Mr Bennett while you were answering my colleague's question you mentioned that communication between your agency and um Mr Castro was done through his attorney that's correct at any point did you have any direct communication with Mr Castro no I did not okay now um Rob please correct me if I'm wrong it's one of the yellow on two occasions December 2nd and December 17 I have here that you've received correspondence directly from Mr Castro is this true yes okay were the were these two occasions the only two occasions that that you communicated with Mr Castro directly and the 14th of November when he was inie okay thank you so the reason why this is interesting to me because the Maverick report not the Maverick agency is supposed to be another independent agency but to me is interesting how when it came to Bennett's investigation Castro would not make any communication with you unless it was through his attorney this is also an investigation that has a that's a legal that's completely uh a uh has a legal component but he seemed very comfortable to communicate with you directly not the target of my investigation nor was he advised in writing that there could be potential criminal uh implications to the allegations we weren't investigating any one individual period so we were investigating how it expanded and whether or not there was collusion period I I I understand that I understand that so the reason the other half of why the other Port part of why this is interesting was because the administration publicly communicated to the community and also to City councilors that the investigation was not done was not done the investigation overall stems from the Castor situation now if your name is being brought up in any investigation while you are the main person or not you would think to stay on the safe side you will continue communication through your attorney because you never know unless there's some there's some familiarity between that agency or that individual are you are you making are you asking me a question or you are you making I'm making a statement this is a statement there this I read There is absolutely no connection the first time I met William Castro was on November 14th when he responded to my office and was interviewed by myself and Rob budri first time I met him no no connection whatsoever period in fact I don't know anybody in the City of Lawrence period to include the police officers and I was a police officer not too far down the road in saem New Hampshire for 25 years I don't know anybody so there is no connection to anyone I understand that but do you see why it could it could be seen kind of kind of suspicious I don't because again he wasn't the target of my investigation okay that was made very clear to everybody you are not the target of my investigation our job is to try to find out how this expanded and whether or not was collusion and I think our findings are pretty clear that that wasn't the case can you through m madame vice president do you mind uh just uh one quick one quick question for him do you mind expanding on what you just mentioned the findings of your investigation sure key findings no evidence of collusion no definitive evidence of delusion involving Michael Owens former HR Director Daniel Bennett or members of the Lawrence Police Department Superior officer Union was found allegations of personal connections or biases influencing the investigation were unsubstantiated significant procedural missteps I don't know that I want to mention names here um just just scoss the names just scratch the name name uh lapses in judgment including careless handling of confidential documents and forwarding inwriting several unsupported allegations Michael Owens constrained Chief Castro's interview scheduling without accommodating legales representation Daniel Bennett submitted findings and recommendations without a formal interview of William Castro undermining the completeness of the investigation there seems to be some confusion on whether Mr Castro refused to show up or didn't want to show up without legal counsel I understand the point that you're trying to make I wasn't investigating William Castro Mr Bennett was big difference but in your introduction you mentioned that you were doing this I'm sorry in your introduction you mentioning that you spanding the investigation no we in the primary P purpose of this investigation was to determine whether collusion among specific parties compromised the Integrity of the investigation conducted by Daniel Bennett of comprehensive investigations and Consulting not reinvestigating what Mr Bennett did not at all we didn't interview the same people we interviewed people that may have knowledge of how it expanded which we concluded in our report how it expanded it's not a matter of National Security how it expanded but the problem that you have in this city and I think that you'll probably agree with this is very very very poor communication so if you go to our recommendations I think you'll see what the recommendations were and what they conclude that that is a major Fortune of it a major problem and it's not one party there's plenty enough blame to go around so and again you're not the Lone Ranger you're not the only municipality that has that issue thank you council president iing in thank you I think uh Mr Bennett that was that was all for you um I I want to go back to the post letter and I and I want to bring back um attorney hoen attorney when you received this post letter who did you forward the um the letter to the mayor and Octavian span those only them two yes only them two yes are you sure I at um upon my initial release yes if it was lat to release my office I it could be but I have here Octavian spanner mayor depa and Claudia hoos oh the mayor's confidential secet yes I'm sorry now what I would like to know why didn't the city council receive a copy knowing that we had a pending uh meeting special meeting the next day about this exact topic do you this is a question do you believe this would have been good information for the council to have ahead of time coming into this meeting okay it's my understanding that you were going to talk to both parties which were the Maverick investigation as well as the Bennett investigation about their investigations not about post not talking well post this this is what the nature of this investigation was but this letter refers to the marck investigation it refers to so it's it's still related in some way it it's referring to allegations of a police officer acting inappropriately that's what it's referring to okay well in this letter on the investigation uh and well my my understanding again this is in this all about Mr Castro once it Strays from Mr Castro still in this letter pulse directly quotes at lines from the investigation so this this is related to the investigation um so the council should have received it as as a City attorney that works for the city that doesn't that doesn't work for anyone's particular as as you always say when you're in front of us the city council or at least the city council president and vice president should have received a copy of this okay I immediately sent it to the mayor's office I did not receive a response from the mayor's office it was when it was requested by Council Lan it was given to council L my next question for you uh attorney hoen one of the conclusions that the mer report um includes is to have a to to create a procedure on how things should be reported to post in the letter in the letter from post they they included the Massachusetts General Law chapter 6E Section 3 A5 that says otherwise that anyone can report to them if we were to if we were to um create a process how does that how do we I guess violate that Massachusetts General law not looking to violate what I would suggest is that we there's a lot of police procedures that I believe should be reviewed and we should get them correct post is a brand new organization there's a lot of confusion of what they do there's a lot of confusion on on reporting I would suggest that we we educate everybody about it but I'm not an expert on post okay so I I want to post this a new agency etc etc but but the Massachusetts General law is is the Massachusetts General law we are not above our our Commonwealth's laws correct so again how would that how would that interfere or violate Massachusetts General law how would what violate I'm sorry if we were to establish a procedure uh a communication procedure we would establish a procedure that complies with all rules and regulations of post and all Massachusetts general laws we that's what we were do when we create a procedure we make sure it was a legal procedure we would bet it we would submit it we would submit it to post we probably submit it to for review by outside somebody that knows this that's how we create a procedure you don't just think of it a whole half you get you get information you take um they can you sometimes you even get e whatever the communities do when you follow okay well future for the future as a City attorney these are important documents that members of the city council should have when when we are going to talk about topics because again this is related to the marick report and it is yes it talks about employee retaliation which is also included in the first report so all of this is connected and I have the entire email chain from you from pul from from Mr spanner and and Rob here so I know not one not no communication to the city council but I'm going to conclude there with that topic I have another question for you attorney hoen in the marrick report president before you before you go to that to that question it is important to spend on something that you just mentioned right now which is the communication what I have seen is that most of the that information that is supposed to be coming to the city council have to be screen screen it out by the mayor's office it happened today you guys saw the email early today but it happened many other times is this was the case do you need to give it to them and then got an authorization from them to release it to the city council all information is to be given to the mayor's office immediately so and then after they review it that that's when you can release anything into us no after they review we have a conference on what to do with it it's not who do we review it to sometimes it's not reviewable again every every correspondence is different it may be information that you're not privy to that you can't be privy to I I can't give a generalization when I get information from other agencies I get information on cases Mo most of the information I receive regarding things I don't give to the mayor I don't give to you it has it's to do with a case it's part of my my job that's what I handle it's internally handled I don't send everything that comes to my I get thousands of communications every day it does not get distributed to anybody that stays in my office an attorney says I want to settle the case I then send something back no talking about all these are specific I understand but you're you're making the assumption that that I am some sort of a gatekeeper uh for the mayor's office I am not I am a gatekeeper for the city and I understand that that when that happened if he happen with his off his staff director staff that that's that's fine it happened today with the state of the city they didn't send it to us they provided to us yesterday I want I W both versions they waiting for the mayor to say yes but that's public information sometime we need to differentiate what is public and what is not and if we want to really want have an open communication and and have have to run a city and then that need to change I understand Madam vice president thank you council president and this and this is a act this is a bit of of a confusion for for me um the next question so I'm hoping that you can clarify with the yes or no in the Merrick report um it is said that Castro believed that he was set up by some officers because they wanted an an internal Chief not him um in the benett report there is there there is a situation where it is said that an officer was picked up by Castro an officer was asked to have a private meeting with the mayor and his residents basically using fear tactic and that and to me the way I'm reading that that's that's another form of setup and I'm and I want you to to to tell me maybe am I reading this wrong am I interpreting it the wrong way but I'm seeing that as a form of a setup just the for just the other party the other way around again I'm unaware what it the purpose of that was it could also be interpreted that um someone was concerned about a sick officer that's the way people they spin it to whichever way they want how's been it can can I get Bennett's answer on this too as well please in your report when an officer stated that that he was that he he had a meeting with the mayor or he was requested by the mayor to talk about um officers supposedly setting setting him up to get him fired Etc and then the next day Castor picked him up to talk about the same thing the way that I interpreted that and I and I actually want a a genuine expertise response because I could be interpreted this the wrong way which which can happen the way that I was interpreting that compared to the Bennett report I mean the the Maverick report where Castro um alleged that he was he was set up that this was also a type of setup for that officer to kind of scare him into going on Castro side for chief so that he would be okay I think the way I looked at that and this was from the officer himself who was it was backed up by another officer also stating he had been told um sort of the second statement is heay but the first one was directly to me I apologize um was that he was intimidated um that he was um sick and and on the edge and that um when former Chief Castro showed up at his house um he was telling him that there were other there were other people out after him and that they couldn't trust the white officers and so in that way it was an intimidation that he was putting on to that office officer and showing uh that was certainly detrimental to the uh good operation of the uh of the Lawrence Police Department and along with that which was backed up by another situation was that was after former Chief Castro was suspended by post he wasn't supposed to be talking to anybody about any Police Issue and he had already been at a meeting where he was discussing um where he he had been discussing the budgeting for the Lawrence Police Department so it wasn't just an isolated incident where he was visiting a sick friend he was over there trying to manipulate what was going on in the and gain allies and he picked out somebody who unfortunately um had some emotional problems at that time so can that also be seen as a setup I apologize can that also be seen as a setup I I just wouldn't use those words but um yeah one sentence before that happened uh it's also mentioned that uh this person was asked to visit the mayor's house that's correct can you expan on that please the day before uh deputy chief Castro picked him up for the only time in his life this officer was asked to go over to the mayor's house and he went over to the mayor's house and was given a lot of the same information that Deputy former Chief Castro also gave him in the car ride around the neighborhood when they were together so it was over to the mayor's house then the next day it was picked up by uh uh former Chief Castro to do the same thing did the mayor mention at any point that he was suspended I read that I guess on the I can't recall I apologize I I read that that that's there uh but I mean mad VI president M for it to to come back and then I'll ask for the floor council president before you go we go that way uh we're going to go this way and that's coun rosar thank you through you uh council president Mr Bennett after you see or or you stop your investigation how many days did you inform or give the time for the mayor to revise what you close because according to your contract it says that the Mayors need to accept it or denied your investigation so after you close it how many days did it took you to bring it or send it to the mayor's office and did he accept the report or he denied it well I'm going to say this about that when I was told to stop my investigation I sent it within four days and he till today can deny or accept that I don't know that he has accepted it so he's got I guess whatever October 13th so he's had three and a half months to accept or deny the investigation I guess thank you any other questions yeah uh councelor yeah I would like to know about the ration and intimidation with the police officer and I would like to know how many officer and police did you make the interview for them how many for that particular allegation there were two officers for the intimidation there were two officers that were interviewed to that particular for the overall um investigation for the four where was hired for four different issues for that I interviewed 17 police officers and one civilian and how many time do you try to contact Castro for the interview I I don't want to exaggerate so I'll say seven times okay thank you any other questions all right I go back to I I wanted to hear that question again and that answer I'm sorry I didn't how many time he tried to contact uh the chief op Castro for the interview yeah I I believe I tried to contact and this is his attorney I sent at least seven emails to his attorney all of them involving setting up the interview yeah thanks so you got you got answer celor follow the question to you Mr President uh how many people you interview in total 18 18 and what is the the descrition to the interview to the 18 different person what you mention right now was two for intimidation and what is the other yeah that was two for intimidation and the the reason I interviewed those two for intimidation is one had um sort of a what was you know firsthand knowledge of being told about what had happened to the to the officer that was allegedly intimidated and then the officer himself so I interviewed first I interviewed both officers one the person who was telling me that they were intimidated and then also to see if their story was consistent with what they had told another officer yes um a number of them were for um a number of them were for the um the car chase anybody who was involved that day with the car chase and by that I mean radio call stopped somebody heard something they were all interviewed on that about that car chase and then I interviewed um the civilian and a number of other people and I'm going to say two other people with regards to whether or not um former Chief Castro had been attempting to sort of circumvent the Civil Service system and trying to get people hired um using his influence as the chief to do that and then uh I interviewed two people with regards to um whether or not there was some type of retaliation being taken on by Chief Castro against other people and some of those people overla because they they might have something to say about the car chase and also have something to say about the hiring process no there there was four things there was four things there was the car chase and what Chief castler did about his police report with the car the the second issue was um whether or not there was intimidation going on with the officer the third part was whether uh there were three people that Chief Castro was attempting to get employed within this the Lawrence Police Department and using his influence as the chief of police to do that to break the rules and then the fourth part was whether or not Chief Castro was um in some way retaliating against officers who were um opposed to him so those were the four issues that I got a email from Mike Owens saying we would like you to give us a proposal these are four issues you should be would be looking at that's correct [Music] Annes and I de to attend how many more offic to the same issue [Music] the pur I saw offic viation violation to the the policy policy okay and and that's the very good question because part of the job was um three officers including former Chief Caster were notified that they were respondents of the allegations that they were in the chase um another officer um I don't want to get past where I'm supposed to be going here but I I I did an investigation of three separate officers and made findings on all three separate officers on the chase two offic don't consequences [Music] about they they on of those of the three officers one of them it was a sustained finding against that officer but I'm not going to say that officer's name under the Lawrence rules and under almost every Police Department I know there's a thing called mitigation so that when you give out when you recommend the punishment you decide whether or not there's any mitigation to it so there was punishment for this officer but the mitigation towards it was he was getting calls from the chief of police that he was the chief of police was in a high-speed chase and that's why he got into the highp speed chase but he was was sustained against that officer and that officer did receive a punishment or or actually I shouldn't say that I recommended a punishment for that officer I don't know what happened with that officer so I apologize on that but I did recommend a punishment for that officer the third officer he responded but when you watch the videos and I watched a lot of videos he actually didn't break any traffic rules so he was stopping at the lights he was under the speed limit so was he in the chase yes but my findings were he wasn't breaking any traffic rules so I wasn't going to sustain the uh sustain it against him in my report all three officers are addressed and all three officers are addressed I don't want to say the officers names all three officers are addressed the reasoning for why I sustain the allegation that he shouldn't have been in the speed chase for another officer is addressed in there I did take into consider mitigation in other words hey why was he doing it okay was he just hearing over the radio Like Chief Castro that was a bad Che go ahead could I just state that um he does not discipline anyone that's not his job no he recommend he just does a recommendation so discipline is up to discipline is up to the City of Lawrence the police chief of the City of Lawrence the mayor of the City of Lawrence so he can't answer for that because that's his job is just to give us a recommendation so whether one person gets treated one way or another that's up not up to Mr Bennett Mr Bennett's only obligation is to give us a report and and and some and I want to know you need to push the button the button uh now you got it so I can repeat it again everything because I love to do that exit make question and asking and looking for clarification because uh Mr Ben yes and as a matter of fact mad mad coun Rees none of his uh recommendations were imposed actually I know but I have question yeah PR I want to do that because I have my right of course thank you I I I know but I continue to to to you mentioned before you can close the report uh without any interview with the principal person correct yes and I love to know why because I want to have the right to receive my interview I know you try to to contend uh seven time but uh you mention to through the report he mention he not attending because uh he don't be ready because he don't have the Arney or something they done his attorney sent me an email back I we had contact his attorney said this is a bad day for me I moved it okay well first I sent this attorney an email that said pick a day give me some days I'll do it on one of the days you want I didn't get a response then I picked a day his attorney said no that's a bad day for me so I picked another day and his attorney said no that's a bad day for me so I said how about give me some days so we picked the day late October and as soon as I did that and we had that date his attorney said no you don't have a right to talk to him you don't have a right he asked me what's my right I said well the City of Lawrence you know hired me essentially and he said no that's not enough you don't have a right to do that then I got back in touch with Mike Owens I said I've never had this happen ever to me but even though I'm the independent uh investigator the attorney for the respondents saying you don't have a right to interview because he doesn't have to answer my questions right if it's if there's if there's criminal action and there's potential criminal action against gief Castro but he has to show up okay so Mike Owens then sent the attorney a email that said you got to show up in attorney Bennett's Office on such and such a day okay then his lawyer sent back Chief Castle's lawyer sent back an email that said not only doesn't attorney Bennett have a right to talk to him you don't have a right to talk to him the only one who can order him to go in there is the mayor so we're not talking to you then Owens gets fired and then before we even would try to set up another meeting then he does show up C doesn't show up I sent him an email another email his lawyer said Hey listen you didn't show up we're going to continue the investigation and when we finish we're going to write our report and he could have answered and said hey give me hey I'll meet with you next week and I would have done it but he wasn't he had already indicated he was not going to talk to us and then I got an email from Octavius spanner saying halt your investigation so that was the end of it it wasn't a question of us not wanting to talk to him was a question of him saying we didn't have a right to talk to him he wasn't going to talk to us and then being told by the mayor you got to stop your investigation halt your investigation that's right that's right that that's correct that that's correct uh good evening who hied you the investigation hi um Mike Owens was the one who got in touch with me originally he sent me asking for the proposal I'd say they produced a contract that was supposed to be um and actually Atty outon probably can explain this better than I can that was supposed to be for me to do multiple different investigations um which was signed by the by the mayor but this this investigation being one of them the one I had returned the proposal had filed a proposal on um the will hided by Michael O to do the investigation through the mail but you were supposed to report to the mayor I was supposed to report make a report back to the mayor but I'm an independent investigator so my report is my report he can say I don't believe your report I don't like your report that's the way it goes but I don't work for the mayor the mayor can stop my investigation by saying halt which he did but but at that point he gets a report of where my investigation is but they didn't say to stop the in investigation they said to wh on the investigation right and why and that's a transitive verb meaning to stop and it's from Middle English you can go back and look at all the way back through through C ly he didn't say hold he says hold hold not hold hold to hold the investigation no hold can you spell the word he used h a l t t hold yes to hot the investigation not to stop well but it's a transitive verb meaning stop I'm sorry let me talk let have the floor thank you can you continue please sure it's a transer verb meaning stop did you call the major and ask him see he want to stop or hurt I did not you did not I did not did you call the maor and find out why Mr Castro doesn't want to come and talk to you I did not you did not because I think so that he was the on you know that should have all the information and talk to you or give it to you whatever direction that has to be taken according to what I can see in here I'm I'm not sure that question can you just repeat what you mean I I'll do the best I'm to can and Mr Castro refus to talk to you why you didn't call the mayor because he was the the uh the person that should be given to you or to Castro you know and and speak with him regarding why he doesn't want to show or speak with you okay so I two I have two answers to that one is I was speaking to Castro's attorney he was the one who's making the representations to me the other thing is I'm an independent investigator I don't I don't report to anybody I don't necessarily call up I'm not looking to have my investigation interfered with if you're saying that I should have called up the mayor and interviewed him then may not to interview well that's the only way I would have talked to him sit down with him put him on tape and interview that's the way we do it we always shouldn't say always but overwhelmingly if I'm going to talk to somebody it's either I get something in writing or I sit down when I talked to Octavian spanner and the City attorney after the investigation I didn't tape it but I had my assistant there typing up everything that was said in that meeting every time that you for either the attorney or Mr Castro uh to interview him did you give a different time different day to do it did every time I do it I can't say every time I did did it but I did it several different times first uh was you pick a date second was this is the date bad date for the attorney this is the date bad day for the attorney fourth time give me any other date that you will in October then I sent back another one saying okay we can do it on this date then he said no my client's not talking to you my client you don't have a right to talk to my client did just for the record and at that point at some point on the investigation you mention or the investigation mentioned that only the mayor can authoriz my client to I don't have the report from me for I minute but here yes what isn't there that's only the major was the one who authorized the yeah but that at that point that we have the the the HR Director that was the person in communication with both paries when did you notify Mr Castro that he was investigating I never notified Mr cast Mr Owens notified him on September 25th that he was being investigated let him respond there was attempts by Mr Owens before that to serve him and he was my understanding is trying to avoid them but I never would be in the role of in uh letting somebody know that they're being investigated that would always be the city or town or sheriff's department or college or just the mic we've been fighting an interference I'm doing terrible with that no no no you're you're good you're good did you okay you said that you were investigating three people for the car for the chasing for the chasing yes but only one of the report or this report was completely focused just only on Mr C no I in my report I gave an answer to all three people that were served as respondents I made findings and I put them in my report so why we are practically I'm going to say use the word chasing only Mr Castro because whatever that we have practically go directly to Mr Castro okay can you can you repeat the previous statement that you said sure there in my report there are three people that were respond as with regards the car chase I interviewed the other two came in with their Union representative I they did not have an attorney to my recollection but they came in with their Union Representatives I interviewed them both and I made findings on one of them I sustained that he shouldn't have been in the car chase either and on the third one I didn't um I didn't sustain it because when I watched the videos and I watched a lot a lot of videos he never broke any traffic rules that I could tell so it wasn't just Chief Castro it was all three of them what was the finding on Chief Castro related to the chasing it was sustained that he didn't have a right to to do that and it was based on the fact a lot of factors but one big factor was there was a uh a a a call that that was had gone out with regards to the passing of the bad check and it was twice within the the call that was out that was being received by the all the officers that it was was a bad check or a false check and it gave the description of the person who had passed it so you couldn't have gotten involved in the chase to find that person unless you heard at the same time that it was a bad check or a false check the description of the individual with their green hoodie their age what street they're on is all mixed in with it being a bad check or a false check it's in it's impossibility not to be able able to if you hear one you hear the other you hear it's a false check or you don't have the description of the person to Chase and he's chasing the person therefore he has to know he has to know that it's a false check or a bad check and that is not a bank robbery and that's what he said he was he was concerned that it was a bank robbery but he had heard it was a false check and a bad check and what was that recommendation sorry but I have't I have yeah what was that recommendation but it was uh 90 days suspended for getting in the C case the chase but lying in his police report saying that he believed it was a bank robbery it was that he be terminated because that's a criminal felony in this state s caning thank you okay so you have said that this is a criminal felony in the estate yes you know but it looks like that you have a lot of information regarding except that you don't have the information from the person that you were supposed to investigate that's correct so how do you close a case without having or preparing a report without having you know the information from the person that we really need to investigate okay because that person refused to meet with me well he refused to meet Sor no no no let him respond okay because you ask a question that person refused to meet with me and then I was stopped from doing further investigation however I'll just give you an example of honestly of the 30 murders that I have tried most of those murderers did not give a statement to the police and I still tried them and 29 of them were convicted so very many times I take information and it's called circumstantial evidence and if it fits then I make a decision about what it should be presented and that's what happens if he had wanted to talk to me I would have been Overjoyed if I had been continuing to do the investigation and hadn't been halted then he would have had more time to do that but he still did have time once he got my letter saying you didn't show up I'm sorry the attorney got my letter saying you didn't show up but within two days the investigation got halted when I came up to interview more people somehow somehow Octavian spanner got my cell phone I don't know how but he got my cell phone and he called me up when I got to Internal Affairs councelor Levi so from me your report is incomplete in this time so the principal person has not been interviewed you don't have his own version and we can not get I don't know how they uh they said in here uh that you are not guilty on you you're innocent unto you proven guilty okay and that was the investigation fair enough council president uh no let let her finish okay for now okay let's go to the second round now second round we have Council of Vice pres vice president infant and then we have councelor Rees and then we have uh plant and then we have uh and then we have Council Rosario and then we have councelor lcon okay so CC presidant you have the floor thank you through you council president um I still up here or am I for for one more thing for for one more thing we have we have the other investigation as well here if you have any questions uh I want to reiterate what Mr Bennett mentioned earlier even if Castro would have showed up for his interview he could plead the fifth and not say anything and we would still be arguing that it's incomplete because there is no statement from Castro and he could still say that he doesn't want to say anything with the attorney there so either either option we still wouldn't have cuz my opinion he probably would probably or maybe he would have spoken I don't know I don't know but the point is is that whether he was there or not he he would have had the option to not speak and and then what we still say that the that the investigation is incomplete no we don't um thank you uh Mr Bennett uh before I I want to hear from and before I I call I call them up through you council president to the podium I'm almost thank you Mr B um it's it's from Sergeant samard because he's he's one of the people people that that has been questioned in both reports but before we go to Sergeant Samar I want to read the introduction from the Maric report word for word marick Investigative Services and RCB and Associates were engaged were engaged by the City of Lawrence Mass to investigate the circumstances surrounding the expansion of the William Castor investigation initially centered on a motor vehicle Pursuit policy evaluation the investigation extended to the to the two allegations of untruthfulness unethical hiring practices intimidation and retaliation the primary purpose of this investigation was to determine whether collusion among specific parties compromised the Integrity of the investigation conducted by Daniel Bennett of comprehensive investigations and Consulting the reason why I emphasized primary was the word primary mean me does not mean Soul if this investigation's sole purpose was to was was to um determine whether collusion happened or not Mr castra wouldn't have been interviewed for 6 hours cuz why is someone that you're that you're that supposingly you're not interested in was interviewed for 6 hours I don't understand that you have a question I just wanted to put that on the record actually yeah can you yeah can you can you answer that please and can you and can you not helpful and their way off face okay question he was there for 6 hours because I let him talk and talk and talk and talk he came in with a tote a suitcase sized tote with a bunch of documents he then produced a 205 page rebuttal to Mr Bennett's investigation with 65 exhibits I read that you got my 441 page report I read probably 10 times the amount of pages that's why he was there for 6 hours I listened to him it doesn't mean that I believed or disbelieved what he was saying I listened to him just as I allowed everybody else that I spoke to to tell me what they wanted to tell me I had specific questions on how it expanded did he have some theories on that he did did I find any Merit did I find a finding I did not okay so again the assumptions are very dangerous and way off Bas got to be careful with that because assumptions are not facts well also I mean word dictionary meanings that's where my assumption is coming from your introduction when you Soul goal and primary goal like are two different the word the meaning primary is a different definition it's correct the main goal primary was to see if there was collusion that interfered with Mr Bennett's investigation we were also asked to determine how the investigation expanded and how was it expanded besides the collusion post asked them to expand it but nobody seemed to know that answer until I interviewed Mr Owens and for the record what was what was the reply that you got from Mr Owens he told me that he got he had a zoom conference with the uh member from post and that attorney Foley was present and they asked him to expand it corroborate that I interviewed attorney Foley who corroborated that it was a zoom meeting with somebody from post and it was in Mr Bennett's uh Mr Owen's office that it took place mystery solved well thank you for that clarification I have another question for you I have another um first of all you can stop with the attitude well you you have the attitude well now I have an attitude now I have an attitude the conversation through you council president my next question for Rob is U Mr Moren is you have the floor um and can you clarify as to why the email from Lieutenant um uh lle was included um pertaining to the police search concerns that he had because from my understanding this does not have any that email did not have anything to do with this investigation either no but I'm glad you brought that up because I'd like to make a a very important point on that it was forwarded to me so I included it okay but in that email and it doesn't surprise me because Lieutenant rassell went to law school and he's bar admitted he said my observations and my concerns that's an opinion he didn't put it out there as fact his observations and his concerns not a thing wrong with that not one thing wrong with that and I believe that if you asked Lieutenant Razo who I know is here he would tell you that that's exactly what I said about it okay it was put in my report because it was forwarded to me and in those 441 Pages which include 24 exhibits you will see and if you want to go to exhibit 10 you can see the communications between Mr Owens attorney Jacobs Mr Benet all in there okay that's why there's I know it's a quite a volume of stuff to go through but that's what we did that's our report and I went through much more material to do that again our findings are clear the scope of what we did is clear and our recommendation are clear so I don't appreciate the Assumption okay because you're assuming something that is completely wrong completely wrong there is no connection between Maverick Investigative Services RCB and Associates and anyone in this city anyone nor did we have a dog in the race nor did we have a Target that we were looking at we did exactly what we were asked to do and we did not go beyond the scope of what we were asked to do thank you you're welcome through you council president I would now like to to bring up Sergeant Mike Samar who was uh involved with both interviews and get his point of view on the differences between um the reports good evening Council my name is SJ Mike Samar I'm the union president of the superior offices thank you for having us tonight and inviting us here can you um s justar go go over I mean obviously we we have it here and R read it but your interview process um your experience when when being interviewed by um the marck agency and then we did we did a already talk about the Bena report a little bit prior meeting but if you can summarize your experience with that as well just to make the the overall connection sure and and I'd like to thank Mr Bennett for being an apologize from our Union for having his integ being brought to question by this Administration um You can compare what I feel was a valid investigation and then the subsequent cover up and it's obvious and it's it's disheartening to the men and women of our department who keep getting dragged through the mud William Castro was an unqualified correctional officer who dreamed of being a police officer and that dream was fulfilled by this mayor for whatever reason he became a police chief after becoming the police chief of staff he became a police chief never have attended a full-time Academy his lack of qualification showed on that February day when he got into a police chase for a bad check then lied in his report and then exposed the public to to all these safety risk in these offices who actually followed him into battle that day for no reason whatsoever the city then covered that up after he lied in his report the city then covered up in my opinion when they said nothing to see here I didn't investig ation nothing to see here go back to work offices that was me I would have been fighted on the spot no doubt in my mind it was reported to post about the coverup and the the violation of policies and the subsequent lies in the report and the hiring process the two te Internal Affairs systems so PO says to the City of Lawrence you need to investigate this so Mike Bennett another person I want to apologize to whose integrity was called into question by this Administration who everyone in the city adors because he was the right person for the job he hires Bennett Mr Bennett cic with an unblemished background as we heard he does a thorough investigation of 18 people including 17 officers and he records every interview I might add that Mr Castro's seven six hour interview was not recorded at his request why why mine was I had no say in it mine was Lieutenant razo's was everyone's audio interview was recorded Mr Benner finishes a report now I I might add that during this Chase and soon after within two weeks of that investigation of that coverup William Castro tasked a video analysis unit manager Angel Mia with the biggest download of video evidence that this department has ever seen during two homicides William pastor's sole intent was to follow me and mo agula Captain agula around the station for two weeks and he wanted that to help his cause during two homicide investigations he's tasking Angel Mi who has more important things to do obviously with following me and Captain agila around the station did Roy V vas get that same sort of allowances when allegations were made against him Chief ly vas did more for this Police Department than any police chief I ever worked for in 29 years and because Chief Castro wanted to be a chief a hit was put on him along with many other offices and it continues today where I heard another retaliation investigation is going to come up on one of our offices again investigation was ensued by Mr Bennett a very thorough one I might add and keep in mind I've never been the subject of an internal affairs investigation I went because I had to I was ordered to it's part of internal affairs investigations Castro felt he didn't have to because he's getting 210,000 as a provisional chief he can do whatever he wants and he's done whatever he wanted to for some reason so Mr Bennett does the investigation he can't finish it according to some counselors according to the mayor but he did finish it because like he said before whether the respondent or the suspect cooperates that's fine but if he doesn't he's going to go go with what the evidence presents and it did it presented itself as you can see Harvard educated first assistant district attorney director of Public Safety 30 homicides and our city travels to New Hampshire to hire Maverick investigations did anybody do a background check on Maverick investigations I did and and and and I suggest you do the same they call him because the cover up what they God from Bennett was not what they wanted because Castro was their guy for whatever reason some here may know the reason but there's leverage there for something why I don't know but this city suffers to this day this Council suffers to this day this Administration does whatever they want and they use you to rub a stamp it be careful because this happened to M when I was there and we're still paying for it trust me when I tell you everyone blame the counsel everyone so Mr Bennett does his investigation it's complete they don't like it they halt it they stop it whatever word you want to use they stopped it in its tracks and Octavian spanner did it why did he do it well twofold to protect Castro and to protect himself and we all know why how about the recent allegations that came out by Francisco Paulino I'm just want to get into why we're being tainted we're being persecuted for the rise of William Castro all we want is a qualified police chief so then they hire what I call Hitman out of s New Hampshire to come in and give them what they need to to fool you he can be a chief they're lying they don't want anybody from from outside they want someone from the inside we want someone who's qualified we're one of the busiest departments in the car we want someone who's qualified who's been to a full-time Police Academy that's it someone who Rose through the Bri knows how to how to work with the community not someone who's politically connected to the point where how many times how many mayors has he back havil mayor mthu mayor now the Lawrence mayor it worked he picked the right horse didn't he and here he is today and who gets a contract for a year as a provisional chief who does that where he goes from the chief of staff to the chief of police back to the chief of staff everybody watching this meeting right now in this C off is saying what the heck is going on in Lawrence what is going on here it's embarrassing that I have to stand up here and you have to stand up here and you have to question Mr Bennett about his Integrity because that's why he's here I I I don't get it so the city didn't like what he had to say so they hired Maverick and M never comes in I interviewed him and when I when he interviewed me I recorded it too one of my questions was have you ever worked for Eis investigations that's the former Chief from mun who's currently under indictment they signed a contract with them last month there's a lot of in Castro has political ties to the former Chief and that's where his credentials have out that's where he maintains his his credentials to be a special police officer out in the Fone there's a lot of lot of you know red flags here and unfortunately the mechanism for those red flags are being right here and you have a City attorney I I feel bad I really do he's put on the hot seat every time he's trying to figure out who he's got to protect but I think we all we all know we got to protect the citizens of Lawrence and I don't think that's happening and it's frustrating and here we are today so all I know is I had myw recorded 6-hour interview with 205 pages that was just billable hours for the for the Maverick investigator that's all that was that was predetermined and we said it guy was chewing tobacco in a cup spitting in a cup I'll buy you a beer when I see you at tusin PR s to me and we have a har educated director Public Safety here before you who's I hope getting paid because his time is very valuable it's just frustrating and again we're going to get dragged through it so I I hope I answer your question counselor but when does this end when is someone held accountable when are we going to have oversight we want the feds to come in here we need we need that in our Police Department who the our trust has just been destroyed in public by this man continuously when does it end because quite frankly I'm ready to retire but I don't want to leave the men and women of this department that I put 29 years of my heart and soul into this city for what for a guy to be played cops and Ro and get into a bank Chase give me a break that's what this is about and it's frustrating thank you uh councilor ver you still have the floor thank you um I have one statement about the City attorney and then I I want to listen I want to hear from Lieutenant Russell uh cuz he's been here as well and this is this this is not let's allow that uh City attourney so you have a question for him you have a statement statement a statement she doesn't have a question for you through you council president coun presentent I'm very disappointed in you City attorney um I lost faith after after receiving that post letter um the way that I'm I'm seeing that is that you play the administration side when it's convenient for you and you you play the city council side when it's convenient for you that's how I'm seeing it we could agree to disagree um but I'm I'm just very disappointed because I know that you know better and you know that communication to the council should have been made um and that's all I'm going to say about that council president and um now I would like if if you allow I would like to hear from Lieutenant Russel yes sir yes let's keep it short good even yeah Lieutenant Russell can you keep it a little as short as possible yes please I we we hit everything if it is an statement yeah no I I understand again I appreciate we came back I I think everything was H upon tonight um I I think we got to ask ourselves where are the connections here you know um I'm glad both parties were here but um you know Mike Owens fired Castro's ordered to come in Mike Owens fired and then just uh just just Ado that um Mike owns fire because it's something might happen eventually right um Ju Just a couple highlights from my interview um when when I asked the the investig confirm that Octavian SP hired him went up to T New Hampshire uh who who does that why' he go to T New Hampshire what what's the other side here um you know and then he he told me in the interview that there's a mind stating this on the record that the mayor created something these problems he didn't think it was malicious maybe a touch of incompetence not realizing but the beginning interview he said there was no collusion at all that was the primary focus here and then the the city asked Maverick if they would settle with Owens with the HR Director will it affect this investigation and I like how you you asked about my my city emails and I I heard the response but why were they there I was confused about that and you we started this thing with retaliation post confirms retaliation I think everybody can see through here there is retaliation uh some of the interviews the city attorneys documented in the Maverick report that it's no secret that that depena and Castor friends the City attorney was doing his duty to keep depena isolated from false allegations and he depena attempted interair he stated the department was feeding information to post because they resented Castro because he was an outsider he confirmed that Jacobs was ducking notice of Investigations and then ma know HR Director on 1122 24 almost 2 months ago acknowledged that he looked at these forensic download pretty much said there's nothing there why the investigation keep going Castro was interviewed for 6 hours not recorded not one mention of any objectively reasonable belief of the pursuit was a bank robbery Dan benett said it best he nobody heard bank robbery it never came over the radio wouldn't that come up in the six-h hour interview with the second investigation uh you know I I we hit everything tonight but it just seems that this this is all dragged out and it's there's some common denominators here there absolute conflicts of interest wasted money being spent to go to Salem New Hampshire then have have to hire a mass investigator to to do it why didn't they just go to the State Police for a simple download if they're talking about collusion and Corruption uh you know you you might not trust the Lawrence Police Department but a simple download started this whole thing and then it evolved into months of uh hours and and wasted resources uh um everything was hit tonight I think we cleared everything and I you know I I just I I agree with with s m where do we go from here you know you know I'd like to ask MAV when he's here who did he give that report to you know that should be an easy answer I don't know if we can ask him on the record he he had to give that report to somebody and you know I know we're going to get an investigation by the City attorney hopefully but that that report had to come to City Hall last two weeks ago when I when we spoke here and then all that stuff is unredacted and the stuff that was unredacted about confidential memos Octavian span and doing his own investigation he's not trained to do a police investigation and and then I just found that out because of a leak report you know that there was so much cover up here that was disclosed with with these open forums which I like and this is the way we have to go to figure it out but we that report go it came on Wednesday we didn't know anything about it when we're here sitting talking and then it's on the internet next day unre deck uh you know a lot of personal information a lot of confidential memos uh I don't know if we could ask him who he gave it to if we wait for the [Music] investigation it should be simple so just just just the the question would be who did you send the report when it came out of your computer to somebody's email well I did did not send it by a computer I hand delivered one hard copy and one thumb drive you you hand deliver a tumb drive and a hard copy to City Hall to what office the mayor's office to the mayor's office only correct okay did you did you handle it to somebody in the front or you give it to the key point that this name on the investigation I gave it to the mayor himself you give it to Brian a the pñ correct okay so that's them there half the investigation you know it had to be one of those people that either negligent like I said last week and uh and to be fair to the process Mr Bennett can you please uh come to the P Podium and um and ask the same question uh who did you send your investigation or your report exactly uh I sent it to the mayor I sent it to and I sent it to uhen Ross okay did you send it to post I did not okay can you repeat those names so we can have it for i s it to the mayor I sent it to attorney H and I sent it to Lieutenant Rossy so okay so davan spanner was not there on the email no no okay just three those three people those three understand um okay thank you so much unless you have any other questions I I think we personing you hold the floor I appreciate your patience I appreciate your cooperation your concern your good faith even though some see it otherwise and um I I've had situations with with your your union where we don't we don't agree so you guys know I'm not I'm not doing favoritism I'm not you guys know how I am absolutely and um I'm just I'm just dis I'm just disappointed in all of this it's it's not a perfect department but the entire department works day in and day out for for this community and then to be treated the way that you guys are being treated today it's it's just not okay it's not fair and that's all I'm going to say thank you Council council person inant so let's go to the list and we have Cel through you C president uh sure I know who is the person to respond my question but I want to know uh when they decide from the major office to when they decide to hide in a consultant uh they do a big Contra to the city or they need to shoose three they can compel what is the more very offer or something like that the beating process so just so you know in the past we put it out to bid uh we had used a prior agency uh to do investigations unfortunately the uh principal of that agency had a heart attack I believe I believe one of Mr Bennett's um earlier contracts was originally given to that person they had a heart attack they couldn't do it so we go looking for agencies U we have a list as a state list and you can you have an a list of state vendors State vendors the list uh I actually personally called five of them five different none of the ones that are here today and um none of them return my phone calls none them return my emails that's the process you do you go out there looking for you look for independent and um yeah and the and the and the and the price at some point just depend the price limit have to be M well that's why they're on the state contracts because yes they give you a proposal so you understand you know and you can accept or not accept what they you have to be less than 50,000 yes that's based on a state if you're using a state Bender you have to be less than a set amount yes and then uh you go from there and and for Mr Bennett on the last time because um we never know when an investigation is going to come up I mean hopefully they never come up what we like to do is have the person available as you well know sometimes to get people it takes some time so that's why uh Mr Bennett's contract was kind of broad it was hey if we need any it wasn't specifically for this investigation it was if we need investigations we will use your agency and that was the the nature of it so when this came up it was under the umbrella of that contract there was two others that you guys used Mr Bennett yes right um uh can you do you have the bills for uh for that uh for both mitigation I know that on the Bandit on the banded one you say that it was close to $39,000 I believe they're contained in there I believe one was 36,000 and the other was 7,000 7,000 all right great no problem so the the uh invoices are in the report uh uh then we have the next Cel you good we have Cel plan Mr H than you have a seat secretary bet want to go back to the report again um notice there were regarding Castro we already talked about the pursuit he talked about the three police officers besides Castro Mr Castro I so we got that pretty clear I want to talk about the four um allegations or four points of which you recommended a disciplinary action um and I'm going to ask you what they are I have them written down what they are what you recommended and then why you recommended that I'm sure you had a variety of different places you can go and why you selected what you selected for the recommendation so um in no particular order the vehicle Pursuit recommended suain 90 days uh suspended and the reason for that was um the the recklessness of of the driving of the chief and the fact that it was clearly from uh from all the calls that were coming in it was clearly a bad check and to be driving on the sidewalk and going the wrong way down one way streets and driving on the other side um and it did actually cause a it did actually cause a car uh it did end end up in a car accident so that's the reason why I recommended 90 90 days uh with that a false report termination why uh termination that's a false report a police officer fires a false report and lies in their police report that's actually a felony um and you it's Fallen right under what post is trying the most I shouldn't say the most but one of the major things that post is trying to do which is to to make sure that the the police officers are honest and doing what they're supposed to be it's it's something that he was in a position where um had someone chose to charge him with that I think the evidence was sufficient so it was he committed a he committed a felony and he should be terminated for that as an aside when I was first on the council a little bit history lesson in 1998 my first year on the city council uh we actually had a police officer um who was well decorated at the time um who lied on the police report and the chief at that time was Ronald gilmet Chief gilmet who was a former state police officer you may know him um and he recom he fired the police officer and by the way this police officer um I don't I think I can mention the name it's in the police it's in the it's in the newspaper uh officer David P um who was widely received a lot of accolades back in the day but because he lied on the police report gilm fired him so there in our city there is a track record of when you fire when you when you lie in a police report there is Ultimate termination and that has happened so I just want to make sure um that we know that number three intimidation termination yes and that had to do with the consistency of it that that it seemed like the officer it was clear to people who I was interviewing that the officer had emotional problems um had been seeking help and to follow up uh the officer going over to the mayor's house the night before and to pick him up and to throw into the mix and this is from the officer himself um that that no no one could be trusted that he was going to get charged that he couldn't you know couldn't trust the white officers that that that was such a step over the line that for a police chief to do that it merited being terminated when you were considering that one the the criminal one makes a lot of I mean that's kind of black and white to me but on this one there seems to be more of discretion um judgment um as to termination versus maybe a year suspension two years or something something else right so I want to drill down just a little bit more with you why termination and not another punishment that you may have considered it was there a track record elsewhere in the Commonwealth where that's typically what H I don't know why I don't want to put no and and and I I didn't have a track record on the on the on former Chief Castro that that at all I didn't know of any other problems he had he may have had them at the sheriff's department I don't know and I wasn't making that assumption that he did I know that's the law enforcement agency that he worked at before and I think you're absolutely right there is a lot more discretion um with this one part of it was the fact the termination part of it was the fact that he was under suspension by post at that time and the fact that he was still going to meetings deciding the the the city budget and still interacting with officers bringing this type of stuff forward that played a role in my mind that he was suspended by post at the time but I think you're absolutely right um councilman there is a lot more flexibility there than there is in someone who lies and is committing a felony and the last one for your recommendation one wasn't sustained but this one was unethical hiring practice is I believe that one also you recommended termination why the reason for that was it was something that had spread over from when he was uh before he was even um the police chief and it had continued right through and there were three people one of whom was hired who actually was still uh was still under suspension by post and another one uh and he was um trying to get and the best way I can put it is trying to have he knew he couldn't vouch for this individual but he was trying to get other officers in the department to vouch for this individual and it seemed to me it was almost like trying to create a conspiracy to get this individual onto a police department and that's why I made that recommendation in termination to me is the nuclear bomb I mean that's something that's pretty serious you're taking someone's livelihood um potential pension depending on things and depending on time I mean it is a significant a penalty you've offered that three times on three different allegations and that I the magnitude of that is significant and I I just don't want to gloss over that that that you've decided that you were going to in your review you were going to throw the most harsh penalty you possibly could based on that and I just want to make sure that I'm clear that you chose not to go in between you went to I'm going to say the word extreme but that's not that's got a negative connotation but to the very edge to the end right so I'm not sure if you want to comment on that again or not just that I don't do it very often that's not that's not a usual recommendation from cic it it it takes um some extraordinary circumstances for that to be the recommendation from us and that is a powerful statement based on what you have done in your track record throughout the Commonwealth and you've seen a lot and to say that that's a rare occurrence that you offered this I'm not sure I don't want to use the word extreme but to the the most significant penalty possible there there it is uh says says a lot to me thank you um to cap recap my my comments on this you can say you're sit down by the way when you're done and I'm finished asking my question I'm willing to get you and uh and Mr Mo and some water because you guys have been here for a while would you care for a glass of water because after I'm done I'll be happy to get you Mr Mo are you all set all right you guys are going to stick it out all right um listen to me the focus here we're hearing a lot about other stuff timing we're hearing about investigations on this that and the other I'm hearing all that and I'm not saying that's not important but I want to crystallize what I think we should be focusing on here when you have a report that's been made by someone of the stature of secretary Bennett that was not refuted by the secondary report that was issued by Maverick regardless of the other stuff that we've been hearing this evening regard L of that but it's not not refuted at all that's powerful we I think should be more focused on the individual who has caused the damage that's bringing us here tonight it's Mr Castro let's be honest this report there are three other officers I understand that but in comparison that is where this we our focus should be on and I am tr I have so far just listening I'm having an open mind but that the book is about to get shut here on my on on as I'm was trying to be neutral on this and hearing all sides because there's nothing I'm hearing tonight nothing that I'm hearing tonight that suggests to me that our focus should not be on Mr Castro I think that is where it should be because of the pages and pages that the testimonies the emails the conversations if you go and yes there's other stuff there too but if you focus on the principle that is where the focus is and so my I'll stop there I don't want to get to a conclusion but you can read where I'm going with this so I'll stop right there thank you very much council president presid thank you uh through you council president if I may I think you to make your 10:00 vote motion to pass by 10 second hi uh thank you through you council president um just to elaborating something that my colleague vice president said and and to you Mr hudin that I have a lot of respect um you said something earlier that you are the gatekeeper of the city and I just want to remind you that you might be The Gatekeepers but we are the check right ERS so you should one time I told you that I I asked you to somehow just give us legal's opinion because that's what you're here for I don't know if you remember that and I don't want to keep pounding on you I don't I don't think it's fair but some flaws throughout the investigation or throughout the way that we get the communications or the information it comes to us again as as you most likely as your legal opinion most of the time I mean most likely as your personal opinion most of the time when we talk about anything well I think well I think no no what is the legal that you should tell us but again just that that hit me when you said I'm the gatekeeper of the city which is great but we are the check writer so somehow you need to communicate with us evenly the same way you communicate with upstairs and and I with all the respect that I have and again I don't want to keep beating a dead horse because I don't think we're going to go anywhere but hopefully this meeting like I always said bring something and positive and and and we can at least get the right communication between all of us and the legal department and us so we can don't look as fools outside because we look fools when somebody else had the information that you should provide to us and we don't have it and some people in this building might have the information that we should have and again we don't have it and somehow people get the information before we do and sometimes I'm home wondering how it happens when we have a City attorney that might have this information on his hands but we don't have it and when we asked the mayor he said you work for us when when we ask you somehow that we don't got the information the mayor has it to us you work for the mayor so so it's it's confusing with all you respect I I think we should change the way we we do the legal stuff here and we should communicate with this legislative body at the same time we communicate with the mayor whether it's something that have to do with reports or anything legal that we are involved that's that's what I'm saying and and and that's that's great I'm almost set with you and and if I ask one last question to uh Rob Mr Maverick uh Mr M uh yes when they hired you you said that you were hired to check on two devices I'm sorry say that again did you said that you were hired to investigate basically you said two devices and I don't want to quote everything that it's in the intro but you said on your own words two devices right yes a cell phone and a laptop a laptop and what was the finding on those devices if you can if you can share with us so um we downloaded text messages from the um cell phone and uh emails from the um laptop so it in a cursory review initial review of the text messages um without further context they didn't look so good they required further context which was supplied and you'll note in the investigation that it says that the explanations were sufficient to rule out any valid of valid concerns of collusion doesn't mean that somebody couldn't say well this one any valid the rest of it is just white noise so we gave those text messages in full to the parties that were communicating and asked them for explanation which they provided which we reviewed which we then made a finding that nothing to see here nothing valid came out of that did require context though because without that context one could look at it and make an assumption of what it meant that's not what we did we asked for clarification we got it and that's that and now also at the beginning of the meeting you say you're not you some type you're in agreement with the benett report all the findings you're not we didn't no we did not reinvestigate with Daniel Bennett did so I I didn't have those interviews with people I didn't look at the necessarily the same information because we were not investigating anyone we were investigating to determine and how it expanded and if there was collusion okay what I was going with that is that in that same context you said that you not had to discuss that it's just what you were hired to do but if was something you would have done it differently what would the different something different that you would have done that benett did that you wouldn't you said at the beginning two things I would have interviewed William Castro no matter how long it took me to do it and two I do not in attorney how and said it um we do not make recommendations on discipline that is not for us to do you make a finding and you should state that you know this finding is a violation of this policy City Policy Department policy recommend uh forwarded to department head or hiring and firing Authority for their review if it appeared to be a violation of the law appears to violate Mass General Law whatever recommend that you send to uh the county uh district attorney or AG's office for review so perhaps a philosophical difference in how we would do things but I would have made darn sure that we interviewed William Castro because what's you'll find um because I did read his 200 105 page rebuttal I did read all of his exhibits that he asserts support his findings that makes a difference that does make a difference um so but no I didn't have a problem interview well you know eventually the police officers did sit down with us um but they filed grievances they didn't want to sit down with with us we had it scheduled for one date they requested it move two weeks later okay no problem okay again they weren't the target of my investigation um I had considered just contacting them but I was damned if I did damned if I didn't because if I didn't follow procedure and request it through then there would be criticism on that end so I went through the process but again each officer literally when they came in I made it clear to them that they are not the target of any investigation that we're trying to just gather information and obtain understanding I appreciate the Hitman comment but it's just not true thank you uh one last question Mr hoen uh thank you for your all set Mr hoodon even though everything is public everything is out there so is is this meeting in order and there's no legal consequences for none of us while you know going through this report which is public but I want to hear from basically our legal advisor which is you sure obviously you could stray into areas that we have agreements on stray into areas that are protected that's my job here is to make sure that you don't again when I say gatekeeper I'm sorry I am the gatekeeper for you too and just because you're m the council doesn't mean that you might not do something that puts the city in Peril and my job is to protect the city not protect the council not protect the mayor so yes if you were to delve into areas that I believe that you should not that could put the city at Bay I mean you you might very well say something as simple as well I think we're Wicked liable I think we should pay up I would tell you that's not something you should say that puts the city in Peril so it may be your opinion that's why I'm here thank you thank you right we have uh Council Lon oh thank you council president and the good things being the last one so most of my question you're not the last one I'm not oh oh good oh you the last one a c president Sano okay I'm almost um some of my questions are already um you can they answer but I do uh I still have a few questions uh just for the record and I want to ask through you uh council president if if we uh a a letter was sent to the mayor uh to mayor depa for this meeting if we send a letter inviting him to this meeting no we did not okay all right thank you but do we it's uh this is a Contin we have we have the continuation of the previous meeting which on the previous meeting we did invite uh the administration and and then we have a representation of the mayor here okay that okay and uh for the record can Madame CLA read the letter that was sent to us for the first meeting from the from mayor depa uh January 22nd is in the front please if I'm c yeah I I have that letter here it's um January 22nd 2005 2025 excuse me LA City Council um regarding the benett report it says Dear counselors I'm unable to attend your meeting tonight I am awaiting the results of a report I commissioned regarding the Castro situation it is my belief that the Bennett report is incomplete and both reports need to be reviewed once the new report is complete I will share a copy with the council we'll have a press release discussing both reports thank you in advance for your cooperation sincerely Ryan a depena um thank you I just wanted uh that for the record and I want to ask uh the a a City attorney if I may council president sure just for the record how many months we waited for the venor report and I know you answered this in the first meeting but I wanted to repeat that how long the entire benett report took no how long do we you office made us wait for the Benet report because according to uh Mr vet he submitted a report on October 13 if I not I'm not mistaken correct how many weeks how many months we waited okay just so you know I did not make you the council wait I made everyone wait I did not distribute it to anybody I believed I had the legal right because it was an ongoing investigation to withhold it from everybody I do not C single out the council I did not single out any counselor I believe I was doing my job I believe that the city may have been in Peril if we released a document that was still under investigation so you mean Mr Bennett Mr that wasn't the question I'm sorry Mr Mo when did you get the report Bennett report sorry when did we get the Bennett report um uh I don't have a specific date was before January yes it could have been I it it would be in the report so still investigating again I can only control what I do much like when I was here last time and I I I just take great umbrage at this because the mayor accuses me of leaking documents you accuse me of leaking documents I no but I if I may council president I just I just you know sometime I just have to speak up a little okay I didn't give it to anybody if someone here gives it to a third party you can't blame me if someone from the mayor's office gives it to a third party you can't blame me my office did not give it to anybody my office protected it so I the question should be did I hand it to him no that did not happen when I was here the last time a document was released to a third party I never had that document in possession I never saw that document so I'm I'm just take umbrage that there's a suggestion that somehow there's a leak in my office it's I do what's according to the law I give it when and if someone else goes around around me that's on them it's not on my office so that your office never never never send it to to Mr uh to the m to the mavick investigators again I can't say never I've been asked for that after the the time that it was released I may have sent him a copy I at this point I can't tell you ever but I'm saying I never leaked it to anybody when I was trying to withhold it okay no problem counc l oh thank you uh I'm not finished yet no problem no problem and thank you for uh clarifying that uh and did the report you don't know but I'm assuming maybe should I ask the other consultant it that report was unredacted cuz the one that was sent not to you I think the one that was the one that was leaked to Mr Dugen was UN no no no the vet report the one that was sent to the second Consulting agency can I ask the other Consulting agency of course you have the floor yeah um thank you so much what a long nine the the report that you received it if that report it was unredacted it was unredacted yes okay okay thank you initially um we just had the narrative we didn't have the exhibits so had no idea what was being referenced is that a common practice to get uh a on redacted report but I'm asking because they made us wait I mean personally they made me wait months to get a report the Benet report because the excuse was that it was unredacted is that a common practice that you re uh for you Consulting agency to receive unredacted uh reports so yeah if it's part again the Bennett investigation was literally we had no idea what was what was what so it was it was research for us it was reading it was part of the investigation not that we were reinvestigating that but getting a history of what happened because we didn't know what happened we weren't told what happened we weren't suggested what may have happened it was very our scope was very narrow on what we were doing so it was I requested things so that I could have a better understanding of what had transpired so and uh I believe and I don't remember at what point I did request the exhibits and I believe I believe it was from attorney hooton who emphatically stated in his email that because it was um subpoenaed by post or whatever that it was highly confidential blah blah blah blah blah I mean he he put that language in there which of course we understood but In fairness to attorney hton he absolutely when he did forward the exhibits because we only had the narrative at first made it crystal clear to us that it was again I I think it was something that he didn't need to say but needed to say just so it could be documented understood that that was not to be shared which we did not share it with anybody it was for our purposes only to get history and understanding but you just saying that you receive an email for the city's attorney and he just mentioned the exhibits the exhibit you you receive a report exhibit exhibit the exhibit which is the benett report no no no no the exhibits that he refer ref to in his reports okay so the do the secondary documentation okay on so you never cuz my first question is that if you receive an unredacted uh uh an unredacted uh benit report that was my first question yes okay so it's not a you can call it whatever you want to call it but no no no what what what he's what we're trying to say here that hton didn't send the report but he did send the supplementary documentation of the report to sequent cor correct cont so there would been a there would be a later request after they had the initial Bennett report they there was a request that they get the supplementing documents I so this would be later it would again you got to look at it in two parts explain it okay if if you look at your agree your document it has 83 Pages that's the report much like when you have a book and there's a reference that I took this information from another book or I I got this information for discussing it those are the exhibits so when he initially got his report whoever he got the report from he did not get any exhibits so at a later date he requested from my office the exhibits having already had the report that's what I wanted to know but not from me not from you but that's what I wanted to know if if their report was sent to the second consultant it was yes it was thank you I I appreciate and then un redacted unredacted I have no idea I did not okay you didn't exactly so it was sent to the second consultant on uh well you don't know because you don't have so what we know now is that the city sector attorney didn't send their report to the second consultant but he received the venor report okay and again just so we don't parse words initially at some later date I might have sent him a redacted version at some later date well beyond that I might have sent him another copy if anybody asked me another copy I would once it was released I would gave it to everybody so I'm not going to say ever because that's something that I know somebody will try to come back maybe you can help me with that if I'm doing an investigation it it's that appropriate for me to receive a report will that uh make me go into a different direction instead of me or the consultant doing the investigation first at least interviewing the officers first no again enlight me with your answer if you if you're listening to what they say and again this is not my testimony is these are two completely separate investigations one is an investigation into William Casto and some other activity the other one is that there was a belief that the uh Bennett rep report may have been influenced by outside information so that that was being researched the outside information again I didn't order either one I don't know now that I have you there uh and I know what we it's been difficult for your office because we have asked a lot of questions and requests a lot of information in the last day especially me and well so my colleagues too but um the point that I'm trying to make here is that your office made us wait weeks months for the report for the ven report correct yeah thatat is correct for the rec um I think that's all the questions that I have for you I'm being nice tonight all right thank you and and I want to can I go back cons president to the consultant to Mr Mo yes please do you have any relationship um uh professional friendly relationship with Joel Salomon I was the deputy chief in Salem New Hampshire Joe Solomon was the chief in methan of course I know the man so Sergeant samard mentioned that he asked that question which I wrote in my report that it was respectful and I didn't take offense to it took a little bit of offense tonight but that's okay he asked if we'd ever worked with Eis and I said yeah last month they subcontracted a surveillance to us on a case that they were working because it was in New Hampshire okay a lot of pis like RCB and Maverick collaborate on a lot of projects that's what it was okay that's it so Joe Solomon doesn't own my company Joe Solomon has never been to my house we've never gone out to dinner we've never shared a beer do I know him of course I know him I was in the neighboring town did he recommended this job to you in by any way did they do what I me if if Salomon Joe Solomon mentioned this job opportunity with the city of lawence this contract to do this investigation to me yes no I I I didn't seek the City of Lawrence they sought us okay that's where I'm going that's where I'm that's I I don't I don't know how to answer that question except that when they came to us the first investigation that we did was forensic extraction and I will tell you that yes State Police does have that capability okay but a lot of private investigators don't we also offer polygraph services that a lot of Investigative Services don't I don't know why they came to us I don't I have no clue I don't know Octavian spanner I don't know Brian depena I don't know any of these people none I don't know Joe Solomon so we are in the same in the same place but I know that Mr Castro knows Solomon and Mr Castro used to work well he's working he's back with um uh Octavian spanner that was the person that called you I'm we're just trying I'm trying to navigate here because I know the president of the Union mentioned it and some of my constituents also uh they send question because this is a second I think what you need to focus on is the find you don't tell me what I need to focus on I'm asking questions our report didn't do any favors to William Castro and it didn't do any harm to any member of the Lawrence Police Department so if I were uh a plant for somebody I didn't do a very good job for them because the our report does not do any favors for William Castro nor does it harm in any way any member of the Lawrence Police Department okay I was a police officer for 25 years I will bleed blue until my final breath okay we did not have a Target there was no member of the Lawrence Police Department that was a Target absolutely not it was never asked of us it was never suggested to us and it certainly wasn't an our finding and I appreciate your coming and thank you for your service to this great nation as a police officer former police officer but my job as a city councelor uh is to ask questions some of them are not what you want to hear and my one of my well I think it's one of my last questions to you you is that where did the interview of Mr Castro took place at the office Maverick Investigative Services office okay with myself and Rob buer and why did uh is that a I think you mentioned or the other Mr benett mentioned that they usually record the interviews and in Mr Castor case the the the interview was not recorded is that part of your practice no he declined to have it recorded just as if the officers had declined to have it recorded I wouldn't have recorded it you always want to have a recording of it um but I documented I summarized and you can see in the report the summary everything that he said which is a summary of course it's not verbatim um and I did the same thing with the people that I did and then attached the audio to the report which was on the thumb drive did the other officers have the same do you offer the other uh people that you interview the same yes um opportunity yes you did yeah okay according to the only difference that has he mentioned is that on the William Castle situation since Cas denied the recording we don't know what was the conversation we just have the statement of facts correct and the statement of fact is say it's a fairly summary of your understanding of what he said is that correct that is correct so it's not necessarily what he said but your understanding of what he said I'm taking notes as he's speaking so yes I mean did I catch every word no of course not yeah difference than the Benet report that the Benet report actually transcribed the conversation correct on that uh corre and that's one of the mayor difference between the two what I did with the ones that were recorded I summarized and then the full audio file was part of the report that was on the thumb drive yeah um and oh thank you counil president um okay and there was no criminal finding in your report just for the record we we weren't tasked with doing that that was not I just wanted to hear from you I and go ahead no we weren't tasked with investigating that okay some of the thing that I noticed uh with the two report is that you Consulting uh firm had a ver communication with the mayor's office it looks like with the other consulting firm uh with Mr benett consulting firm things were a little bit more difficult it's not your fault it's not your fault well I think I need to clarify that I spoke to the mayor two times you did when we sat to discuss the scope of the investigation and who would be our contact which was attorney hton mhm and then the day that I dropped off the report okay I didn't have attorney hton was probably the person that I communicated with the most who set up the interviews or if I called them and I I had a question um or I requested material uh so when when I say that I came to City Hall I'm trying to give kudos to the professionalism of the people that at work here because it was it was inviting It was friendly and professional okay a totally different situation with the other Consulting agency may I just address that because it's been brought up a number of times it should be noted that the first investigation was of William Castro um because it was of William Castro and the relationship between the mayor and William Castro myself and Michael Owens detered deted that it was best that we removed the mayor from the situation so nothing was going through the mayor because we did not want the appearance of of anybody interfering with that so I think if you ask Mr Bennett to come up right now and ask him was everybody in the city um amenable to him did he have any problem getting people he would say he did not I don't want to speak for himself both sides I don't like I don't want anybody to think like one one investigating group got all the people in one didn't I think Mr Bennett will speak for himself why Mr Bennett didn't speak to the mayor I think because myself and Mr Owens were shielding the mayor because it was his friend and we didn't want anybody assuming that there was an undue influence what I find concerning uh attorney is that the mayor was uh part of the conversation and we I was not there and you were not there we don't know what happened in that conversation with a second uh Consulting agency that is concerning to me as a city councelor uh again I'm not the mayor I'm just telling you the process and I appreciate that and also I appreciate all your emails and all your response I appreciate that and I appreciate your job sometimes I disagree with the way you handle communication yes and I have one last question to you I'm sorry council president uh you left me for for the end and um where you were ordered by the mayor mayor Thea not to release and this is for the record not to release the vened um uh documents after the DA office release it release the report and this is good for you because at the beginning people thought that you release the venet report so this an opportunity for you to to make an statement correct you release the report ordered by mayor thean after the da release it okay so you were waiting for the mayor you were waiting for his order to release the report to all of us because I got it at the end of the uh around after 300 p.m. on that day and it was being reacted by office reacted for two months come on attorney we no no no again I'm not saying that again everybody's misinterpreting from the very beginning we were not going to release the Bennett report it was it was our belief that it's an ongoing investigation we did not want to release it to anyone and I respect your opinion I disagree with that uh thank you uh uh to both Consulting um agencies for responding all my questions and and that's what I have council president Cel Sano thank you council president I would like to have in the podium U Mr Mo for for no from the the company for the mavick Okay so okay and in the report mention it about interview for Mr William Castro yes you said that in the report the the interview was not recorded but how you can describe how was the interview a date time something to realize because it's not recording and not much in the record and I would like to ask you as well H how many time how many hours or can you specific the time the do you make the interview for the lieutenant and and Captain or the for the attorney as well I would like to know H the how many hours um approximately an hour for each officer maybe a little bit more may a little less roughly an hour um William Bennett's cast uh William Castro's uh interview was on November 14th I believe he reported to the office at 10:00 a.m. and and it was approximately 6 hours um I Heard a question like again we weren't we weren't inter we weren't re reinvestigating what Mr Bennett's findings were so I did not ask him about the pursuit or what his perception was because that's not what we were investigating we were investigating how it expanded okay yes I wanted to hear from him because I wanted to hear how he thought it expanded okay does that mean that it's it's absolutely truth no that's when you go and you try to corroborate statements that are being made and from the officer standpoint um quite honestly a big part of the interview with each officer was can you explain the post procedure as you understand it and the reason we were asking that is that we were quite clear now Rob budger retired in 2012 I retired in 2019 from New Hampshire post is fairly new and completely foreign to us so we were trying to understand exactly what is required what their understanding was and quite honestly there is a lot of confusion they don't quite know and part of that is because post is relatively knew Growing Pains whatever um but we were trying to understand we were trying to get their understanding of it okay again it was not accusatory nobody was the target of our investigation at all so I can't answer for anybody why they decided to do that except that I can say that from the forensics the extraction we did say some of these texts don't look so so good and they need further explanation they need context and once they had context again you will see that our finding was there's no valid concerns here and in the interview in the interview I can see Castro talk about some police officer but the those police officer didn't cat catch you your attention to call for interview like Montes no [Music] Aguilera how many police officer do you interview three would you like to know why tell me why okay one is the union president one is the accreditation manager and one is overseas IAS those would be the three people that would have in our estimation the most knowledge of what we were trying to understand okay whether what William Castro says is is accurate or not I don't know because we didn't investigate that that was not the scope of our investigation William Castro was not the target of our investigation there was no target other than to determine how the investigation expanded and if there was any collusion which would have interfered with Mr Bennett's findings I can't speak to Mr Bennett's findings and what he because we didn't investigate that you asked the question if I would have done things differently I would have done things differently it doesn't mean that Mr have Ben it's wrong just that I would have done it differently that's fine thank you thank you all right uh any other counselors counselor before you you going you're going to finish up with that are you going to ask a few questions Cel Pres inant I I I want to finish off this discussion um I know council president has a few questions but to re reiterate something really extremely important that is has a legal aspect uh so if the City attorney can come just so just so you can listen um um from the post letter the commission wishes to State most emphatically which emphatically means forceful without a doubt that it will take whatever steps are necessary to protect the ability of any law enforcement officer in the Commonwealth to make good faith reports to the commission freely and without any fear retaliation and the commission will forcefully act in response to any evidence of actual or threatened retaliation such actions may include making in referrals to appropriate prosecut Pro prosecut entities to bring that to the Forefront again because out of all everything in in that letter to me that's the most important the most serious paragraph especially because we do have testimonials in the benon report that reflect what this says um and I and I want to make sure that if post or any or any individ whether a city employee post whatever gets involved in a situation that refers to this that we do not cover anything up that we don't play these political games and that we do what we're supposed to do by the law and I'm going to end with that thank you mad chair you going to pass the go over um I'm going to bring up a few things probably some comments and some some questioning that I'm still debating on my mind um so just to to Mr Mo um so Mr Mo first of all we would like to to just say thank you to you and to Mr uh Mr Bennett from being here definitely appreciate you guys being here so um just looking into the documents that um Mr gasto provide uh to you for the investigation as of how this this investigation expanded and if it was an interaction um this the the report that he submit to post uh when did that happen I don't know the exact date um it would be in the report I don't recall off the top of my head what the date was but I believe it was sometime in December yes so why this report that he submit to post was important to the investigation why would it be important yeah if it was after the f have much to do with the reason that he was able to do that is he had his first hearing um and he wheeled in his suitcase size tote and post gave him 30 days to produce his rebuttal um his rebuttal um as I said is 205 pages with 65 exhibits um yes I read every single page um is there exculpatory potentially exul atory evidence in there I believe there is and that's why it's important to interview the target of your investigation because you have a circumstantial case without the targets or the the subject of the investigation testimony and then given his opportunity to speak and then he provides backup documentation to that that circumstantial evidence now Isn't So circumstantial anymore now again this will be up to post at this point to review that and determine if it's if the findings are still valid that was not our job that's not what we did that's not what we were asked to do and it's certainly not what we did I did however read that listen to what everybody had to say what they wanted to add gave them opportunity to explain some things that were of at first blush concerning and I think the report is clear that they are no longer of a concern so I so so essentially what you're saying is that even though your investigation went on you guys investigate two different devices at the beginning uh you investigate uh how these might uh how the investigation is founded if it was an interaction and none of that uh was conclusive or interfere with correct with the with the report correct so your report was as you're saying uh did not change the fact that it was an original report and it was for recommendation from the banner report I'm sorry could you repeat that so your report or did not interfere or recommend otherwise uh compared to the banner report no so it is it is if I if I if I ask a question tomorrow uh by somebody saying oh it was a second report and the second report actually bring up the truth of the case is that the case it brings up the truth that there was no collusion exactly it brings up the truth that there's terrible communication it brings up the truth that there's no trust on either side okay that's what it brings up the truth on as far as whether I'm saying that Daniel Bennett's investigation is not valid no I don't there's nowhere in my report that had said that no and nowhere in the report that it said that an officer or anybody can't report to post yeah that's and post letter is inaccurate okay the procedural missteps were when that report was sent via email and ended up to recipients that it shouldn't have gone to because a group email was selected that mayor depena happened to be on so it went to unintended recipients that's the procedural misstep cuz there's nowhere in post that it says that anybody but the head of the agency is mandated there is no place in the Lawrence Police Department policy that it says anybody but the chief is mandated okay but it does talk an awful lot about confidentiality so when you send something via email and you make a mistake and you send it to a group email with unintended recipients not saying it was done intentionally but it was certainly careless that is why when I delivered my report it was hand delivered it wasn't sent electronically and it certainly wasn't sent to anybody other than the mayor but I mean uh it is important that you mention that because your report was the one that was get get to to the Press without within six hours what I can tell you is it's not it's not it's not your control it's out of your I delivered one hard copy and one thumb drive but you see you see how this community is been so like into because of that situation you given it to the mayor's office yeah I and then all of a sudden he get to the Press like I said there's no trust we not no Mar and if I could solve that for you then I be charging a lot more money um so uh essentially I would like to know um so I have a quick question for for Mr bannett uh thank you Mr M so Mr Mr Mr Bennett have you done any type of similar investigation uh I didn't take a that amount of time and that amount of effort and that amount of money for a temporary employee in the past for a temporary employee in the past have I oh yes for temporary employees for for police no temporary employees temporary employee because Mr Kasa was a temporary employee oh temporary employee uh no I don't think I have for a temporary employee no usually what is the pro I mean the process for a temporary employee I mean do we have you seen anything like this been done I haven't done an investigation of uh I'm trying to think of I don't I can't think of an investigation I've done on a temporary employee um I can't think of one off hand I've done investigations of employees who were in their first year of work for someplace so that they had no Civil Service protection and things like that but not for a temporary employee that I can think of okay so based on your and and the and and the previous investigation with the City of Lawrence and you're in this investigation with the City of Lawrence uh were you did you get access to information that you need to perform your duties and any interference uh from the from the administration perhaps um other than having a communication to Halt the the investigation the the only interference I had in my investigation was being told to Halt it that's correct from the City of Lawrence okay and your decision were made based on U evidence that you that you were getting throughout the entire investigation correct okay all right uh I have no more questions I mean I think that uh we are clear uh on this on the situation that the second investigation didn't oversee or overpass the first investigation that that everything that we have here we' we keep we keep on hearing that uh one super superp pass the other one that's not the case they are two independent investigation with two different things uh two main objective different objective um even though they targetting the same case uh but I mean I would like to just close by saying it was it's been a a great effort by by the investigators uh Mr Bennett thank you for everything that you did on the original investigation and Mr Mo uh for clarifying what the second investigation was all about and and I think that the city council you know have opened the floor to this investigation that's something that um we we we felt intrigued by the fact that that originally uh the internal Affair investigation was not sufficient inv not sufficient information to M to to keep to keep up with the case but all of a sudden we have over uh 600 pages of uh of of documentation and investigation and and and and and a resolution uh that recommend termination and 90 days suspension for that uh for the person in question so thank you for everything they have done okay you're welcome thank you very much thank you all right this point um do we have any further comments or questions seeing none I will now I'll make a motion to withdraw motion has been made to withdraw item 2825 of is there a second second seconded by councelor De Rosario discussion seeing none all those in favor say I I and the eyes have it I will entertain a motion to adj motion to adj SEC properly second all please say I I ni have it thank you counselors