5 April 18th-April 24th, 2024 phoenixnewtimes.com PHOENIX NEW TIMES | NEWS | FEATURE | FOOD & DRINK | ARTS & CULTURE | MUSIC | CONCERTS | CANNABIS | Attitude Problem How Phoenix undercut its own police oversight agency. BY TJ L’HEUREUX I n January, the city of Phoenix began publicly fighting independent over- sight of the Phoenix Police Department, claiming its recently created watchdog agency provides “robust, independent, civilian review of the PPD.” At the same time; however, city officials were working to curb the independence and power of that agency, the Office of Accountability and Transparency, and its director, Roger Smith. Smith told Phoenix New Times in an interview that OAT made “pretty good, meaningful inroads” with Phoenix police during his tenure. The pushback, Smith said, came from another source. “The people who have opposed civilian oversight with the most fervor and energy are the City Manager’s Office and the Law Department,” he said. Documents obtained by New Times suggest that top city officials — including City Manager Jeff Barton, Deputy City Manager Ginger Spencer and City Attorney Julie Kriegh — worked for months to ensure that Smith did not hire Catherine Bowman, the lawyer Smith wanted to serve as his deputy, even after she already had been offered the job. In the city’s efforts to block Bowman from being hired, a portrait emerges of Phoenix officials’ heavy-handed control over OAT, which Smith led until he left the agency on Feb. 9. “Events have led me to conclude that OAT does not have the independence required to effectively perform its respon- sibilities,” Smith wrote in his resignation letter, which he submitted on Jan. 29. Bowman would have brought 35 years of legal experience, most of it involving policing issues in Arizona, to the account- ability office. “That’s a mighty capability to bring to OAT. And that’s why I think they didn’t want her,” Smith said. “They did not want that capability coming into OAT.” It’s been more than two and a half years since the U.S. Department of Justice began investigating the Phoenix Police Department out of concern that it has engaged systematically in excessive use of force, discriminatory policing, retaliation against protestors and violation of the rights of unsheltered and disabled people. When the Justice Department finds systemic problems and patterns of miscon- duct during investigations of police depart- ments across the country, it typically seeks independent oversight to reform the department through a “consent decree,” a type of legally binding performance- improvement plan. But the city has made it clear it does not want to cooperate with the Justice Department by signing a consent decree, even after city police officers killed more people in 2023 than they did in the previous year. This is the story of how OAT got declawed and stripped of authority to do what it originally was created to do, and how Smith ended up in a position where he felt as though he had no choice but to leave. Dumbed down and downgraded The police oversight agency was created in May 2021 by the Phoenix City Council, three months before the Justice Department stepped in to investigate the police department. In November 2021, Smith was hired following a nationwide search to lead OAT, which was designed to “provide civilian oversight of adminis- trative investigations of misconduct allega- tions” made against officers, according to the city’s website. As the first director of the fledgling agency, Smith was tasked with building it from the ground up. Smith, who grew up in New Jersey, previously worked at the New York City Civilian Complaint Review Board, one of the country’s oldest civilian oversight agencies, and then ran a similar agency in Cleveland. The agencies in New York City Roger Smith, former director of Phoenix’s Office of Accountability and Transparency, resigned in February. City officials nixed his choice for hiring an attorney for the police oversight agency. The office was created in 2021 to provide an independent watchdog over the Phoenix Police Department. (Photos by TJ L’Heureux and Matt Henniw) | NEWS | ‘Sweetheart Deal’ Rivals pounce on Rachel Mitchell’s plea deal with former prisons boss. BY STEPHEN LEMONS I s Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell, a rock-ribbed Republican, soft on crime? That’s how her Republican primary rival, Gina Godbehere, portrayed Mitchell during Godbehere’s appear- ance Friday on J.D. Hayworth’s radio show on KFNN 1510 AM. The candidate blasted Mitchell for what she called a “sweetheart deal” with Charles Ryan, former director of the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry. Godbehere, who lost a GOP primary challenge to Mitchell in 2022 by nearly 15 points, is Mitchell’s only opponent in the Republican primary on July 30. Godbehere swung hard at Mitchell from the right during her interview with Hayworth, a former U.S House member from Arizona. She said that a county attorney deal allowing Ryan to plead “no contest” in February to one count of disorderly conduct for a drunken barri- cade incident — during which he pointed his pistol at two police officers — was an example of what ailed the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office. “The problem with the county attorney is she’s wedged between a Democratic governor and a Democratic attorney general, and she has liberal staff that are running that office,” Godbehere said. “When you allow sweetheart deals, like in the Ryan case or pointing the gun at police, and you’re not holding offenders accountable, this is the problem we’re having,” she added later in the interview. Godbehere, the former city >> p 7 >> p 10 Gina Godbehere, who is challenging Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell in the Republican primary, criticized Mitchell for not “holding offenders accountable.” (Photo by Gage Skidmore via Flickr)
