An independent investigator is now looking into how the authorities and local government handled the Daniel Prude case.
New York City attorney Andrew Celli is a Rochester native who’s spent much of his career focusing on police accountability. He is now bringing his expertise back to Rochester to look into the case that has put his hometown in the national spotlight.
During a news conference, Celli said, “The City Council has asked us to conduct a thorough investigation into the intragovernmental processes that were in play and to determine who knew what when with respect to the death of Daniel Prude. There’s really one question here and that is was there a cover up?”
City Council voted on Friday to give Celli authorization to move forward with this case, with full subpoena power.
Celli says subpoenas will be issued as early as Monday to the mayor’s office and City Hall, the Rochester Police Department, the City Law Department, and Rochester City Council.
Most called to testify will be under oath and are expected to include Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren and former RPD Chief La’Ron Singletary.
"The number of subpoenas is not clear, more than a handful for sure. Our hope is to be done with this investigation in approximately three months," said Celli.
Celli describes the game plan and goals of the investigation. First: determining the timeline.
“Gather information and put them on a timeline so that we know specifically from documents and testimony exactly what happened, in what sequence," said Celli.
Second: identifying internal communication.
“How government actors within the city of Rochester structure communicated with each other behind closed doors, not in public about what they knew and when they knew it,' said Celli.
Three, examining external communication.
“What is it that city of Rochester officials said publicly and what did they know when they said it. Was there a cover up with respect to the public? And I think that’s a compelling question that President Scott has asked us to answer," said Celli.
“City Council will have an extremely limited role in this investigation. The way I see it, our job is to insure that Mr. Celli has unfettered access to any information he may need to be able to issue his report," said Rochester City Council President Loretta Scott.
“This is not some kind of generic report where we’re going to give you a bunch of information and ask you to figure out what to do with it. We are going to provide our best response to those three questions, the timeline, internal cover up, external cover up," said Celli.
