To the editor:
In 2018, I ran as a progressive candidate for DA. Now, I’m supporting Tim Shugrue. The depth and breadth of Tim’s legal experience will enable him to actually bring substantive criminal justice reform to Berkshire County. The current DA has not done this, nor will she. This story is one example of how I know this is true.
In 2017, I was hired to represent an 18-year-old Latinx man with no criminal record and was working two jobs. He had been beaten and tased by three white police officers inside his home while in his stocking feet. He was charged with three counts of assault and battery on a police officer, resisting arrest and disorderly conduct.
The police unapologetically reported that they had struck my client with batons, punched him in the face and tased him with a stun gun numerous times. Months before trial in August 2019, I repeatedly asked Ms. Harrington’s office to dismiss this case due to the police officers’ obvious use of excessive force and the lack of criminal conduct by my client. Each time, Ms. Harrington refused.
On the morning of trial, I confronted Ms. Harrington in the hallway and asked her again to dismiss the charges. I reminded her of her promise to bring a more enlightened approach to the criminal justice system. She refused. Instead, Ms. Harrington deferred to the rogue police officers who brutally beat my young Hispanic client — exactly the kind of conduct she purportedly stands against. Thankfully, the jury did the right thing and acquitted him on all charges.
Worse, Ms. Harrington later told the NAACP that by the time she learned about the case, it was too late for her to dismiss it. This is not true.
We’ve had four years of progressive rhetoric without action. The verdict is in. With Ms. Harrington, it’s just rhetoric, not deeds. A progressive DA would never have prosecuted my client.
In contrast, Tim Shugrue is a stand-up guy. He ran against David Capeless in 2004 for many of the same reasons that I ran against Capeless in 2006. We shared a disdain for the thuggish use of mandatory minimums by that office to incarcerate nonviolent individuals. Now we both believe that there remains a deep need for criminal justice reform in Berkshire County and that this can be accomplished hand in hand with effective law enforcement, not in spite of it.
Judith Knight
Great Barrington
