ACLU Calls for Release of Full State Police Investigation of Cranston PD

The state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union is calling upon Cranston Mayor Allan W. Fung to release the full copy of the state police investigation into issues at the Cranston Police Department.

The ACLU announced Wednesday that the mayor’s public statements this week that he is seeking an advisory opinion from the attorney general before releasing the report out of privacy concerns are “unnecessary and unwarranted.”

“In many respects, the report is at the bottom of an examination of personnel and investigative matters, and so reliance on APRA exemptions ultimately serves merely as an excuse to withhold vital information from the public,” Brown said in a statement. “The city should not seek to use the open records law as a shield to withhold disclosure of critically important information from an investigation of alleged serious abuses of the public trust.”

A full copy of the letter sent to the mayor can be found HERE.

Fung himself was admonished by the state police in a summary released earlier this week for alleged interference in the investigation.

The interference centered on Fung’s efforts to work out an arrangement with a disgraced officer at the center of the so-called Ticketgate scandal to bring him back to the department in exchange for a demotion.

The ACLU contends that even if the AG’s office determines that some information in the report should remain withheld from disclosure, “it is completely in [the mayor’s] hands whether to do so.”

Fung on Monday night addressed the City Council and said that he asked the state police to investigate the police department knowing that his own actions and managerial decisions would be scrutinized.

He has since acknowledged missteps and pledged to do better.