Local
Cheh questions subpoena power Fenty gave to police chief
By: Bill Myers
Examiner Staff Writer
December 17, 2008
A key D.C. councilwoman expressed concern Wednesday about a new executive order from Mayor Adrian Fenty that appears to grant Police Chief Cathy Lanier broad authority to issue subpoenas.
The order, signed quietly by Fenty last month and posted on the city’s Web site last week, gives the chief the power to probe “any municipal matter” and allows Lanier to delegate her subpoena power “to her subordinates.”
Councilwoman Mary Cheh, D-Ward 3, a constitutional law professor and former prosecutor, wrote a letter Wednesday to Fenty, asking him to explain the order.
“I have grave concerns over the prospect that this authority may serve as an attempt to make an end-run around the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement,” Cheh wrote in the letter, obtained by The Examiner. “To permit the chief of police to issue subpoenas would essentially convert the Metropolitan Police Department into a form of Grand Jury.”
Attorney General Peter Nickles told The Examiner he didn’t know anything about the new order and declined comment.
Rank-and-file members of the police department are worried that the chief will use her new powers to hunt down dissenters, union official Delroy Burton told The Examiner.
“It’s an extraordinarily broad authority and it’s dangerous,” Burton said. “It’s unprecedented.”
D.C. only has the authority to prosecute misdemeanors and juvenile offenses. Otherwise, it must rely on the U.S. Attorney’s Office to investigate crimes and to issue subpoenas.
A law enforcement source told The Examiner that the Fenty administration reached out to the U.S. Attorney’s Office while crafting the order. Fenty was worried because his regulatory agencies couldn’t move faster in prosecuting low-level criminal cases like housing violations.
His police department has also struggled to prosecute juvenile cases because it can’t compel witnesses to testify and can’t get sworn statements from witnesses without a grand jury, the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Federal agencies like the FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration are sometimes given subpoena power for broad categories of criminal investigations. But the power is usually temporary and must be reviewed periodically.
Last year, the FBI lost a bid to expand its subpoena power in terrorism cases.
It’s unclear if any city police department has ever had subpoena power. Officials in the Baltimore, Chicago, Richmond and New York police departments told The Examiner that their chiefs have to ask for subpoenas from the courts.
The order, signed quietly by Fenty last month and posted on the city’s Web site last week, gives the chief the power to probe “any municipal matter” and allows Lanier to delegate her subpoena power “to her subordinates.”
Councilwoman Mary Cheh, D-Ward 3, a constitutional law professor and former prosecutor, wrote a letter Wednesday to Fenty, asking him to explain the order.
“I have grave concerns over the prospect that this authority may serve as an attempt to make an end-run around the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement,” Cheh wrote in the letter, obtained by The Examiner. “To permit the chief of police to issue subpoenas would essentially convert the Metropolitan Police Department into a form of Grand Jury.”
Attorney General Peter Nickles told The Examiner he didn’t know anything about the new order and declined comment.
Rank-and-file members of the police department are worried that the chief will use her new powers to hunt down dissenters, union official Delroy Burton told The Examiner.
“It’s an extraordinarily broad authority and it’s dangerous,” Burton said. “It’s unprecedented.”
D.C. only has the authority to prosecute misdemeanors and juvenile offenses. Otherwise, it must rely on the U.S. Attorney’s Office to investigate crimes and to issue subpoenas.
A law enforcement source told The Examiner that the Fenty administration reached out to the U.S. Attorney’s Office while crafting the order. Fenty was worried because his regulatory agencies couldn’t move faster in prosecuting low-level criminal cases like housing violations.
His police department has also struggled to prosecute juvenile cases because it can’t compel witnesses to testify and can’t get sworn statements from witnesses without a grand jury, the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Federal agencies like the FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration are sometimes given subpoena power for broad categories of criminal investigations. But the power is usually temporary and must be reviewed periodically.
Last year, the FBI lost a bid to expand its subpoena power in terrorism cases.
It’s unclear if any city police department has ever had subpoena power. Officials in the Baltimore, Chicago, Richmond and New York police departments told The Examiner that their chiefs have to ask for subpoenas from the courts.
