THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, March 6, 1996 TAG: 9603060617
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MAC DANIEL, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE LENGTH: Medium: 56 lines
The Chesapeake City Council on Tuesday met in closed session for half an hour then postponed deciding whether it wanted to publicly call for a grand jury investigation into the performance of the police department.
Despite the decision to continue the executive session at next week's meeting, one city official said Tuesday that Circuit Court Chief Judge Russell I. Townsend has taken the matter under advisement and could decide to hand it to a sitting grand jury within the week.
The city official also said the council is not seeking a special grand jury because such a jury would not have authority to issue criminal indictments.
The Chesapeake Police Department came under fire last month after Police Chief Ian M. Shipley Jr. failed to satisfy the council, which had questions about an internal investigation surrounding the arrests of the sons of a longtime councilmember, a sheriff's captain and a police captain.
Councilmembers declined to comment Tuesday after the 30-minute meeting. Mayor William E. Ward would only say that the council had continued the executive session until next Tuesday.
``We haven't asked anybody to do anything,'' said Ward.
City officials said last week that City Attorney Ronald S. Hallman had asked Judge Townsend whether a special grand jury was ``a viable option'' to get to the bottom of the police department's actions.
Judge Townsend reportedly asked for more details and might reply to the council's request as soon as today, officials said.
A new grand jury has just been impaneled and is meeting today, city officials said.
The Virginia State Police has refused to conduct an independent review of the case after being asked by the council. State police officials said that, based on what they had been told, it was an administrative matter and not criminal.
In question are how the police investigated crimes allegedly committed by the sons of three prominent people and whether an internal affairs investigation and the official reprimands to five officers that followed were adequate.
In one of the cases, Alan Keith Butt, 27, son of veteran Councilman John W. Butt, and William Jeremy Brickhouse, 20, son of Sheriff's Capt. William Brickhouse, are charged with receiving stolen property allegedly taken from Givens Honda in 1994.
In a separate case, William Lawrence Spruill Jr., the 23-year-old son of police Capt. William L. Spruill, is charged with grand larceny and breaking and entering in the theft of an all-terrain vehicle from the home of Vice Mayor Robert T. Nance Jr.
Nance has removed himself from all proceedings dealing with the case, he said Tuesday. by CNB