Harrowing images from a videotape showing Goose Creek police pulling guns in the midst of more than 100 students in a Stratford High School hallway linger. So does the question of whether any officers will be charged for their roles in an ill-advised, failed drug raid that has attracted unflattering national publicity.
And though local residents have been choosing sides in the continuing debate over that controversial Nov. 5 police action, there has been dismay expressed on both sides that 9th Circuit Solicitor Ralph Hoisington, after conducting an investigation of his own and considering a 200-page SLED report on the incident, has declined to file any charges or to declare the case closed. Instead, Mr. Hoisington has withdrawn from the case, turning it over to the state attorney general.
Though some criticize Mr. Hoisington for passing the buck, the solicitor told us Friday that he had no alternative. He said that because he is "part of the law-enforcement community" and frequently prosecutes cases in alliance with the Goose Creek police, he is not the appropriate prosecutor to move forward on charges against any of their officers. As he put it: "If I had somebody on my staff charged with a crime, it wouldn't be this office that would prosecute that case."
He likened his investigation to "a preliminary inquiry," explaining that if he failed to find sufficient evidence to advance the case, he would have dropped it -- just as he dropped a case after failing to find sufficient evidence to charge North Charleston police in the 2000 shooting death of Edward Snowden. But Mr. Hoisington said he could not reach such a conclusion in this case, so he sent it to Attorney General Henry McMaster.
Even so, Mr. Hoisington was critical of what he called the police's "paramilitary" tactics: "People that have weapons drawn on them would consider that to be force."
He added: "Can you justify restricting the rights of all those people in such a dramatic fashion to try to catch the few? I don't think so."
The solicitor's decision raises the question: If a conflict of interest precludes a prosecutor from filing charges against police from a department with which he regularly works, why should that prosecutor be in a position to clear those police?
Yet Mr. McMaster's spokesman, Trey Walker, told us Friday: "Solicitors commonly refer these types of cases to our office. It's a longstanding practice."
Mr. Walker also said that the attorney general will review the solicitor's information, the SLED report and any other related material, then "decline prosecution, prosecute or refer it to another law-enforcement entity." That other entity would likely be another solicitor in this state. The attorney general's office declined to give a time frame for its decision on this case.
Solicitor Hoisington said possible charges in this case include pointing and presenting a firearm, assault, assault and battery, and assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature. He added that federal authorities could file charges for civil rights violations.
The attorney general's office should recognize the extraordinary public attention created by this case and, albeit with deliberation, move to expedite a decision.
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