A Connecticut police officer's membership in the Proud Boys, a far-right group known for engaging in violent clashes at political rallies, didn't violate department policies, the town's police chief has concluded in response to a civil rights group's concerns.
The East Hampton officer, Kevin P. Wilcox, "stopped his association" with the Proud Boys in February, about five months before the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law inquired about his social media connections with other group members, Police Chief Dennis Woessner said.
In a letter to the Washington-based civil rights group, the police chief acknowledged that Wilcox had been a Proud Boys member and made online payments to a group leader. The rights group described those publicly visible, online transactions as monthly dues that helped fund the Proud Boys' "violent or otherwise illegal" activities.
But the chief said he reviewed the matter, received an "explanatory report" from Wilcox and closed the department's inquiry as being "unfounded," with no evidence to support a policy violation. Wilcox "adamantly denies being associated with white supremacists' groups," the chief wrote in a letter dated Sept. 13.
Kristen Clarke, the civil rights group's president and executive director, said she was "astounded" by the police chief's refusal to take any action against the officer.
"In an era where we are seeing a spike in white supremacist activity, this should sound an alarm. It should not be business as usual," Clarke said during an interview Tuesday.
Wilcox didn't immediately respond Tuesday to a message left at the town's police station or a text message and voicemail left at an apparent telephone listing for him.
He has been an East Hampton police officer since 1999 and never had any complaints of racial bias made against him, according to Woessner. The chief said department records show Wilcox, who patrols a town with an overwhelmingly white population, has stopped only white people between January 2018 and September 2019.
"There is no question that he is not a white supremacist," Woessner said Tuesday.
Asked what he knows about the Proud Boys, the chief said, "Only what I searched on the internet."
East Hampton has roughly 13,000 residents and is about 20 miles southeast of Hartford. On its website, the town's police department says it currently has 11 officers and four sergeants.
An initial letter from Clarke to Woessner, dated July 24, noted that a federal jury in 2008 awarded more than $27,000 in damages to a man who accused Wilcox and other East Hampton officers of using excessive force during an arrest.
The plaintiff, Alan P. Clark, claimed Wilcox repeatedly struck him in the head with a metal flashlight while trying to subdue him. Clark said he needed about 14 staples to close his head wounds.
Jurors concluded that Wilcox violated Clark's constitutional right to be free from excessive force and decided the officer was liable for just over $11,000 in damages to compensate Clark for his injuries. An attorney who represented Clark said Tuesday that the parties reached a confidential settlement less than two months after the trial.
"Officer Wilcox's association with white supremacists on public platforms, as well as his history of violence, risks interfering with your department's operations by disrupting the working relationships between the East Hampton Police Department and the community it serves," Clarke wrote in her July 24 letter to the chief.
In a Sept. 26 response to the chief's Sept. 13 letter, Clarke wrote that the police department should immediately review any stops, arrests or investigations by Wilcox "to determine whether or not they were infected with racial bias." She also asked for a list of any complaints against the officer involving allegations of racial bias, discrimination or harassment.
The chief hasn't responded to the letter, Clarke said.
Wilcox isn't the first law enforcement officer linked to the Proud Boys, a group started in 2016 by Vice Media co-founder Gavin McInnes.
Last year, a Louisiana sheriff's department fired a deputy who had publicly identified himself as a Proud Boys member and was an administrator of the Facebook page for the group's local chapter. The Plaquemines Parish Sheriff's Office said its deputy violated an internal policy prohibiting employees from engaging in social media activity that "negatively affects the public perception" of the department, The New Orleans Advocate reported in August 2018.
McIness and the Proud Boys have described the group as a politically incorrect men's club for "Western chauvinists" and deny affiliations with far-right extremist groups that overtly espouse racist and anti-Semitic views. In February, McInnes sued the Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center for labeling the Proud Boys as a hate group.
In response to the lawsuit, the law center said Proud Boy members often spread "outright bigotry" over the internet and have posted social media pictures of themselves with prominent Holocaust deniers, white nationalists and "known neo-Nazis."
"Soon after McInnes unveiled the Proud Boys to the world, the group began making headlines for its members' involvement in often-violent, ideological street confrontations with other groups," law center attorneys wrote in a court filing.
In New York City in October 2018, police arrested several Proud Boys members who brawled with anti-fascist protesters following a speech by McInnes at a Manhattan Republican club. Proud Boys members also have frequently clashed with counterprotesters at rallies in California and Oregon.
Clarke noted that the Philadelphia Police Department placed 72 officers on administrative leave in June after a nonprofit group published a review of personal Facebook posts or comments by officers in several U.S. police departments, including messages that were racist, Islamophobic and identified with right-wing militia groups.
Follow Michael Kunzelman on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/Kunzelman75 .
PARIS (AP) —
Reuters photographer Mohammed Salem captured this year’s prestigious World Press Photo of the Year award Thursday with a depiction of loss and sorrow in Gaza, a heartrending photo of a Palestinian woman cradling the body of her young niece. The photograph, taken in Khan Younis just days after Salem’s own child was born, shows 36-year-old Inas Abu Maamar holding five-year-old Saly, who was killed along with her mother and sister when an Israeli missile struck their home.
Salem, who is Palestinian, described this photo filed Nov. 2 last year, as a “powerful and sad moment that sums up the broader sense of what was happening in the Gaza Strip.”
The image ”truly encapsulates this sense of impact,” said global jury chair Fiona Shields, The Guardian newspaper's head of photography. “It is incredibly moving to view and at the same time an argument for peace, which is extremely powerful when peace can sometimes feel like an unlikely fantasy,” she added.
The World Press Photo jury praised the shot’s sense of care and respect and its offering of a “metaphorical and literal glimpse into unimaginable loss.”
This is not the first time Salem has been recognized for his work on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; he received a World Press Photo award more than a decade ago for another depiction of the human toll of conflict in the Gaza strip.
In the three other global categories announced Thursday, South Africa’s Lee-Ann Olwage won Photo Story of the Year for her touching series “Valim-babena,” featured in GEO magazine. The project focused on the stigmatization of dementia in Madagascar, a topic she explored through intimate portraits of “Dada Paul” and his family. Lack of public awareness surrounding dementia means that people displaying symptoms of memory loss are often stigmatized.
In the series, “Dada Paul,” who has lived with dementia for 11 years, is tenderly cared for by his daughter Fara. One of the standout images in the series shows him preparing for church with his granddaughter Odliatemix, capturing moments of normalcy and warmth amidst the challenges of dementia.
Photographer Alejandro Cegarra, a Venezuelan native who migrated to Mexico in 2017, won the Long-Term Project award for “The Two Walls,” published by The New York Times and Bloomberg. Cegarra’s project, initiated in 2018, examines a shift in Mexico’s immigration policies, which have moved from being historically open to enforcing strict regulations at its southern border. The jury said the photographer's perspective as a migrant gave it a “sensitive," human-centered perspective, according to a press release.
Julia Kochetova of Ukraine won the Open Format award for “War Is Personal.” The project stood out from coverage of the ongoing conflict by offering a personal look at the harsh realities of war. On a dedicated website, she merged traditional photojournalism with a diary-like documentary style, incorporating photography, poetry, audio clips and music.
The Associated Press won the Open Format award in the regional Africa category with the multimedia story “Adrift,” created by journalists Renata Brito and Felipe Dana. The story investigates the fate of West African migrants who attempted to reach Europe via a treacherous Atlantic route but ended up on a ghost ship discovered off Tobago. The team’s compelling use of photography, cinematography and detailed narrative, enhanced by expert design and multimedia elements, highlights the perils faced by migrants and the human stories behind global migration issues.
The Associated Press' Ebrahim Noroozi won the Asia Stories award for his series “Afghanistan on the Edge,” which documents the country since the Taliban took over in August 2021.
World Press Photo is an independent, nonprofit organization based in the Netherlands, founded in 1955.
This image provided by World Press Photo is part of a series titled Afghanistan on the Edge by Ebrahim Noroozi, Associated Press, which won the World Press Photo Asia Series category and showsAn Afghan refugee rests in the desert next to a camp near the Torkham Pakistan-Afghanistan border, in Torkham, Afghanistan, Friday, Nov. 17, 2023. A huge number of Afghans refugees entered the Torkham border to return home hours before the expiration of a Pakistani government deadline for those who are in the country illegally to leave or face deportation. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
This image provided by World Press Photo is part of a series titled Afghanistan on the Edge by Ebrahim Noroozi, Associated Press, which won the World Press Photo Asia Series category and shows : Since the chaotic Taliban takeover of Kabul on Aug. 15, 2021, an already war-devastated economy once kept alive by international donations alone is now on the verge of collapse. There isn't enough money for hospitals. The World Health Organization is warning of millions of children suffering malnutrition, and the U.N. says 97% of Afghans will soon be living below the poverty line. Three Afghan internally displaced children look with surprise at an apple that their mother brought home after begging, in a camp on the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Feb 2, 2023. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
This image provided by World Press Photo is part of a multimedia project by Associated Press' Renata Brito and Felipe Dana titled Adrift, won the World Press Photo Africa Regional Winner Open Format category and shows a mortuary technician opening the door of a refrigerator used to store the remains of migrants recovered from inside the Mauritania boat that appeared drifting near the island of Tobago, in Scarborough, Trinidad and Tobago, Tuesday, Jan. 25, 2022. In May 2021 a boat from Mauritania full of dead men was found off the coast of the Caribbean Island of Tobago. Who were these men and why were they on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean? Two visual journalists sought answers, uncovering a story about migrants from West Africa who seek opportunity in Europe via an increasingly popular but treacherous Atlantic route. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)
This image provided by World Press Photo is part of a multimedia project by Associated Press' Renata Brito and Felipe Dana titled Adrift, won the World Press Photo Africa Regional Winner Open Format category and shows young fishermen walk into the ocean to board an artisanal fishing boat in Nouakchott, Mauritania, Friday, Dec. 10, 2021. In May 2021 a boat from Mauritania full of dead men was found off the coast of the Caribbean Island of Tobago. Who were these men and why were they on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean? Two visual journalists sought answers, uncovering a story about migrants from West Africa who seek opportunity in Europe via an increasingly popular but treacherous Atlantic route. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)
This image provided by World Press Photo is part of a multimedia project by Associated Press' Renata Brito and Felipe Dana titled Adrift, won the World Press Photo Africa Regional Winner Open Format category and shows Moussa Sako, an asylum-seeker from Mali, who survived 22 days aboard a Mauritanian boat drifting in the Atlantic Ocean covers his face during an interview with the Associated Press in Guadalajara, Spain, Sunday, Nov. 14, 2021. In May 2021 a boat from Mauritania full of dead men was found off the coast of the Caribbean Island of Tobago. Who were these men and why were they on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean? Two visual journalists sought answers, uncovering a story about migrants from West Africa who seek opportunity in Europe via an increasingly popular but treacherous Atlantic route. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)
This image provided by World Press Photo and taken by Julia Kochetova is part of a series titled War is Personal which won the World Press Photo Open Format Award. Amidst tens of thousands of civilian and military casualties and an effective stalemate that has lasted for months, there are no signs of peace on the horizon for Russia's war in Ukraine. While news media updates its audience with statistics and maps, and international attention drifts elsewhere, the photographer has created a personal website that brings together photojournalism with the personal documentary style of a diary to show the world what it is like to live with war as an everyday reality. (Julia Kochetova/World Press Photo via AP)
This image provided by World Press Photo and taken by Julia Kochetova is part of a series titled War is Personal which won the World Press Photo Open Format Award and shows a stabilization point near Bakhmut, Ukraine, of the 5th assault brigade and 77th brigade. Hospitalliers battalion - volunteer battalion of combat medics are helping here. Amidst tens of thousands of civilian and military casualties and an effective stalemate that has lasted for months, there are no signs of peace on the horizon for Russia's war in Ukraine. While news media updates its audience with statistics and maps, and international attention drifts elsewhere, the photographer has created a personal website that brings together photojournalism with the personal documentary style of a diary to show the world what it is like to live with war as an everyday reality. (Julia Kochetova/Der Spiegel/World Press Photo via AP)
This image provided by World Press Photo and taken by Julia Kochetova is part of a series titled War is Personal which won the World Press Photo Open Format Award and shows the training of mobilized conscripts of 68th brigade in Donetsk region, not far from frontline. 68th brigade recently liberated Blagodatne village during the Ukrainian counter-offensive. The instructors came from US, working for NGO "Saber".Amidst tens of thousands of civilian and military casualties and an effective stalemate that has lasted for months, there are no signs of peace on the horizon for Russia's war in Ukraine. While news media updates its audience with statistics and maps, and international attention drifts elsewhere, the photographer has created a personal website that brings together photojournalism with the personal documentary style of a diary to show the world what it is like to live with war as an everyday reality. (Julia Kochetova/Der Spiegel/World Press Photo via AP)
This image provided by World Press Photo and taken by Alejandro Cegarra for The New Times/Bloomberg is part of a series titled The Two Walls which won the World Press Photo Long-Term Project Award and shows Carlos Mendoza, a Venezuelan migrant, crossing the Rio Grande river to seek asylum in the United States. Piedras Negras, Mexico, 7 October 2023. (Alejandro Cegarra/The New York Times/Bloomberg/World Press Photo via AP)
This image provided by World Press Photo and taken by Alejandro Cegarra for The New Times/Bloomberg is part of a series titled The Two Walls which won the World Press Photo Long-Term Project Award and shows a migrant walking atop a freight train known as "The Beast." Migrants and asylum seekers lacking the financial resources to pay a smuggler often resort to using cargo trains to reach the United States border. This mode of transportation is very dangerous; over the years, hundreds have fallen onto the tracks and have been killed or maimed. Piedras Negras, Mexico, 8 October 2023. (Alejandro Cegarra/The New York Times/Bloomberg/World Press Photo via AP)
This image provided by World Press Photo and taken by Lee-Ann Olwage for GEO is part of a series titled Valim-babena which won the World Press Photo Story of the Year Award and shows Dada Paul Rakotazandriny (91), who is living with dementia, and his granddaughter, Odliatemix Rafaraniriana (5), get ready for church on Sunday morning at his home in Antananarivo, Madagascar. 12 March 2023. (Lee-Ann Olwage/Geo/World Press Photo via AP)
This image provided by World Press Photo and taken by Lee-Ann Olwage for GEO is part of a series titled Valim-babena which won the World Press Photo Story of the Year Award and shows Joeline (Fara) Rafaraniriana (41) watches her father, Dada Paul Rakotazandriny (91) clean fish at home on Sunday afternoon. A typical Sunday consists of the family attending church in the morning and spending time together in the afternoon. Fara works during the week and as the sole provider and carer for her daughter and father struggles to manage all her responsibilities in the absence of assistance by her siblings who live close by. Mandrosoa Ivato, Antananarivo, Madagascar. 12 March 2023. (Lee-Ann Olwage/Geo/World Press Photo via AP)
This image provided by World Press Photo and taken by Mohammed Salem of the Reuters news agency won the World Press Photo Award of the Year and shows Palestinian woman Inas Abu Maamar, 36, embracing the body of her 5-year-old niece Saly, who was killed in an Israeli strike, at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, October 17, 2023. (Mohammed Salem/Reuters/World Press Photo via AP)
