The City of Winston-Salem’s public safety committee has recommended an independent panel be formed to review the Jill Marker case. The city council is expected to vote on the panel later this month.
City Manager Lee Garrity was asked to consider an alternative to an independent panel, however:
The proposed independent panel is also different from a suggestion made at the public-safety committee’s previous meeting. The members asked Garrity at the time to consider hiring an outside company to review the police department’s handling of the Marker investigation.
A company that city officials had been interested in already had a connection with the case and, therefore, could not be picked to do the job. Moreover, council members asked Garrity recently to set up an independent panel of volunteers.
“They just wanted it to be as transparent as possible,” he said.
It’s not explained in the article why an independent panel would be more transparent than an investigation by an outside company. But people living in Greensboro and reading this article are probably nodding their heads.
