Story at a glance
- Five officers were fired after an internal investigation.
- This was prompted by the death of William Harvey, 60, in police custody.
- Harvey’s family wants a further investigation into his death.
Five police officers in Georgia have been terminated from the force following the controversial death of William Harvey.
Another officer has been suspended in the wake of the incident.
Harvey, 60, who was Black, died while in police custody on April 2. He was reportedly taken to police headquarters in connection with an aggravated assault investigation.
He was found dead in the interviewing room, having apparently hung himself while left alone.
Despite police’s efforts to resuscitate him, Harvey was pronounced dead at the scene. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) ruled the death a suicide.
“At the conclusion of the SPD [Savannah Police Department] investigation, two department members were terminated, and one was suspended. Another officer was terminated for a previous incident that was not related to the Harvey investigation,” the SPD press release said.
The officers who were terminated include Corporal Silver Leuschner, Sgt. Michael Kerr, Officer Rodheem Greene, Sgt. Christopher Hewett, Cpl. Erica Tremblay, and Officer David Curtis.
Officer Matthew White, meanwhile, was suspended.
The charges are diverse and include violations of supervisory responsibility, violation of employee responsibility and oath of office ethics, as well as insubordination.
Part of these terminations follow an investigation into an inappropriate group chat between officers where they shared images and memes of a Black man hanging in the wake of Harvey’s death.
The Savannah Morning News reports that attorney Mawuli Mel Davis of Davis Bozeman Law is representing Harvey’s family.
In April, Harvey’s family said they did not believe that he committed suicide and called for a further investigation into the incident.
“In a climate where Black men and women are dying in deadly interactions with police, there must be proper investigation that is thorough, transparent, and most importantly truthful. The family wants Savannah and the rest of the world to know that Mr. Harvey was not suicidal and they do not believe he would ever have harmed himself,” a press release from the law office said in April.
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