Revere police sergeant fired for actions after officer's death
REVERE - A high-ranking Revere police officer who fled the scene after the fatal shooting of his colleague last year, then diverted an officer responding to the scene so he could get a ride home, was fired yesterday by Mayor Thomas G. Ambrosino.
Siding with a recommendation for dismissal from Police Chief Terence K. Reardon, Ambrosino terminated Sergeant Evan Franklin, 37, stating that his actions the night Officer Daniel Talbot was killed were a "breach of the most fundamental of police responsibilities."
"I have little doubt, as confirmed by Chief Reardon's testimony, that some police officers in our department would have difficulty working with, and under the leadership of, a superior officer who fled the scene, as Sergeant Franklin chose to do," Ambrosino wrote in his decision, released yesterday. "However, I conclude it was not this lack of leadership at the time of the shooting, but rather Sergeant Franklin's conduct upon confronting the first responding unit, which justifies dismissal."
Franklin, who has been suspended with pay since the Sept. 29 shooting, will appeal the decision, his Boston-based lawyer, Neil Rossman, said. Reardon had suspended Franklin without pay for five days, the maximum penalty the chief can dole out, last month, prior to the April 16 termination hearing before Ambrosino, the city's appointing authority.
"I'm disappointed, but I'm not surprised," Rossman said in a phone interview yesterday. Franklin, he said, was disappointed also.
"He knew it was coming, but he feels he's a victim of this situation also," Rossman said. "Obviously not a victim who paid with his life like Officer Talbot, but still a victim of what occurred that night."
On the night of the shooting, Franklin and Revere police Officers William Soto, Stacey Bruzzese, Talbot, and Talbot's fiancée, Connie Bethell, were at Revere High School's baseball field drinking beer from a cooler in Soto's truck. Sometime after 1 a.m., the group exchanged words with a 17-year-old youth later identified as Derek Lodie.
According to reports, Lodie left the scene but returned a short time later with other young men, including Robert Iacoviello Jr., 20. Lodie allegedly taunted Talbot, luring him toward the parking lot, where the other men were waiting, and where prosecutors say Iacoviello shot Talbot in the head. Talbot died later that day.
While Soto returned fire and Bruzzese protected Bethell, the unarmed Franklin fled the scene, according to testimony and police reports. Franklin's service weapon was inside Soto's truck, unsecured, a felony under state law.
Some distance later, Franklin came upon Officer Robert Impemba, who was responding to the shooting in his cruiser, and asked him for a ride home. Upon learning that Impemba was on his way to the shooting, Franklin got into the back seat and, according to Impemba's written statement, said, "All right then, just bring me to Broadway."
Franklin did not tell Impemba that he had been at the scene of the shooting, according to reports.
"To divert Officer Impemba from immediately responding to the crime scene was indefensible," Ambrosino wrote. "To fail to mention to Officer Impemba anything at all about the shooting was unconscionable."
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