Officer involved in fatal crash is faulted

Report says speed, judgment at issue

A Boston police officer who sped through South Boston streets on his way to help an officer in distress was reckless and used poor judgment, causing a crash in which a 36-year-old woman was killed, according to the department's Internal Affairs Division.

Officer Jesse Stots, a 13-year veteran, violated department rules of emergency response when he drove through an intersection at 51 miles per hour nearly a year ago as he rushed to help an officer who was being attacked by a man with a knife, police said yesterday.

Stots struck the side of Ann-Marie McNally's Saab at the intersection of D Street and West Broadway. She was three blocks from home, according to her family.

"I truly believe that if the officer followed policy this wouldn't have happened," Commissioner Edward F. Davis said yesterday. But he also said the department has to improve training at the Police Academy so officers understand what can go wrong when they are driving during emergencies.

"We have to do everything we can to make sure it doesn't happen again," Davis said.

McNally's family has agreed to help the department develop more training and might participate in a video that would be shown to officers, he said.

In July, Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley found that Stots was not criminally responsible for McNally's death on Nov. 10, 2007. But in a five-page letter to Davis, Conley said the department has to reexamine officers' training regarding driving during emergencies. Davis has asked the Police Executive Research Forum, a Washington organization that works to improve police procedures nationally, to look at the department's policy.

The department's Internal Affairs Division sustained the findings of a review board made up of high-ranking Boston police officers, a legal adviser, and three state troopers. The board, which convened Sept. 10, concluded last week that Stots should have slowed down when he approached the intersection because obstructions hindered his view.

Stots is out on injured leave and has not returned to work since the accident, according to his lawyer Thomas Drechsler, who said he was not notified of the board's review or given an opportunity to defend his client at a hearing.

"I hope that my client isn't going to be made the scapegoat here, and the department will take to heart the comments the district attorney made about training," Drechsler said.

Thomas Nee, president of the Boston Police Patrolmen's Association, said Stots is traumatized by the accident.

"Our hearts collectively go to the family of the young lady," Nee said. "But at the same time I do know that Officer Stots has suffered immeasurably since that day and time. He has not been the same person."

Davis said he has not decided how Stots will be disciplined.

Michael McNally, Ann-Marie's brother, deferred to Davis's judgment when a reporter asked what should happen to Stots.

"It was really important for us as a family that he was held accountable," McNally said. "Something like this could happen again if you don't show that something like this is not acceptable."

Maria Cramer can be reached at mcramer@globe.com.