Today, on the second anniversary of the shooting death of Robert "Woody" Woodward by Brattleboro police, it would be easy to let sleeping dogs lie. Residents, police, local officials and eyewitnesses at the church where the shooting occurred have grappled with this for 24 months, and to a large extent they have been successful in putting it behind them.
The police force has added two non-lethal weapons to its arsenal, and, to its credit, has peacefully defused at least one volatile case involving a heavily armed suspect. Town officials have created a competitive salary and benefits package to attract and retain good officers, and a number of new recruits have joined the force.
So why not just let this ugly memory fade away?Woodward's death at the hands of Officers Terrance Parker, who remains on the force, and Marshall Holbrook, who does not, is the subject of a pending wrongful-death civil suit, which to some extent precludes town officials from openly discussing this issue.
But time has not healed this wound because too many questions keep it raw, and little has been done to ease or even acknowledge the pain of Robert Woodward's family and friends.
Woodward -- by all accounts a peaceful, free-spirited man -- inexplicably entered a West Brattleboro church during the 10 a.m. worship service asking for sanctuary, brandishing a knife and demanding that worshippers listen to him. He was at times ranting and incoherent, in the throes of what appeared to be a psychotic break. But by the time police arrived, several mental health professionals in the congregation had calmed Woodward, who was then seated behind the podium, knife put away, in quiet conversation.
Yet less than a minute after police entered the church, Woodward was shot with seven .40-caliber rounds from the two officers' semi-automatic guns. Four rounds went into his right arm, shattering his elbow, one into his left arm, one in the abdomen and one in the back.
Police said later that Woodward made a threatening motion toward them with the knife, which until that time he had directed only toward himself. Some witness statements corroborate that contention -- which is central to the officers' argument that they acted correctly -- and others dispute it.
Perhaps it was the perfunctory way in which law enforcement officials pronounced this shooting justified. Police Chief John Martin, then the interim chief, defended the action just days afterward, even though the state police investigation would continue for months.
Attorney General William Sorrell's supporting conclusion puts a spin on the incident that would do Madison Avenue proud. Resting on witness testimony that corroborates the police position, and dismissing the testimony that does not, the document is little more than a justification for Sorrell's foregone conclusion.
Absent a grand jury or a formal independent investigation, several meticulous civilian analyses of the testimony cast a much-needed outside eye on the events, but were categorically dismissed by officialdom. It was Sorrell's material, not any of the civilian work, on which the FBI and the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Justice Department based the ironic decision that Woodward's civil rights had not been violated and hence, no further investigation was necessary.
Woodward's friends have a long list of outstanding questions that an objective, comprehensive investigation should have answered. Why didn't police attempt to negotiate with Woodward? Why was he handcuffed and left to bleed profusely for 13 minutes, despite a doctor's pleas that she be allowed to treat the abdominal wounds that ultimately led to his death? Why were the police officers allowed to write their follow-up statements in the same room at the same time? What about two witness statements indicating that most of the shots were fired after Woodward had fallen to the floor?
For our community, other pressing questions remain: What has changed in Brattleboro in the past two years? Could something like this happen again? What happened to calls for a civilian police review board and other community recommendations that grew out of a series of roundtable discussions?
Plausible answers have been in short supply these past two years. Woodward's friends' persistent questions and demands, their monthly picketing on a Brattleboro street corner, their silent march today down Main Street, are uncomfortable reminders of one very bad Sunday morning in our sleepy Vermont town. But they also remind us of the official machinery that kicked into gear, stamping out thin, inconsistent answers that don't hold up under close scrutiny.
A life was lost in Brattleboro on Dec. 2, 2001. To ignore that not only diminishes Woodward. It diminishes all of us.