It’s taken almost four years but a citizen board to review South Bend police misconduct allegations has started meeting, without really telling the public.
Charles King, director of the new Community Police Review Board office, said the nine-member board has met three times at the Human Rights Commission’s offices, 319 N. Niles Ave. King said he’s been posting meeting notices in the lobby. That technically meets the letter of Indiana’s Open Door Law but King said the meeting notices were not distributed in any way that most people might have seen, like through the news media.
He said the board has not yet reviewed any cases.
"Boy, those first sets of meetings were so operational, it was just really us discussing our structure," King said. "I don't think it was something that media probably wanted to be involved in but it was an opportunity for us to kind of discuss which direction our board would operate, according to the ordinance."
WVPE on Friday asked the city clerk’s office whether it had been notifying the media about the meetings. The clerk then emailed WVPE a list of the board’s meeting dates. As it turns out they’ll be meeting monthly and their next meeting is Thursday at 6 p.m. in Suite 150 of the Key Bank Building. Their meetings are open to the public.
Mayor James Mueller hired King a year and a half ago but it’s taken the council this long to appoint the board members and get them trained through the police department’s Citizen Police Academy. For his part, King said he’s been visiting other cities to study their community review boards and writing the board’s bylaws.
Mueller hired King after The South Bend Tribune reported that the planned office’s former director, Joshua Reynolds, had been suspended seven times in his prior job as an Indianapolis police officer. Former Clerk Dawn Jones had hired Reynolds in 2021. He quit later that year over the scandal.
King said the board already has two cases to review. He declined to provide details on those cases.
