…But this time it wasn’t Officer Greg Kwiatkowski (click here for more background). Officer Ann Vanyo took the witness stand Thursday morning in this latest in a series of disciplinary hearings regarding Officer Cariol J. Horne. Of course by now it is well-known that Horne is the black female cop who was allegedly punched in the face by the white male officer Gregory Kwiatkowski over a year ago on 11/1/06 because she intervened on his choking a black suspect David Neal Mack of 707 Walden Ave in Buffalo NY. As you can just imagine, the next few moments following that incident were extremely tense, top level decision making by superior officers on the scene would have made Horne’s hearings unnecessary. What is said to have taken place is something completely different.

Vanyo says she was one the officers that tried to pull Horne away from Kwiatkowski in the immediate aftermath; according to her Horne was the aggressor. In Vanyo’s 11/1/06 P73 statement handed to Fillmore/Ferry St. precinct Chief Marcia Scott, she states “she then pushed me with full force on the chest with both of her hands.” Angry words were then exchanged: “when I heard officer Kwiatkowski say ‘get the f—k off me!’ I went up there, I pulled her off his back… I restrained myself from falling on the ground after she pushed me.” During further cross-examination by Horne attorney Dr. Kenneth Nixon, Officer Vanyo added that Horne told her ‘f—k you, you white bitch,’ “Next I seen her she was running up to the patrol cars.”

Vanyo seemed to contradict herself on a few occasions or just wasn’t clear on things you would think she remembered. She said when she answered the call to Mack’s home she went into the kitchen but couldn’t see anything because the doorway was blocked; she couldn’t remember where everything was because she was too busy trying to find out what was going on. Apparently she is the only officer that went upstairs who didn’t have any personal description of what went on. Hmmm. Nixon and co-Counsel Anthony Pendergrass don’t believe she ever went upstairs to Mack’s apartment. Indeed she seems to be only specifically descriptive about the events that took place after the other officers dragged Mack outside. Oddly enough her testimony about Horne jumping on Kwiatkowsk’s back runs in direct conflict with Kwiatkowski’s who is on record saying she was never on his back. She also testified that she didn’t see what kind of a hold Kwiatkowski had on Mack and she did see Horne swinging at Kwiatkowski but didn’t see any contact made. Prior to a morning break Nixon tried to press her on this but to no avail.

Vanyo and Horne have some history of conflict, in fact it may well be that Officer Vanyo had run-ins with several Black female officers including one that was sitting in the audience and asked to leave because she is expected to be a witness; Officer Justine Harris (Nixon was about to go into a transcript of a 911 transmission 10-years-ago involving Harris when Corporation Counsel Diane O’Gorman shot back “Objection! Relevancy! We are on Venus!), Lisa Wilson (Vanyo claims she saw Wilson jump on another officer’s back), she also accused a black female civilian with jumping on her back. Vanyo seems to have that jumping-on-back thing pretty much down at this point, or perhaps she just needs an eye exam. She has trouble seeing anything else. She is on record telling PSD officer Lt. Ortiz that Horne told her, “you didn’t see nothing.” (She doesn’t remember having a conversation with Ortiz either). Any of you have a cane, a pair of sunglasses and a memory chip you want to contribute to her send them to her precinct (please don’t jump on her back). Shockingly enough Vanyo’s vision returned yesterday during the middle of her stint on the witness stand when she suddenly shot “she keeps looking at me saying things under her breath!”

While Vanyo and Horne make for an interesting catfight, Nixon without warning went into a subject matter that sparked a lot of outrage and debate back in the fall. Nixon from this writer’s view was not on his game as I have seen him before. He spent a lot of time trying to connect issues and incidents that seemed little more than trivial or just couldn’t drive home. He went into the matter of the 911 call on 88 or 86 Woltz Ave without setting it up. Of course this had to do with Buffalo Police Commissioner H. McCarthy Gipson’s much publicized crack-cocaine purchase back in ’05 when he was employed by the Sheriff’s Department and her alleged cover-up of Gipson’s involvement. Nixon asked “Can you please tell us the circumstance you found yourself at 88 Woltz Ave.” Vanyo answered “I believe it was Assist a Citizen.” “Who was the citizen?” “McCarthy Gipson. This was his property, he was on the property… prior to us getting there, there was an altercation where the suspect pushed him. Gipson didn’t live there, it was just a rental property that he owned.” Vanyo submitted the drugs which she said she believed was crack cocaine to the lab. Now on the merit of this testimony alone this does not prove Gipson purchased crack, smoked crack or is a “crackhead.” It in itself just connects him to an incident. I spoke with the commissioner during lunch break Thursday and he is taking this as unequivocal proof that he has no connection to crack cocaine as Pendergrass has stated he is. He also said that myself and the local black press have in our recent articles about Horne been biased against him.

I told him that I can only speak for myself and not the Challenger or even the Criterion of which I am mainly an opinion columnist and have no control over what anyone else says. I should have acknowledged fellow Criterion columnist Frank Gist’s favorable take on him but I didn’t remember at the time. Gipson personally knows of my “bias” since last spring from our numerous conversations. Nothing has changed, I’m one of the few who started this movement. Bias? Hell Yeah! Pendergrass later told me that it was the Buffalo News that first mentioned Woltz Ave., he only accused Gipson of being a crack-head. It’s was never my view that Vanyo was their only witness. Other officers that testified Thursday were Ralph Skinner, Mike Eason, Lt. Kevin Brinkworth, Det. Walter Hrynczak. According to Pendergrass these officers had a combined weight of 900 lbs over Mr. Mack but they are really trying to play him as a big physical threat. I saw some try to make the same implication of Officer Horne.

The whole incident was one of the saddest in the history of Buffalo for so many reasons. I have long known of racial conflicts between Black and white officers.The brothers in blue usually being left to defend their manhood and status as a full legitimate officer in the face of non-stop white police arrogance, and the sisters having been victims of sexual harassment for a long time. What seems evident is there seems to be no standards for behavior for whites in police uniforms as there are with whites in other secular occupations. This is extremely bad given the police work is arguably the most important job there is, and by contrast you have so many individuals with minds cluttered with racial one-upmanship and they feel this mindset is going to protect them until retirement, that is a horrible tragedy. But that’s the spirit of Buffalo, while the hearing was going on Thursday, two of Horne’s brothers were arrested for allegedly being in possession of scrap metal near Metalico Buffalo. If you think this a strange coincidence, consider whom News 4 Buffalo names as one of the two arresting officers; Greg Kwaitkowski. Like most of us Horne didn’t find out ‘til later, but she isn’t making much of it. When I asked, she said "Am I my brothers’ keeper?”