Morning journal and courier., 1881-08-31
LOCAL NEWS.
Police Commissioners.

Complaints Against omcers-The Aarol 1 Wilcox Case-Report of Committee 1 What the Roundsmen Have to Sa! About Delinquent Officers. The regular monthly meeting of the Polic Commissioners was held last evening. Al the commissioners were present except Com missioner Hart His Honor the Mayor wal present and presided.
 Mrs. Michael McGarty appeared before the board and preferred charges against Off cer Philip Ryan for arresting her son Ber- nard without cause or warrant in his own house. The woman charged the officer with impertinence, an uncalled for arrest and using abusive language. The charges were accepted and ordered on file to be considered at future meeting.
 Sundry bills amounting to $12S.30 were approved and the pay roll was referred to His Honor the Mayor and Chief to approve when the month of August shall expire.
 The following persons appeared as appl- cants for positions on the force: John w.. Coleman, Andrew Bracken, Ernest Krause, 2d, and Patrick Healey. Their applications were lodged on file.
  garding the charges against Officers Jackson and Phelps who arrested Aaron E. Wilcox, the person who died in the hospital some time since from injuries supposed to have been received by the policemen who arrested him, reported as follows:
 DEPARTMENT OF POLICE ]
 NEW HAVEN, Conn, Aug. 30, 1881. President and Board of Police Conlnetsstoaa
 erS-
 GENTLEMEN: We, your committee appoint ed to shape the finding of this commission in the case of the arrest of Aaron E. Wilcox by Officers Edgar Phelps and Benjamin $. Jack son on the morning of June 25th, 1881, re- port (here is rehearsed the complaint that the testimony of the officers making the arrest is not controvert- ed and is opposed only by certain statements and expressions said to have been made by the said Wilcox immediately following his arrest and during his confinement at police headquarters and also at the hospital These statements if accepted as reliable testimony would show that one of the officers making the arrest was guilty of unnecessary and un- pardonable violence, but which, whether Officer Phelps or Officer Jackson, such testi- mony would not disclose. We are not dis posed to treat with indifference these state- ments or expressions of the deceased, yet we cannot accept them reliable testimony when we consider their indefinite character in asserting that he was injured by one of the officers, and this one not identified or intelligently described; and that these expressions are filtered out to us by one who signifed no conscious ness that he was making solemn declara- tion, believing that he was in the presence of death and further, when we consider that at the time in which he claimed the injuries were inflicted there was reason to believe that his condition was such as to suggest grave doubts whether he was sanely con- scious of what was done or what took place The assertions said to have been made by the deceased, taken in connection with the de- velopments of the autopsy and the testimo ny of Officers Phelps and Jackson, furnish material for the ready construction of theo- riest hat may seem plausible and which as theories may account for the injuries said to have been sustained by said Wilcox, but the gravity and importance of this case prohib it's this commission from being governed by conclusions not fully warranted by reliable testimony.
 We therefore find that Officers Edgar Phelps and Benjamin s. Jackson, in making ing of June 20, 1881, are chargeable with vio- lence only in such degree as may be suggested by their own testimony.
 Your committee do not find that the off, cers in charge of police headquarters during the confinement of said Wilcox are charge able with negligence or inattention under the rules then existing; but it is plainly the duty of this commission to make such provision as will insure the attention of competent phy- sician in all cases where prisoners physical condition is not fully understood.
 FRANK D. SLoAT,
 WILLIAM B. CATLIN,
 Committee