BLM Saratoga and the Subpoenas

A weekend round-up of our coverage.

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The Black Lives Matter Saratoga group held a vigil and walk to the Saratoga Springs Police station on Wednesday evening Aug. 31. The date commemorated the night nine years ago when a young man, Darryl Mount, was chased by SSPD and then fell from scaffolding as he tried to escape arrest, as the official record indicates, or was beaten by police, as the BLM group believes. In either case, he died weeks later of the injuries. The group is still hoping for an thorough investigation by an outside party. 

The Office of the New York State Attorney General opened an investigation not into that death but into the way the police handled the protests last summer, protests that tied Darryl Mount's death to that of George Floyd, protests that focused on police use-of-force and then-Governor Andrew Cuomo's review of police policies statewide, and protests that focused on the Civilian Oversight Board that will look at police activity in the city. 

"What we're going to do is continue to put pressure on the city, continue to put pressure on SSPD," Lexis Figuereo told a group of a few dozen Wednesday evening. "The city is going to have to pay for what they did."

He said they have been protesting for 28 months, since June of 2020, when activists blocked city streets. The protest ended with the police pepper-spraying the protestors after one young man assaulted an officer, the police say.  

Figuereo said that they city has not moved fast enough on a number of issues, and his group, which helped the current board to get elected, will work to get them unelected next fall. 

"They used us as pawns," Figuereo said, "as they continue to do." 

This week we reported that former mayor Meg Kelly and former Commissioner of Public Safety Robin Dalton had been subpoenaed by the OAG in July. They are to appear and testify in the OAG's office later this month. 

The following stories are large handful, but not an exhaustive list, of the reporting we have done on this...