November 19, 2007

HEARING OPENS -- WITNESS STICKS TO HIS ORIGINAL STORY

The hearing to determine whether Dobbs Ferry Police coerced a key eyewitness into changing his accountof the shooting of Charles Campbell, thus unfairly influencing the trial of Richard DiGuglielmo, began today.

Witness Michael Dillon stuck to his original story, the account he gave to the media, and then to police, at the scene immediately following the incident, when he said, "You see your father getting beaten with a bat, you got to do something about it. So it's self-defense from what I saw."

Dillon then told the court how the police visited him, unannounced, on two separate occasions, including at his job, to re-interview him. Each time, police drove Dillon in a patrol car to the police station, where they interviewed him in a bare room of the type used for interrogation. Each time, Dillon stuck to his story. Then, again, on the evening of October 7th, police drove Dillon to the station for another interview. Finally, after midnight, feeling "intimidated" and "tired of talking to them," Dillon signed a statement he thought was "up to their satisfaction." Dillon said the police wrote the statement, using terms he would not.

Read the coverage in the Journal News here.

The hearing is scheduled to resume Tuesday at 10:15 a.m.