Across Virginia
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A statue honoring police officers killed in the line of duty was removed from a park in Richmond Thursday morning after it was covered in red paint.
Video obtained by news outlets showed a truck hauling the Richmond Police Memorial away from Byrd Park, the same place where a statue of Christopher Columbus was torn down, set on fire and thrown into a lake Wednesday.
The bronze memorial was placed at the location in 2016 and lists the names of 39 fallen Richmond police officers, news outlets said
The statue was damaged during ongoing protests sparked by the death of George Floyd, a handcuffed black man who died two weeks ago after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee on his neck for more than eight minutes as he pleaded for air.
The temporary removal comes as protesters in Richmond and around the country have called for the removal of monuments many say are symbols of racism. On Wednesday, protesters toppled a statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis that sits along Monument Avenue, about a week after Gov. Ralph Northam ordered a statue honoring Confederate General Robert E. Lee be taken down from its position on the same street.
The police memorial was set to be restored and “returned to public display,” WRIC-TV quoted a spokesman for Mayor Levar Stoney as saying.
The Virginia Department of Health says COVID-19 testing numbers show a sharp increase today, but officials say it reflects backlog of 43,000 tests from two laboratories that are now reporting electronically. Even with that test backlog now cleared, the VDH reports 490 new confirmed cases statewide in the latest 24-reporting period, and that is lower than the seven-day moving average of 665 — and well below the daily peak of 1,550 on May 26.
In the Roanoke Valley, there are now 232 confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases in Roanoke City since the virus first arrived, 132 in Roanoke County, 43 in Salem, and 44 in Botetourt County. The VDH defines “probable” as “symptomatic with a known exposure to COVID-19.”
NEWS RELEASE: (Richmond, Va.) – Today, COVID-19 diagnostic testing data reported by the Virginia Department of Health (VDH) will reflect a sharp increase in PCR SARS-CoV-2 tests completed in Virginia. Today’s testing report includes 43,000 PCR tests. Two laboratories began electronic reporting to VDH this week, allowing a backlog of negative tests to be included in today’s testing report. Positive test results from these labs were hand entered into the system when they were received to support follow-up by public health staff. The addition of these negative tests will result in a decrease in the percent of positive PCR tests. One lab had roughly 18,000 results and the other had around 13,500 results. The remainder of the figure reflects regular daily reporting. VDH reports labs by lab report date on our website. These results will be presented based on the actual date the laboratory reported the test result.
All labs in the Commonwealth are considered disease information reporters. Therefore the names of the labs are considered confidential by the Code of Virginia sections 32.1 -36 and 32.1-38 so VDH cannot release this information.
Michael Connors (Photo: Richmond PD)
Vincent Martin (Photo: VaDOC)
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A man who served decades in prison for the killing of a Richmond police officer and whose parole grant sparked a still-continuing investigation by Virginia’s government watchdog agency has been released from prison.
Vincent Martin, who had been held at the Nottoway Correctional Center, was released on parole, Virginia Parole Board chair Tonya Chapman told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Martin, who was serving a life sentence for the 1979 killing of Richmond patrolman Michael P. Connors, had been scheduled to be paroled May 11, but his release was halted at the last minute.
A temporary 30-day hold was put in place “pending the conclusion” of an administrative investigation by the Office of the State Inspector General into the Virginia Parole Board, Chapman said at the time.
Chapman, who assumed her role after the decision had been made to grant Martin parole, said the inspector general’s office was investigating whether the board followed state law and other policies and procedures in its decision-making process, but not the board’s ultimate decision.
Chapman wrote in an email Wednesday that the 30-day hold had ended and Martin was released in accordance with state code that says “the final decision to grant release on parole rests solely with the Parole Board.”
The announcement of the inspector general’s investigation came amid a push by the board to speed up its work because of the coronavirus pandemic and amid news reports from across the state about parole decisions in which both prosecutors and victims’ families said they were not notified or given a chance to provide input as required by law.
Martin’s parole grant sparked an uproar in the law enforcement community, and both Connors’ family and Richmond’s top prosecutor, a Democrat, asked the board to rescind its decision. Connors’ family was contacted for input but has raised concerns about the process.
Republican lawmakers asked for Martin’s release to be delayed at least until the inspector general’s findings were complete.
Former parole board chair Adrianne Bennett, who recently left that role to become a judge, released a lengthy statement defending the board’s decision to release Martin. In it, she wrote that Martin “has demonstrated himself over the decades to be a trusted leader, peacemaker, mediator and mentor in the correctional community” and has been infraction-free for more than 30 years. Martin has always maintained his innocence, wrote Bennett, who has not responded to interview requests.
She wrote that his conviction was based “primarily upon the conflicting testimony of the three cooperating co-defendants,” who were also convicted but completed lighter sentences in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Martin previously declined an interview request from The Associated Press sent through the Department of Corrections.
Connors, who was raised in Buffalo, New York, and the surrounding area was the oldest of five siblings in a close-knit family, his sister Maureen Clements said. He started his law enforcement career in Richmond and had been on the force for about a year, she said, when he was fatally shot in November 1979.
State Sen. Ryan McDougle, chairman of the Senate Republican caucus, called Martin’s release before the completion of the investigation “outrageous.”
“Mr. Martin’s early release is an affront to the rule of law, an insult to law enforcement and a tragedy for the family of the police officer he executed, Michael Connors,” McDougle said in a statement.
Senate Democratic leadership, meanwhile, said they believed the process had played out fairly and they supported the board’s decision.
“We are truly dismayed that Mr. Martin’s case has been hijacked for the purpose of clickbait and scoring political points,” Majority Leader Dick Saslaw and Caucus Chair Mamie E. Locke said in a statement.
Governor Northam says all Virginia private and public colleges and universities are permitted to re-open their campuses to in-person instruction, but they must first submit a comprehensive plan on how they will address COVID-19 concerns. Northam says each plan must attend to a wide array of issues that include social distancing in dorms, classrooms and dining halls. WFIR’s Evan Jones has more:
- Repopulation of the campus
- Monitoring health conditions to detect infection
- Containment to prevent spread of the disease when detected
- Shutdown considerations if necessitated by severe Conditions and/or public health guidance
Governor Northam has released guidelines for youth sports under Phase 2 of his re-opening executive orders. They vary by sport, but administration officials say all rely on common sense. Northam’s Chief of Staff Clark Mercer said at Tuesday’s briefing the basic principle is incidental contact is to be expected, but intentional contact should not. WFIR’s Evan Jones has more:
Governor Northam says he expects Virginia public schools to resume in-person classes when the next academic year begins, but it will be a phased-in reopening; some instruction will be in-person, but some will remain remote. WFIR’s Evan Jones has more:
Here is a portion of the governor’s Tuesday announcement:
Schools will have to provide six-foot distancing between desks and, in all likelihood, stagger schedules. Northam says daily screenings will be needed for students and staff, and older students will be encouraged, but not required, to wear face masks whenever possible. Each school system will have to submit a plan to the Department of Education before the phased-in reopenings are possible in that city or county.
It comes after Northam issued an executive order March 23rd that closed all public schools over COVID-19 concerns. The governor says all health metrics look positive, numbers that include the number of new cases, testing capacity and hospital beds available statewide.
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NEWS RELEASE: RICHMOND—Governor Ralph Northam today announced a phased approach that allows Virginia schools to slowly resume in-person classes for summer school and the coming academic year. The K-12 phased reopening plan was developed by the Office of the Secretary of Education, Virginia Department of Health, and the Virginia Department of Education and is informed by guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
- Phase One: special education programs and child care for working families
- Phase Two: Phase One plus preschool through third grade students, English learners, and summer camps in school buildings
- Phase Three: all students may receive in-person instruction as can be accommodated with strict social distancing measures in place, which may require alternative schedules that blend in-person and remote learning for students
- Beyond Phase Three: divisions will resume “new-normal” operations under future guidance
- Daily health screenings of students and staff
- Providing remote learning exceptions and teleworking for students and staff who are at a higher risk of severe illness
- The use of cloth face coverings by staff when at least six feet physical distancing cannot be maintained
- Encouraging the use of face coverings in students, as developmentally appropriate, in settings where physical distancing cannot be maintained
Gov. Ralph Northam
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Governor Ralph Northam is expected to announce plans Thursday to remove one of the country’s most iconic monuments to the Confederacy, a statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee along Richmond’s prominent Monument Avenue, a senior administration official told The Associated Press.
The move would be an extraordinary victory for civil rights activists, whose calls for the removal of that monument and others in this former capital of the Confederacy have been resisted for years.
“That is a symbol for so many people, black and otherwise, of a time gone by of hate and oppression and being made to feel less than,” said Del. Jay Jones, a black lawmaker from Norfolk. He said he was “overcome” by emotion when he learned the statue was to come down.
The Democratic governor will direct the statue to be moved off its massive pedestal and put into storage while his administration seeks input on a new location, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to speak before the governor’s announcement.
Northam’s decision comes amid turmoil across the nation and around the world over the death of George Floyd, a black man who died after a Minneapolis officer pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for several minutes, even after he stopped moving.
Floyd’s death has sparked outrage over issues of racism and police brutality and prompted a new wave of Confederate memorial removals in which even some of their longtime defenders have relented.
The Lee statue is one of five Confederate monuments along Monument Avenue, a prestigious residential street and National Historic Landmark district. Monuments along the avenue have been rallying points during protests in recent days over Floyd’s death, and they have been tagged with graffiti, including messages that say “end police brutality” and “stop white supremacy.”
It was not immediately clear when the Lee statue would be removed.
Other tragedies in recent years have prompted similar nationwide soul searching over Confederate monuments, which some people regard as inappropriate tributes to the South’s slave-holding past. Others compare monument removals to erasing history.
Confederate memorials began coming down after a white supremacist killed nine black people at a Bible study in a church in South Carolina in 2015 and then again after a violent rally of white supremacists in Charlottesville in 2017.
Also on Wednesday, Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney announced plans to seek the removal of the other Confederate monuments along Monument Avenue, which include statues of Confederate President Jefferson Davis and Confederate Gens. Stonewall Jackson and J.E.B. Stuart. Those statues sit on city land, unlike the Lee statue, which is on state property.
Stoney said he would introduce an ordinance July 1 to have the statues removed. That’s when a new law goes into effect, which was signed earlier this year by Northam, that undoes an existing state law protecting Confederate monuments and instead lets local governments decide their fate.
“I appreciate the recommendations of the Monument Avenue Commission – those were the appropriate recommendations at the time,” Stoney said in a statement, referencing a panel he established that studied what should be done with the monuments and recommended the removal of the Davis tribute. “But times have changed, and removing these statues will allow the healing process to begin for so many Black Richmonders and Virginians. Richmond is no longer the Capital of the Confederacy – it is filled with diversity and love for all – and we need to demonstrate that.”
Bill Gallasch, president of the Monument Avenue Preservation Society, said he worried the statues’ removal would change the “soul” of the street, hurt tourism in historic Richmond and stir up violence between far-right and far-left groups.
The monument-removal plans also drew criticism from the Virginia Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. And Republican state Sen. Amanda Chase, who is also running for governor, started a petition on her campaign website to save the statues.
“The radical left will not be satisfied until all white people are purged from our history books,” Chase’s website said.
But Joseph Rogers, a descendant of enslaved people and an organizer with the Virginia Defenders for Freedom, Justice & Equality, said he felt like the voices of black people are finally being heard. Rogers spoke from the vicinity of the Lee Monument, where another rally was taking place late Wednesday afternoon and where he described one wave of cheering after another.
“I am proud to be black, proud to be Southern, proud to be here right now,” he said.
Gov. Ralph Northam
Governor Northam says he hears the cries of protesters across Virginia, and he promises steps to deal with their calls, especially with a review of many state laws. The governor says the oppression never went away when slavery ended, and the anger displayed across the country in recent days demonstrates the result of its continued existence. WFIR’s Evan Jones has more:
Governor Northam says most of Virginia will move to Phase Two of COVID-19 reopening on Friday. Restaurants are permitted to have indoor seating at 50% of capacity. Fitness centers may conduct indoor activities and workouts at 30% capacity. Facilities like zoos, museums and outdoor concert venues are permitted to re-open. Gatherings of up to 50 people will now be permitted. The easing restrictions cover almost all of Virginia, with the exceptions of Washington DC suburbs, Richmond, and Accomack County on the Eastern Shore.
Photo: Senator Bill Stanley Facebook
Virginia Republicans say Governor Northam has shown a double standard in how he dealt with a 2nd Amendment Rally last winter and the recent night of violence and destruction in Richmond. State Senator Bill Stanley is among those Republicans. He recalls the governor setting up protective fencing around the capital for what was a peaceful gun rights rally and declaring a state of emergency in advance of it — and comparing that to the many Richmond businesses have been looted or heavily damaged in recent nights. More from WFIR’s Evan Jones: