Boulder independent police monitor leaving

Deborah Swearingen, Daily Camera, Boulder, Colo.
·2 min read

Sep. 10—Boulder's Independent Police Monitor Joey Lipari is leaving his role with the city later this month.

Lipari, who has been with the city since July 2020, is Boulder's first independent police monitor and helped the city's new Police Oversight Panel find its footing. The independent monitor and Police Oversight Panel are tasked with oversight of the Boulder Police Department.

The oversight panel is now fully operational and preparing to expand to 11 members next year, a Boulder news release notes.

Lipari will serve his last day on Sept. 30 before moving to California to become a special investigator at the Office of the Inspector General for the Los Angeles Police Department.

He hopes to use his new role in a larger city to focus on significant use of force incidents and work to improve national best practices around police use of force, the release states.

"I am proud of all that Joey has accomplished here. Through his leadership we have built a system for independent oversight and contributed to improvements in police policy and operations while also continuing to ensure the community receives efficient and lawful police services," City Manager Nuria Rivera-Vandermyde stated in the release.

According to earlier Camera reporting, the city's overhaul of its local police oversight system began in 2019 after a confrontation between a now-former Boulder office and Zayd Atkinson, a Black Naropa University student who was picking up trash outside his student housing. The officer, John Smyly, repeatedly asked Atkinson for proof of his residency at the building, and pulled his stun gun and handgun once Atkinson refused and continued to pick up rubbish with a metal tool. The incident, captured on widely circulated video, made local and national headlines for weeks.

Smyly was found to have violated department policy and resigned with a city severance package, although an independent review found no evidence of racial profiling. Atkinson reached a $125,000 settlement with the city.

As it works to hire a new independent police monitor, Boulder will use the OIR Group, an independent California-based police oversight and review firm, to handle the monitor's day-to-day duties and support the operations of the Police Oversight Panel, the city noted.