NAACP challenges Fort Myers ‘Lake Boyz’ arrests

FORT MYERS, Fla. The NAACP on Tuesday sent a letter to State Attorney Stephen Russell to find out if five Fort Myers police officers placed on leave had any involvement in the recent “Lake Boyz” arrests.

The organization is also planning to file an official federal civil rights complaint with the Justice Department on Thursday. More than 20 members of the suspected “Lake Boyz” gang face racketeering charges following a Fort Myers Police Department sting.

“We definitely believe some of them shouldn’t have been arrested,” Lee County NAACP President James Muwakkil said. “I’m not a lawyer, but when you read the affidavit, it’s pretty weak.”

The department placed the five officers on paid administrative leave earlier this month. Four of them were put on leave one day before the release of a city-commissioned audit heavily critical of department practices, but it’s unclear if there’s any connection.

Muwakkil said he’d be happy to work with the department to determine whether the arrests were legitimate, but he expressed misgivings that echoed some of the scathing findings in the audit.

“What was found out was devastating regarding what’s happening in the Fort Myers Police Department,” Muwakkil said. “Well, it was 10 times worse if you lived it.”

Chief Derrick Diggs has sought to build community trust in the department since assuming his post in August, but that’ll be easier said than done, according to Muwakkil, who pointed to longstanding issues. In the past five years, 48 unsolved murders have taken place within the city.

“There was no concern from the Fort Myers Police Department when someone was killed,” Muwakkil said. “Someone from the Fort Myers Police Department would come out one time, but then we wouldn’t see them no more. There’s no way witnesses in this community were going to give them information when we basically witnessed them not caring enough to even come back out and pursue leads.”

Angela McDuffie, the mother of one of those arrested in the Lake Boyz sting, echoed those sentiments.

“We are going to have to clean house to get the trust back,” she said.

McDuffie maintains her son, Natyri Pitts, is innocent. But it’s unclear if she and the NAACP will find a sympathetic ear in the state attorney’s office.

Russell took part last month in a Fort Myers Police Department press conference that hailed the two-year operation that led to the arrests as a major development in the city’s battle against gang violence.

“We’ve come together to work together to try to really work on an organization that involves a lot of people who often do get away with minor or lesser crimes,” Russell said last month.

It’s unusual for Fort Myers police to collaborate with other agencies, according to the audit.

“I think that is something we need to do a better job of,” Mayor Randy Henderson said. “The citizens of Fort Myers pay for all levels of law enforcement. From the federal all the way down. Why we would not be engaging with other law enforcement professionals is a mystery to me.”

Mothers share doubts about department

Cronyism, ineffective leadership, corruption and limited resources were among the other issues uncovered in the audit.

And McDuffie believes there’s more where that comes from.

“There’s so much more that will be revealed from this,” she said. “So much more. Just wait to see.”

The mothers of two victims of violence share some of McDuffie’s concerns. Camelia Schley’s son Angelo Gary was shot to death in the city more than a decade ago. She remains puzzled by the department’s handling of the case.

“No one ever talked to me when my son was murdered,” she said. “No one came to my house. No one showed up there. No one knocked on my door to reach out to me. I was the one doing the reaching out.”

Schley is careful not to lay blame on all the department’s officers. But as she grasps for answers in her son’s cold case, she struggles to maintain faith in the department. And the passage of time isn’t making it better.

“I dont know who to talk to, and it seems like nothing changed,” she said. “Everything is still the same.”

Angela McClary has encountered a similar lack of answers over the years whenever she speaks with the department about the murder of her son. The audit’s findings of malfeasance within the department come as no shock to her.

“There’s a lot of stuff that brought back what I’ve been saying all this time, that it has been a confirmation that they have actually not been truthful to the families on what has taken place,” she said. “And all I’m hearing is no new evidence, no witnesses. I have asked, ‘Are you revisiting the evidence?’ and never got an answer to that question.”

Henderson believes transparency and accountability are key to the restoration of the community’s trust in the department.

“If we can deal with fact, we can emerge from this exercise in a way that is transparent, has more mechanisms that are built in for accountability,” he said. “The [City] Council must get to a place where we have accountability instead of relying on reports from time to time.”

WINK News reporter Michelle Kingston spoke with Schley and McClary: