D.A. Covers Up Wall Memorializing Cops Killed In Line Of Duty

By Ralph Cipriano
for BigTrial.net

In a move that's sure to offend every cop in the city, District Attorney Larry Krasner's office has covered up a "Wall of Remembrance" that features a couple dozen plaques honoring hero cops who died in the line of duty.

The Wall of Remembrance is located on the mezzanine level inside the Ray Harley Conference Room at the D.A.'s office at 3 S. Penn Square.

"A fucking disgrace," said one cop. "Here's what Krasner thinks of cops who have died in the line of duty," texted another cop who sent along the photo at left.

In the photo, the wall is covered with a backdrop that bears the repeated images of the DAO logo of the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office.

We already knew that Larry Krasner hates cops. When he was a defense lawyer, he sued the police department 75 times. At his victory party, the crowd chanted "Fuck the FOP." 

But this move is over the top.

FOP President John McNesby was outraged.

"He [Krasner] has been pissing on cops his whole career," McNesby wrote in an email. "This is a whole different situation when you smear the memories of those that gave their lives protecting the community in the line of duty."

"Those in the Law Enforcement community sadly know what kind of person he is," McNesby said. "More of a reason to move him out of that position."

The FOP has endorsed Carlos Vega for D.A., Krasner's opponent in the May 18th Democratic primary.

As he has done for the past 19 months when fielding questions from Big Trial, Krasner didn't respond to a request for comment. Neither did Jane Roh, his alleged spokesperson. 

While Krasner and Roh were stonewalling Big Trial, Roh tried to deflect the controversy on Twitter, after Mike Neilon, a spokesman for the FOP, Roh wrote that covering up the wall was "shameful" and a "disgrace" that amounted to "disrespecting our @PhillyPolice heroes killed in the line of duty."

"Mike, you well know that the emergency of the pandemic has required different spaces in this city to be used for specialized purposes," Roh wrote on Twitter. Roh was seemingly implying that the conference room was used to convene a grand jury.

"We are legally required to cover the Wall of Remembrance when this room is used for certain purposes," Roh tweeted. "*We* follow the law."

On Twitter, McNesby's response to Roh's explanation: "I call bullshit."

Others who worked at the D.A.'s office said that grand juries typically are convened in neutral sites, such as city-owned offices around the city, and not in the D.A.'s office.

Others speculated that if Krasner is using the Ray Harley conference room to convene a grand jury, he may be planning to indict more cops.

When Krasner's fans chanted "Fuck the FOP" at his victory party back in 2017, he was rebuked by then U.S. Attorney William McSwain. 

“There is a new culture of disrespect for law enforcement in this city that is promoted and championed by District Attorney Larry Krasner – and I am fed up with it,” McSwain said. “This vile rhetoric puts our police in danger. It disgraces the Office of the District Attorney. And it harms the good people in the City of Philadelphia and rewards the wicked.”

Sadly, the sentiment expressed in that chant is shared by some of Krasner's own employees. During the George Floyd riots, an assistant district attorney posted on Instagram, "FUCK THE COPS."

Since he took office, Krasner has eagerly indicted cops, whether he had the evidence or not. Such as the fraudulent case he filed against former staff Inspector Joe Bologna that a judge recently threw out of court.

During the George Floyd protests, Krasner dropped the charges against protesters who got arrested for assaulting officers. Protesters such as Evan Gorski, the Temple student that Bologna allegedly struck in the head with a metal baton, allegedly causing a wound that required 10 staples and 10 sutures to close.

The only problem --- video of the incident, broken down frame by frame in the courtroom, clearly showed that Bologna never struck Gorski in the head; instead, his baton struck a backpack, on Gorski's left shoulder, which according to department guidelines, was an acceptable use of force.

The video also clearly showed that Gorski didn't have a drop of blood on his head or any other part of his body. But the video clearly showed that Gorski interfered with officers, and was clearly seen stealing Bologna's baton and throwing it away. While a friend of Gorski's was using a squirt bottle to soak Bologna with a liquid that cops said was urine. 

There's at least 40 Philadelphia police officers who are assigned to work in the D.A.'s office. One of those cops was livid when he saw the photo of the covered up Wall of Remembrance.

"Fuck him. That's blatant disrespect," the cop said about Krasner.

"How could a Philadelphia police officer walk into that building with his or her head held up high when the D.A. has covered up the faces of their brothers and sisters killed in the line of duty," said another cop.

Krasner not only has no respect for cops killed in the line of duty, the cop said, but he also has no respect for the families of those dead cops, who are crime victims.

More than 200 Philadelphia police officers have been killed in the line of duty. The current Wall of Remembrance was installed when Lynne Abraham was D.A., to honor recently fallen officers. Former D.A. Seth Williams added more plaques to that wall. But Larry Krasner covered it up. 

Carlos Vega, a former homicide prosecutor who's running against Krasner for the Democratic nomination in the May 18th primary, said he couldn't believe what happened to the Wall of Remembrance.

"I have walked past that wall daily in my years in the office and was so grateful for their service," Vega said of the cops who were killed in the line of duty. "I knew seven of these heroes personally," Vega said. "They talked about their families and their dreams when they retired. I can't comprehend how those men and women who laid down their lives for our city could be dishonored this way."

Tonight, cops were calling on Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw to pull all the cops who work for the D.A. out of that office as a protest.

That, however, seemed to be too radical a position for the timid and low-profile Outlaw to take. After all, she's the one who keeps touting a recent collaboration she's struck up with the D.A.'s office that has assistant district attorneys assigned to various police districts, in an alleged attempt to bolster crimefighting.

Outlaw's the one who repeatedly tells people that you won't hear her attacking the D.A. in public. Even though the murder rate is soaring, and the D.A. keeps adding to the carnage by letting armed and dangerous criminals out of jail.

Three recent examples:

-- Taray Herring, the registered sex offender with more than a dozen arrests on his rap sheet, who confessed to hacking and dismembering the body of a 70-year-old man who was murdered in the Somerton section of the city. Herring was able to commit this atrocity after he received a get-out-jail-free card from his Uncle Larry.

-- Adriano Coriano, the abusive ex-husband who shot and killed his ex-wife Gladys while Krasner's office sat for six days on a request from the cops to sign off on an arrest warrant that would have put the ex-husband in jail, for repeatedly violating a protection order.

-- Josephus Davis, a  two-time convicted burglar who had two new arrests pending against him, for an alleged carjacking and an alleged aggravated assault. But at two bail hearings, Krasner's rookie prosecutors laid down and Davis walked. Two weeks later, Davis shot and killed a man who was out walking his dog. 

Any one of these outrages might spur a police commissioner with some moxie to call a press conference in front of the D.A.'s office and blast Krasner. But not our Outlaw. 

Accordingly, a spokesman for the police department last night wasn't talking about the Wall of Remembrance, and anything Police Commissioner Outlaw might be willing to do about it to defend the honor of fallen cops, who died in the line of duty.

Instead, the police spokesperson referred all comment to D.A. Krasner, who was busy disrespecting the memory of fallen police officers, and dispatching misinformation to reporters.