Janet Difiore and Chris Ridley Case.

Thursday, April 16, 2009.

The Court Report
By Richard Blassberg

Father Of Murdered Heroic Police Officer
Christopher Ridley Sues DA DiFiore In Fed Court
If Allegations Prove Correct, DiFiore Faces Prosecution

Stanley Ridley, father of the late Christopher Ridley, the Mount Vernon Police Officer who lost his life nearly 15 months ago to a bullet fired by a Westchester County cop, has brought a $10 million lawsuit in Federal Court charging Westchester District Attorney Janet DiFiore with organizing and perpetuating a fraudulent cover-up of a “self-evidently racist murder of an African-American Police Officer”, his son Christopher Ridley, 23, “by a Caucasian County Police Officer.”

The Summons and Complaint filed last Friday, April 10, in United States Federal District Court, White Plains, alleges that DiFiore “enlisted the cooperation of her co-Defendants to hide from Officer Ridley’s father the circumstances under which his son had been executed.” It is further charged that, “DiFiore directed, and Hyland (Chief Medical Examiner Millard Hyland) agreed to keep secret the medical examiner’s report regarding Officer Ridley’s autopsy even though that document is a public record, because it would prove the fatal, albeit unnecessary point-blank gunshot to Officer Ridley’s forehead.” The complaint further charges, “Hyland arranged to have the upper portion of Officer Ridley’s head bandaged while he was in the morgue so that Plaintiff could not see either the entry wound above his left eye or the bulge in the rear of Officer Ridley’s skull.”

Interviewed by The Guardian, Stanley Ridley explained that he was bringing the present federal action against the District Attorney and all of her co-Defendants who have conspired to keep the truth from him and from the public, in an effort to clear his son’s name. In that connection, readers will remember the calculated effort by DA DiFiore to suggest recklessness on Officer Ridley’s part by way of attempting to mitigate the County’s role and responsibility in his tragic death; the whole fiction advanced that Officer Ridley was not displaying his badge while carrying his service weapon; that it was found left in his car.

There is a reason why Janet DiFiore has repeatedly refused to release the video recordings of no fewer than four, and possibly as many as six, cameras mounted on the County Office Building as well as at 85 Court Street, each overlooking the scene of the tragic incident. DiFiore has stubbornly refused to show the un-redacted, un-doctored tapes because they would clearly confirm what several horrified eyewitnesses saw, located within a few feet of Officer Ridley, and have reported, that he was assassinated by Officer Frank Oliveri.