Claremont
The case involves juveniles, so Attorney General Gordon MacDonald has sought approval from a judge on what can be made public, a ruling that hasn’t yet been made, according to Senior Assistant Attorney General Lisa Wolford.
“Once the investigation of the Aug. 28, 2017, Claremont matter was complete, due to confidentiality constraints and the ages of the children involved, the Attorney General’s Office sought a court order permitting the release of a public report detailing its investigation of the matter,” Wolford said in an email on Wednesday. “The report has not been released because litigation over whether it may be released is ongoing.”
In New Hampshire, juvenile court records remain confidential without “the express permission of the court,” according to state law.
There is, however, a provision that allows information to “be furnished by the court about the disposition of a case when the delinquent act would constitute a felony if it were the act of an adult,” as long as the juvenile isn’t named.
The attorney general’s investigation started shortly after the incident on Aug. 28. A group of young teenagers allegedly taunted then 8-year-old Quincy Chivers with racial epithets and then intentionally pushed him off a picnic table with a rope around his neck in a backyard off North Street, according to a version of events relayed by the boy’s grandmother, Laurie Slattery, who spoke to the Valley News about a week after the incident.
Appearing on the daytime TV talk show The Real in October, Quincy said that a 14-year-old first grabbed a tire swing rope and put it around his own neck, and then jokingly said that he no longer wished to keep on living.
Shortly after, Quincy told the show’s hosts, it was his turn to put the rope around his own neck, and he did so because he “wanted to be cool.”
He said it was then that he was pushed off the table.
No adult is believed to have witnessed the incident, and Slattery said the boy’s family pieced together what happened through talking to the children who were present, including Quincy’s sister.
Quincy’s family has characterized the incident as a “lynching” and a “hate crime,” while the parents of a teenager involved called it a “backyard accident.”
Reached at home on Wednesday, Slattery declined to comment.
Messages left for Quincy’s mother, Cassandra Merlin, on Wednesday weren’t returned.
Authorities remained quiet about what happened immediately following the incident, prompting some Twin State activists involved with racial justice issues to speak out.
“Folks don’t just deserve to be informed about what’s going on; it is imperative that we disseminate this information,” Mark Hughes, the co-founder and executive director for Justice for All, a Vermont-based group for racial justice, told the Valley News shortly after the incident. “Because to not do this feeds into the problem.”
The news that a report eventually would be issued came in December when MacDonald held a news conference where he announced the creation of a new civil rights unit within the state Attorney General’s Office.
At that December briefing, MacDonald specifically addressed the Claremont investigation “because of the intense public interest” in the case.
“… As soon as the law permits, our office will be releasing a detailed report of our investigation, the facts that we found and the legal conclusions that are supported by those facts,” MacDonald said at the time. “Of course, we will be prepared at that time to respond to questions as the law permits.”
It isn’t clear when the report may be issued.
Jordan Cuddemi can be reached at jcuddemi@vnews.com or 603-727-3248