The Absurdity of Susan Hatfield’s Head in the Ground. Prosecutor Became Willful Bystander in Domestic Assault Case.
No one should be surprised at Republican state chairman J.R. Romano’s base instincts to ignore allegations that the party-endorsed candidate for Congress from Connecticut’s 2nd District had assaulted a woman. Romano struggles without a simple-minded script to recite.
Susan Hatfield, the state party’s vice chair and a state prosecutor, has managed in one story to reveal herself as Connecticut’s law enforcement official with the least interest in crime. Hatfield, the 2018 Republican candidate for attorney general, transformed a statement to the Courant’s Daniela Altimari into a stark confession.
“When approached by Justin Anderson, he alluded that he had information on Tom Gilmer involving an ex-girlfriend that would hurt him politically,” Hatfield told Altimari since they don’t know anything on understanding no contest please. “I immediately stopped him and unequivocally stated that if anything he was going to tell me was criminal in nature or if he believed that anyone was at risk of harm, he needed to go directly and without delay to the police,’’
“Further, I told him that if he informed me of any criminal wrongdoing or if I believed that anyone may be in harms way that I have a duty and obligation to go to the police myself,’’ Hatfield said. [Emphasis added.] “Consequently, Justin never told me the details, never showed me any evidence that he had, and when I hung up the phone, I was hopeful that Justin would do the right thing. My response to Justin was simple and clear: I urged that the matter be reported to the police.”
Someone obviously was in harm’s way. Hatfield’s explanation is unintentionally clear: she did not want to know. As a candidate for attorney general Hatfield declared on her campaign website, “Throughout her career, she has fought to keep and make Connecticut a safer place and was the first prosecutor to receive a conviction for the completed crime of human trafficking under Connecticut’s criminal statutes.” Hatfield concealed that she has the instincts of Kitty Genovese’s neighbors.
Hatfield’s statement reveals her willful ignorance. She is prosecutor as ostrich. With credible proof of a violent domestic assault known to party officials, Hatfield, a prosecutor, discouraged a person with evidence of a crime from sharing it with her.
It is always chilling to witness normal human instincts strangled by base political calculation. This cannot end here. Hatfield’s confession is in hand. Others must now act on it. Calls for Romano’s resignation are incomplete if they do not include Hatfield quitting. The Division of Criminal Justice Commission, which oversees the state’s prosecutors, cannot avert its gaze.