The full ‘Laurie List’ of NH police with credibility issues was released. Here it is.

A long-shielded list containing the names of 174 current and former New Hampshire police officers with misconduct on their records that raises questions about their credibility is now public, putting an end to years of secrecy, litigation and legislation.

The list – formally called the exculpatory evidence schedule, but better known as the ‘Laurie List’ – was released in its entirety Tuesday by the New Hampshire Attorney General, after an initial version was made public at the end of last year. The document contains the names of officers, along with a brief description of the conduct that landed them on the list.

While the list’s release represents the fullest airing of police misconduct in the state to date, it is far from completely transparent. Large portions of the version released Tuesday are blacked out, redacting the names of 91 officers who are appealing their status on the list. According to a January report from the Attorney General, there are 265 names included on the Laurie List.

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The document shows that eight current or former New Hampshire state police troopers were cited as having possible credibility issues, while 18 officers from Manchester, the state’s largest municipal police force, were also included.

The date of the incident for numerous officers, as well as the conduct that landed them on the list, is labeled simply as “unknown” in the list. It isn’t clear what efforts the attorney general’s office took to investigate the cases labeled “unknown.”

Several of the officers whose names are now public were involved in high-profile incidents.

“Falsifying records/criminal conduct,” reads the brief entry next to former Claremont officer Ian Kibbe’s name, who served 90 days in jail following a guilty plea in which he admitted to illegally searching a suspect’s room and then lying in a police report.

“Truthfulness” is the only word used in the document to detail the conduct of former Manchester police officer Darren Murphy, who along with former officer Aaron Brown, were accused of allegedly coercing a woman into sex in exchange for dropping charges against her.

At least 12 officers were added to the Laurie List for using excessive force, including Andrew Monaco, a former state trooper who was caught on a helicopter’s camera assaulting a defendant following a car chase.

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While advocates for police accountability have been calling for the release of the Laurie List for years, the document itself was never intended to be a tool for reform. Instead, it’s a result of prosecutors needing to track officers with possible credibility issues that need to be disclosed to criminal defendants.

A ‘watershed’ moment for New Hampshire

The release of these names completes a two-stage process for disclosure as required by legislation passed in 2021. The document’s initial section was released last December, revealing 90 officers who were placed on the list since May 2018. The additional names released Tuesday were added to the Laurie List prior to May 2018.

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The list’s release was praised by Rep. Terry Roy, a Republican from Deerfield who co-authored the legislation paving the way for its release. Roy, who calls himself “absolutely pro-law enforcement,” called it a “watershed” moment for the state.

“We need to understand better what’s going on in policing. We need to understand and have faith in this community,” said Roy. “And I think New Hampshire realized, it’s time for some sunshine.”

The measure authored by Roy laid out a process for officers to challenge their inclusion on the list before their name is released publicly. Those appeals are being heard by superior court judges under seal, meaning court records remain shielded from public view.

The list does not specify the exact conduct that landed an officer on the list. Rather, it uses broad terms like “criminal conduct,” “falsifying evidence,” and “falsifying records,” along with a date the incident took place, when known. The vast majority of officers were included on the Laurie List for “truthfulness” issues, a category for which the state does not provide a definition.

Reporting by NHPR following the release of the first portion of the list showed that at least eight of the first 90 names revealed were still employed as officers in the state, including two current police chiefs. Other former officers with sustained misconduct on their record remain in law enforcement fields, including as investigators and police commissioners.

How the Laurie List became public

Under U.S. Supreme Court precedent, prosecutors are required to turn over evidence that is exculpatory, or favorable to a defendant.

Following a 1989 murder case in New Hampshire in which the conviction was later overturned due to prosecutors failing to disclose a detective’s troubling conduct, county attorneys began to maintain lists of officers in order to share that information with defendants. In 2017, the New Hampshire Attorney General’s office took over administration of the list, renaming it the “exculpatory evidence schedule.”

Officers are generally placed on the Laurie List by their police chiefs, though the guidelines for what qualifies as exculpatory material is broad and likely unevenly enforced from department to department.

According to the Attorney General’s office, criminal conduct, a deliberate lie by an officer, dereliction of duty, falsifying records or evidence, excessive force, or anything that “implicates an officer’s character for truthfulness” should be considered grounds for inclusion on the list.

In 2018, the Center for Public Interest Journalism filed a lawsuit seeking the release of the exculpatory evidence schedule after the Attorney General declined a request to release an unredacted version. The group, which was represented by the ACLU of New Hampshire, argued the document wasn’t exempt from the state’s Right to Know statute, and that releasing it would increase transparency into how people in positions of power are held to account for their conduct.

In 2020, the New Hampshire Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the Laurie List is not categorically exempt from disclosure under state law. However, the court sent the matter down to a lower court to determine if releasing the list was in the public’s interest, or if the privacy interests of the officers outweighed any public benefit.

That summer, the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer led to a national reckoning over racism and policing. In New Hampshire, a commission created by Gov. Chris Sununu to look into policing in the state recommended the Laurie List be released to the public, prompting bipartisan legislation that cleared the way for public disclosure. The new law required that officers be given a final chance to appeal their status on the list, and that the state update and publish the list on a regular basis.

Until Tuesday, the Department of Justice has released redacted versions of the complete Laurie List, blocking out the names of officers, and in some cases, the conduct that landed them on the list.

These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information visit collaborativenh.org.