Two Conard High School football players learned on August 26, 2019 why many Black men feel the police target them. Two Hartford police detectives abandoned their duties in the city to travel to West Hartford, where one of them confronted Conard High School students Taariq Lewinston and Antonio Gordon, according to a complaint filed by the mother of one of the youths. It was a chilling example of a Hartford police detective acting like a West Hartford vigilante.
The two young West Hartford residents were doing what the school’s players have done for years: knocking on doors in West Hartford, wearing their team jerseys, to raise money for the team, according to the complaint. The student athletes sell “Chieftain cards,” which include discounts to the purchaser at local restaurants.
Some time between 8:30 p.m. and 9 p.m, the young men knocked on the doors of homes in a neighborhood in the southern part of West Hartford, according to a Hartford police investigation report. As they were walking on the street, a white SUV slowly passed the two students, turned around, headed at them and stopped. Someone in the SUV shone a light on them and told them to stop, according to Gordon. Detective Phil Borkowski, armed and wearing a vest that said “Police” on it, emerged from the vehicle and approached. He asked what they were doing in the neighborhood. His wife was at home, Borkowski said, at a house the youths had visited minutes earlier. Borkowski, according to Lewinston, said his wife was “terrified” that the students had knocked on her door, the complaint states.
The students remained calm and explained what they were doing. Gordon told police Borkowski gave them “a whole bunch of attitude … was yelling … and seemed angry.” After a couple of minutes, Borkowski returned to the SUV and left. Lewinston went home and told his indomitable mother, Keesha Answer, of the encounter. Answer called West Hartford, state and Hartford police to ask who had questioned her son and his friend. There were no records of a stop at that time in that area of West Hartford.
Answer contacted local officials and asked them to find out why her son and Gordon had been stopped by the unknown police. On Aug. 28, she learned that Borkowski is a member of the Hartford police force. The driver of the SUV, which was provided to the city by the FBI, was Hartford detective Josh Lewis. They were with state parole officer Jennifer Sullivan that night as they made compliance checks of registered sex offenders in Hartford, not West Hartford.
When Borkowski received a call about the students from his wife, Kimberly Borkowski — who is also a Hartford Police detective — he told Lewis to drive to West Hartford. The investigation of the incident includes conflicting statements by the Borkowskis. Kimberly Borkowski, according to the Hartford police report, called her husband after hearing the knock on her door to ask if he was expecting someone at their house at that hour. She “did not know why her husband responded to their home, and he never told her why.” Sullivan told investigators that she overheard the call between the Borkowskis, and Kimberly Borkowski sounded “very concerned, she could not see anyone, and she sounded really worried.”
Phil Borkowski was interviewed twice to allow him to explain inconsistencies between his wife’s statement and his. Both Phil Borkowski and Lewis told investigators the encounter was a “consensual citizen contact.” Maybe to them. Borkowski maintained that “his actions did not constitute a stop, based on Hartford Police Department Policy.”
But he wasn’t in Hartford. Borkowski and Lewis, in violation of the department’s policy, told no one they were going on the hunt for two West Hartford teenagers who were just raising money to support their high school football team.
When Gordon saw the FBI-provided SUV approaching, he wanted to run — which he had the right to do. Lewinston, in a moment that may have prevented an unspeakable tragedy, dissuaded him. They endured the outrage and lived to tell of it.
The 17-page report leaves the impression that the two college-bound graduates are more reliable witnesses than the Borkowskis. The investigation of Answer’s complaint concluded in April that no action would be taken on charges of harassment, discourteous attitude, civil rights violation and conduct unbecoming an officer. The complaints of violation of the department’s code of conduct and neglect of duty were sustained.
In a statement released after the publication of this column Thursday online, embattled Hartford police chief Jason Thody announced Borkowski had accepted a suspension of 10 days, Lewis of two. The disciplinary hearing, Thody told Answer, was to have been held on July 2 but appears to have been postponed until an inquiry from The Courant on Thursday morning. Thody called the shifting versions of the phone call between the detective spouses “slightly different.” Thody continued, “What’s most concerning to me about this incident is the apparently casual use of police authority, particularly involving young people — in addition to the fact that it was outside our jurisdiction.”
For Lewinston and Gordon, the penalty is more severe and lasting. They know that two Black young men carrying out a longstanding school activity can suffer the indignity of being questioned by police who will themselves suffer few consequences.
They are young but already sadder and wiser in the ways of the world.
Kevin Rennie is a lawyer and a former Republican state legislator. He can be reached at kfrennie@yahoo.com.
