Largey Family Files Civil Suit Against Officials, Policemen

The attorney for the Largey family filed a civil suit against ten Cambridge officials and policemen yesterday, charging that their actions in the October death of Lawrence P. Largey and subsequent investigations deprived the East Cambridge youth of his rights of due process of law.

Michael J. Haroz, attorney for the family, said at a press conference yesterday that the actions of these officials "subjected Largey to summary punishment without the due process of law."

Cambridge police officers Peter E. DeLuca and Rudolph V. Carbone, who were cleared by a Grand Jury last week of charges of manslaughter, assault and battery, and assault and battery with a deadly weapon, and City Manager John H. Corcoran were among those implicated in the suit.

Actual and punitive damages of $1 million are requested in the suit.

DeLuca also faces an investigation by Corcoran and the City, which Corcoran said yesterday will probably begin later in the week. Carbone faces a similar investigation by Cambridge Chief of Police James Reagan, who is also charged in the Largey suit.

Two other police officers charged in the suit will also face Reagan's investigation. The most serious consequences of both investigations would be the men's firing.

Haroz said that in conjunction with Hard Times, an East Cambridge community organization, he will ask the U.S. Attorney in Boston for an FBI investigation of the Largey case.

He added he will continue his own inquiry about the investigation and prosecution of the case.

"We are not letting the matter drop here. The Grand Jury action was quite wrong; there was more than enough evidence of beating and neglect," Haroz said yesterday.

Haroz and Hard Times are also pressing for a public release of the Grand Jury testimony and assurance from the City that their hearings will be public. Haroz said that it is only fair for the hearings to be open, and that, if they are not, he may seek further public action.

"Each time the hearings were closed we came out battled and bruised, when they were open, we were vindicated," he added.

Charles B. Allen, an organizer for Hard Times, said at yesterday's press conference that the Grand Jury clearance of DeLuca and Carbone showed that justice no longer exists for poor and working-class people.

He added that as a result of this decision the police are free to continue "beating on people of this city without fear of reprisal."

Allen said that the Largey case has rekindled the determination of poor and working-class people to assert their strength and to "break the hold that the rich and powerful have over the courts, the police, and the government."

One woman from East Cambridge attending the press conference said that she was disgusted with the whole matter. "I have an eight-year-old daughter who said she'll kill the policemen if she sees them," she said.