PBA wants gag order in Bird case enforced

The Nassau Police Benevolent Association has asked a federal judge to enforce a gag order on an internal police report in the wrongful death case of Jo'Anna Bird after a Nassau legislator disclosed elements of it in a TV news interview.

The motion to intervene filed Thursday by the PBA requests enforcement of a Dec. 15, 2011, confidentiality order granted by U.S. District Court Judge Arthur Spatt. The PBA accused Nassau Legislature Presiding Officer Peter Schmitt (R-Massapequa) of discussing details of the report in a Feb. 7 interview with News 12 Long Island, in violation of the order. Thursday's motion said Schmitt "should be held accountable and sanctioned and held in contempt of court."

Some Nassau legislators signed confidentiality agreements before being given a presentation on the report in advance of a vote to approve a $7.7 million settlement in a lawsuit filed by Bird's mother, Sharon Dorsett, in 2010. Dorsett is raising Bird's children, Leonardo, 6, and Jo'Anna, 8.

Ed Ward, a spokesman for Schmitt, said the matter had been settled. "The whole issue was resolved when the legislature passed the Bird settlement," Ward said. "It's over."

Nassau PBA president James Carver did not return phone calls seeking comment.

Schmitt in the TV interview said court "orders of protection were ignored . . . [and] mandatory arrests were called for and not performed," according to the PBA filing. Schmitt also said Bird's ex-boyfriend, Leonardo Valdez-Cruz of Westbury, was given a cellphone by police when he was behind bars, and he used it to call Bird 35 to 40 times, the filing said.

Valdez-Cruz repeatedly violated a restraining order when he terrorized Bird in 2009 before breaking into her New Cassel apartment and stabbing her to death. He is serving a life sentence.

Two months after Bird's death, then-Nassau Police Commissioner Lawrence Mulvey said an internal investigation revealed seven officers failed to take proper action during domestic-violence visits to Bird's home.