Damakant Jayshi
Details remain murky about a Wausau Police and Fire Commission inquiry into the investigation of a 7-year-old girl’s death.
At the group’s regular monthly meeting on Monday, Wausau Police Deputy Chief Matthew Barnes provided a very brief “update” on the investigation. “The investigation is on schedule to be completed within the time-frame that was initially provided,” Barnes told the members of the commission.
The deputy chief did not elaborate which of the two investigations he was referring to nor did any of the five PFC members seek clarification. As per the PFC directive issued in February, two separate investigations into six police officers were to be conducted: one by WPD chief Benjamin Bliven and the other by an outside law enforcement agency chosen by Bliven.
Alyssa Froom and Julie Leist each filed complaints questioning the way Wausau Police investigated the 2020 death of 7-year-old Eliana Froom, Alyssa Froom’s daughter and the step granddaughter of Leist. Eliana Froom died Oct. 7, 2020, roughly two weeks after she collapsed at a Wausau home where she was staying with her father. Though a medical examiner’s report shows Eliana died of natural causes, her mother and Leist dispute that finding and alleged the girl was a victim of neglect.
Froom and Leist filed complaints in December with the Police and Fire Commission alleging a shoddy and questionable investigation by six police officers and Bliven. While the commission dismissed complaints against the police chief, it ordered the two investigations of the other officers named in the complaints. Both Froom and Leist challenged that ruling and filed their appeals.
However, the commission did not change course and allowed Bliven to choose an outside law enforcement agency to investigate the other officers involved, a directive that was made before the 30-day window in which Froom could file an appeal. The status of the appeal is not clear as neither the PFC nor an outside counsel, Samuel Hall, assisting the PFC on the matter, has provided any update. They have cited the “ongoing investigation.”
“Deputy Chief Barnes should have not had information pertaining to this on-going investigation nor speaking on behalf of it,” Froom told Wausau Pilot & Review after the meeting. She said she received a letter from police chief Bliven in which he said there are no new complaints against the officers. Froom also objected to the department sharing her daughter’s medical records without a release form.
Froom and Leist have alleged violations of due process over the PFC’s handling of their complaint against Bliven and six other police officers. Earlier, they also alleged violations of their civil rights.
Leist told Wausau Pilot & Review that she is yet to hear from PFC and that she wrote a letter to the commission again, on April 24, accusing the body of “disrespecting” her sharing her March 30 letter with Bliven but not acknowledging receiving it from her.
During a briefing at the commission meeting last month, Bliven told PFC that he had asked “a chief in Fox Valley” to investigate and that the chief had told him that he would likely submit a report to PFC in June after conducting a review of police the investigation into Eliana’s death in April and May. Bliven named neither the agency nor the chief spearheading the investigation.
Early this month, the two women provided additional documents to the PFC after Bliven’s “update” at the commission’s meeting last month and tried to reach PFC and its independent counsel Hall but they said their efforts have been ignored and accused the commission and the attorney of apathy.
