To Mayor Bill de Blasio, the idea of the man dubbed the “cannibal cop” returning to the NYPD is a little hard to swallow.
“No, I don’t think he should ever get his job back, and I think it’s a troubling situation,” Mr. de Blasio said of former cop Gilberto Valle at an unrelated press conference Wednesday.
Mr. Valle graced the covers of the city’s tabloids when he was arrested and later convicted on charges of conspiring to abduct, murder and eat women he knew, including his wife. But he was sprung from jail this week after a judge overturned the most serious conviction in his case, kidnapping conspiracy, writing that the cop’s intricate dinner plans were no more than “fantasy role-play.”
“I’m a little surprised by the court’s action, and we’re obviously going to look very carefully at that situation,” the mayor said.
Mr. Valle was fired upon his conviction.
But even with the most serious conviction overturned, Mr. Valle might have a bit of trouble getting back onto the force — the judge upheld a conviction on a lesser charge, for inappropriately accessing an NYPD database, which prosecutors said he used to check out women he wanted to attack.
