I’ve never believed being chief means I owe an officer blind loyalty. If one of mine is wrong, I have to deal with it. That may mean coaching, discipline, termination, or standing in front of the public and saying we got something wrong. What I won’t do is decide he’s wrong because defending him became…
When one of my officers is under investigation, I have responsibilities to the public, the officer, and the department. Those responsibilities don’t always fit neatly together, especially when people want answers before the investigation has established what actually happened. I don’t believe transparency means telling everybody everything I know, and I don’t believe protecting an…
When I first became a cop in 1997, I was told that if I wasn’t getting complained on, that probably meant I wasn’t putting in the work. There was some truth to that. If you’re making traffic stops, arresting people, writing tickets, breaking up fights, and telling people things they don’t want to hear, somebody…