Anyone whos has seen or heard of the George Floyd video should be rightfully appalled. There are most likely many such incidents that don't result in deaths or are not recorded, that occur many times each day.
As long as we hire human beings as Police Officers, we will see some bad behavior. We probably don't hear very often about the things great Police Officers do every day, but that's the nature of the beast.
Sadly, I think any Police Chief or Police supervisor worth their salary, knows immediately who their problem Officer's are. The real question is what have they done to curtail their problems and address bad behavior before it escalates.
The problem is many Chief's and supervisors are unwilling to deal with the consequences of taking bad Police Officer's head on before the next George Floyd.
Police Union's have become more about protecting bad officer's and winning their job's back than in actually looking out for the good officers and protecting them
The "no snitching" mentality is alive and well in just about every Police Department. Good cops, for whatever resaon tend to cover for "bad " cops. Its just the nature of the culture and good Officers who do go beyond and report bad behavior, usually find themselves as the outcasts because they reported a bad cop.
Last summer I received calls from Officer's about an incident on a Northend street. When I asked to see the body cam footage of the incident, I was told by two high level HPD officers that the officer's in question "left the office and forgot their body cameras" Now isn't that convenient, and what discipline or corrective action was eventually taken to make sure it doesn't happen in the future? None is the most likely answer.
I have had conversations with many Police Chief's and high level supervisors regarding bad behavior by Officer's and there seems to be a common theme when dealing with problem Officers...Police Union's and bad Labor Board decisions.
One Police Chief told me he didn't want to terminate a bad Officer, with well documented racist behavior, because he didn't want to face the officer in the hallway in 2 years when the Labor Board would order him to hire the officer back.
Recently HPD was ordered to hire a detective back after he was terminated as the result of his DUI arrest and his well documented racist tirade, repeatedly using the "N" word during his arrest, all caught on dashcam and bodycam in real time.
Where is it acceptable to now assign a documented racist Officer? Is he only a racist whwn he is drunk?
What about the racist Sergeant who was recently returned to the streets as a supervisor after he was documented previously referring to Hartford's African American men as "Gorilla's in the mist". Did he serve enough time in the bowels of HPD in the booking Department that he relinquished his racist viewpoints? Did assigning him to the Southend ensure he can't exercise his racist behavior. I sure hope so because that is the last thing we need right now and no one can come back and say "geez, what a surprise, we never knew"
Or do we just wait until the next time he has a bad day and boils over in a racist rant? There is too much riding on the Public's trust of Police Officers to allow, or even risk, continued bad behavior.
It doesn't serve anyone's best interest and it may require Legislative change to address the options.Again, Police Officers are human, but maybe the Legislature should require a Labor decision that keeps them employed, but maybe not in a Police capacity. Somerwhere in a Office is the basement of City Hall might work, with limited public contact.
We also need to do a lot more for mental health support for Officers who see things everyday that no human being should have to see or deal with. It is no wonder some officer's eventually "snap", or worse. Supervisors need to be much more in tune with identifying problems and risk factors and not be afraid or intimidated to address these issues.
More on this in the future. This can't be the dirty little secret that no Police Chief wants to address. It is out in the open now, deal with it and work to fix it. Denial now is futile.
15 comments:
There are racists and non racists. But unless the non racist takes issue with the racists, they are not good people. There are a few bad cops and many good cops. But if a "good" cop covers up for a bad one, they lose their entitlement to be called good. Bob Killian
Mayor Bronin did his job and fired that detective. The State of Ct felt so inclined to give that Nazi his job back. Which was a clear slap in the face to all people of color living in CT. CT boast of being a fair and equal liberal state. But that move they made giving him hos job back we mind as well be in Sparta Mississippi. But anywho people are fed up and sick and tired of being sick and tired. Im sure he or Kessler will cost the city hundreds of thousands in a lawsuit in the future.
If the city defunds the police, I'm moving. I'll be damned if a mob is going to tell me how to live,
What ever happened with that detective that hit the handcuffed Hispanic male after a minor car accident? Did GA 14 squash it?
Oh yea I forgot about that incident. Brookman can you FOI that video? I heard it’s pretty painful to watch. Can’t believe with all this going on the PD is trying to sweep it under the rug.
Believe it. The chief, Jason Thody, was one of “those” police officers you talk of that was on supervisors radar from day 1 as a cadet. From drunken off duty fights to shots fired to chasing 63’s, and not to name countless other shenanigans.
It was truly disgraceful seeing HPD command staff submitting and showing weakness and kneeling to protesters. But then it was great seeing a real police Chief, Enfield Chief Fox, not kneel/submit and respectfully explain why. Picture DKR Or DC Brooks kneeling, LoL! I don’t think so! Your weak weak weak Hartford PD, and weakness starts at the top and trickles down. You should be ashamed.
You're 1000% wrong. They weren't kneeling for but kneeling with. And you're even more wrong about those other two.
Hey, "KNEELING IS KNEELING", No matter how you try to talk your way out of it, Honestly shows a Weakness in the leaders of what was a Great Department I dread seeing the Future of the HPD
On a routine basis I read about supervisors and chiefs who are saddled with racist and bad behavior from their subordinates but what about when subordinates have superiors who display this destructive behavior? Chief Billy Smith was heard on tape stating hateful and threatening remarks towards homosexuals, Jews, whites ,females etc. ,if we had a Native American on the job I’m sure he would have found a way to offend and threaten them too. Imagine yourself as a white subordinate hearing your chiefs voice on a recording saying he will reward black firefighters with extra vacation days who assault white firefighters.Who were we supposed to report that to? I respect Bob Killian but staying quiet is mostly exercised for self preservation in a fked up system ,it is not and I repeat not to cover up for bad cops or firefighters .Over the decades many officers in HFD have recommended to higher chain of command issues with untrainable probationary ffs, coworkers who were abusing substances,awols,insubordination etc. to chiefs no different than Billy Smith. Bob Killian how do you overcome that? Please don’t say to reach out to the politicians because their the ones who appoint these puppets to manipulate. Again Bob, self preservation not covering up ,there’s a enormous difference.
How about if the non racist reports the racist and in turn gets retaliated against by the powers that be? What if I told you that there’s a known racist in HPD who was part of a discrimination lawsuit of an Asian officer and this same officer was labeled as a liar in that lawsuit by a CHRO investigator. That same officer had a second discrimination lawsuit against him from a Female Hispanic Detective. That same officer has a Third discrimination lawsuit against him from a Hispanic Male Detective (currently in Federal Court). That same officer has a fourth discrimination lawsuit against him from a Black Male Detective that was a City resident till the harassment retaliation got so bad he had to retire. That lawsuit is currently in Federal Court as well. Guess what happened to all those minorities that filed those complaints. They were further harassed and retaliated against for making those complaints. Guess what happened to the racist officer? You guess it.,,, Not a damn thing, he’s still harassing officers all over the department and still the Supervisor in the same division. Then you ask why the good cops don’t say anything about the bad cops. If you want to flush your career down the toilet, you can go and report bad behavior. Oh did I mention that after you’re career is flushed down the toilet, the City Attorneys goes above and beyond to disprove your allegations against the racist cops. So you tell me, who in their right mind would want to turn a bad officer in?
9:54 pm What is worse, someones phone conversation being recorded or the white Chiefs who said far worse things in person!
9:19 PM Someone’s taped phone conversation is much worse than allegations without proof. Please provide examples of white chiefs who said worse things than Billy Smith and please provide the names of all parties involved so that I can verify if your accusations are truthful. 9:19 PM What would hold up in court ,factual evidence or a he said, he said conversation . While we’re keeping score what demographic did Local 760 have to represent the most related to shitbags on the job? Also ,I looked it up on the internet ,two wrongs still don’t make right.
Anything new going on at HPD? Is bad behavior still being rewarded? When will the corruption stop? Just because you put a Hispanic person at the second highest position doesn’t mean things are ok.
1. He’s Hispanic only by name (doesn’t speak the language).
2. He doesn’t live in the City (South Windsor is nice).
3. He formed a pac with the worst officers in the department.
4. He was easily manipulated by the first person to run and kiss his butt when he arrived at 253.
5. He can care less about what happens to the PD.
6. The only reason he’s still around is because nobody wants him working for them.
7. Since he got to the PD, he’s been totally against all officers and detectives.
8. He hasn’t done one thing to make the department better and has only brought the PD to a lower point.
Can’t wait for the day when the soon to be newly appointed DC’s are further promoted and take over at the two highest positions.
Thody is an all around failure!
Can someone tell me why a newly promoted Puerto Rican Sergeant was taken off the streets and put in booking only to let the “Gorillas in the mist” Sergeant go back to the streets? With everything that’s going on with cops you put a guy like him in the streets? Who’s making these decisions because who ever it is doesn’t have a clue and should move on to other things!
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