Michael Cox, a veteran law enforcement leader who 30 years ago was beaten by his fellow Boston police officers while working undercover in the department’s gang unit, will return to Boston to lead the department as commissioner, Mayor Michelle Wu announced Wednesday, selecting a candidate who carries intimate knowledge of its culture from three decades of service here.
Cox, 57, has been chief of the Ann Arbor Police Department in Michigan since 2019 after working for 30 years in the Boston Police Department and will take its helm at a challenging moment. The force faces widespread calls for reform from community leaders and activists and the mayor herself. Cox, who will be the department’s third Black commissioner when he begins on Aug. 15, will be tasked with changing the department’s culture while maintaining the goodwill of a 1,600-strong force known for resisting change.
An advocate of community policing, Cox said during a media briefing Wednesday that he was determined to “revitalize” the department’s efforts to rebuild relationships with residents, particularly in neighborhoods of color where mistrust of law enforcement is deep-rooted. He cited consistency and humility as the department’s best tools to foster trust, noting that “if folks have issues — historical issues— we need to listen and show that we can take that criticism, and more importantly, that we hear them.”
A former Boston Police superintendent, Cox has earned a long list of accolades in his career but is perhaps best known in his hometown for the successful civil rights lawsuit he brought against the department after a 1995 incident when his fellow officers mistook him for a murder suspect, beat him unconscious, and tried for years to cover it up. Cox’s decision to publicize his experience drew attention to the dangers faced by the department’s few Black officers, particularly while working undercover.
“This is a homecoming for me… [and] a fairly emotional moment,” Cox said Wednesday, his voice quivering. “Since that time in 1995, I have dedicated my life to making sure that both the Boston Police Department and policing in general has grown and learned from the experiences that I went through way back when.”
Cox’s appointment closely follows Wu’s selection of a new fire commissioner and a new school superintendent, cementing her mark on city leadership, and comes as the city has gone well over a year without a permanent commissioner.
Wu said she was thrilled to appoint a leader who “brings decades of experience working at every level within our police department.”
“Chief Cox leads with that sense of possibility, a deep faith in what we can achieve together, and a deep love for the city that he grew up in,” she said.
In February 2020, while he was working as chief of the Ann Arbor Police Department, Cox was placed on a brief paid administrative leave over allegations that he had created a hostile work environment and exerted undue influence over an internal investigation related to parking enforcement.
A city-commissioned investigation by a law firm found “no evidence” that Cox’s behavior created a hostile work environment, and Cox was reinstated after less than a month. Yet investigators concluded in a report “there is no question” that many police department employees “were made very uncomfortable by the Chief’s actions and that they fear retaliation.”
The probe came after a lieutenant indicated that she felt pressure from Cox not to recommend termination for a parking supervisor she had concluded had lied about voiding tickets. After conducting interviews with police officials, including the lieutenant and Cox himself, investigators concluded that Cox characterized the ticket voiding as an unimportant matter and made jokes that some in the department “interpreted as belittling.”
Asked about the incident on Wednesday, Cox said he has “learned from that quite a bit and I wish it didn’t happen.”
“I’ve always tried to coach all officers on good practices to make good decisions and sometimes I can be intimidating to some folks, but I apologize for how I was perceived,” he said. “It was not my intention whatsoever.”
Wu said she had personally spoken with the mayor and town administrator of Ann Arbor about the incident and was confident that Cox “is a leader of great integrity, that he takes every step of leadership very seriously, and that he has taken full ownership over any miscommunication and used that as a learning opportunity.”
He takes over a department without a full-time leader for more than a year.
Previous commissioner Dennis White was placed on leave two days after being appointed by former-Mayor Martin Walsh, following a Globe investigation into allegations that White threatened to shoot his ex-wife. White was later fired and Superintendent-in-Chief Gregory Long has served as acting commissioner since February 2021.
In January, Wu appointed a five-member committee to search for a new police commissioner with the hope of naming someone by spring. The search committed partnered with a search firm to solicit over 40 applications and conduct two rounds of interviews to narrow the list of candidates to four finalists.
The city released a job application in April seeking a “proven transformational leader” for the position, and Wu has repeatedly expressed a desire to hire someone dedicated to reforming a department that has repeatedly been mired in controversy.
Numerous Boston police officers pled guilty to overtime fraud last fall after a federal investigation uncovered that over a dozen employees, including former union president Thomas Nee, falsified time sheets to collect over $300,000 in overtime.
Another one-time union leader, Patrick Rose, was sentenced in April to 13 years in prison for sexually abusing six children over multiple decades. A year earlier, the Globe reported that Rose was allowed to remain on the force for 20 years after police officials determined he more than likely sexually abused a child in 1995, exposing an institutional failure within the department to discipline officers accused of misconduct.
Ivy Scott can be reached at ivy.scott@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @itsivyscott. Emma Platoff can be reached at emma.platoff@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @emmaplatoff. Danny McDonald can be reached at daniel.mcdonald@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @Danny__McDonald.
U.S. - Latest - Google News
July 13, 2022 at 09:49PM
https://ift.tt/eN3DEzW
Michael Cox named new Boston police commissioner - The Boston Globe
U.S. - Latest - Google News
https://ift.tt/67HDqva
Shoes Man Tutorial
Pos News Update
Meme Update
Korean Entertainment News
Japan News Update
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Michael Cox named new Boston police commissioner - The Boston Globe"
Post a Comment