E-Mail This Article to a Friend Boston’s police problem (continued)
	Don’t blame the cops THAT, ESSENTIALLY, was the message Boston mayor Tom Menino sent back in February, when a post–Super Bowl celebration in the Symphony neighborhood led to mayhem and one traffic fatality. And it was the message he delivered last week, when Emerson College student Victoria Snelgrove was killed by a pepper-spray pellet fired by a Boston policeman as an occasionally rowdy crowd massed near Fenway Park to celebrate the Red Sox’ come-from-behind win over the New York Yankees. After the Super Bowl debacle, Menino directed his wrath at the "few knuckleheads" who got violent, the failure of Boston colleges to control their students, and a new law allowing Sunday liquor sales. The police, the mayor insisted, "did the best they could at the time." Following Snelgrove’s death, Menino appeared to change his tune, stating that he and police commissioner Kathleen O’Toole would take full responsibility for the shooting. But subsequent comments by the mayor suggest he’s reverted to his original song: "The police are doing their jobs," the Boston Herald quoted Menino as saying. "The students have responsibility. They’re hoodlums." Maybe Menino truly believes that boorish fan behavior and poor decision-making by the police cannot co-exist. But the mayor, despite his carefully crafted Everyman persona, is a smart guy — certainly smart enough to know that a single effect can have multiple causes. More likely, then, Menino realizes that publicly discussing the possibility of police error could antagonize the BPD — and that, heading into an election year, could be a very risky thing to do. If so, Menino would be the latest in a long line of politicians who have realized that the BPD cherishes its autonomy and guards it with a vengeance. In 1980, near the end of his 15-year tenure, Mayor Kevin White’s push to reorganize the department met with harsh criticism. The Boston Police Superior Officers Federation accused White of meddling in police business, and gave a "no confidence" vote to Joseph Jordan, White’s police commissioner; later, the Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association (BPPA) attempted to stop the reorganization in court. In 1981, a round of police layoffs after the passage of Proposition 2 1/2 made the situation even worse. But White soon found a way to get back on the BPPA’s good side: in a secret agreement that was later made public, he promised to rehire hundreds of laid-off policemen if a massive city-bond bill passed on Beacon Hill. And in 1982, as he laid the groundwork for another campaign, White gave Boston’s patrolmen a hefty raise and restored the union’s right to binding arbitration. He also agreed to staff every patrol car with two officers, a stipulation that still makes it difficult to assign more policemen to higher-crime areas of the city. In the end, White decided not to seek re-election. But it’s likely that, if he had, the police would have been in his corner. Ray Flynn, White’s successor as mayor, also knew the importance of treating the BPD delicately. On November 6, 1987, Robert E. O’Toole — the same officer who allegedly distributed "less-lethal" pepper-spray-pellet guns to his unit, one of which killed Snelgrove, on October 21 — was demoted from deputy superintendent to sergeant for slapping a college student after a 1986 World Series game. The BPD also announced the suspension of a patrolman on a two-year-old brutality charge. The significance? The disciplinary actions were announced after Flynn had fended off a re-election challenge from City Councilor Joseph Tierney. Afterward, Tierney hinted that Flynn and police superintendent Francis Roache, a close Flynn ally, timed the announcement to protect the mayor. Walter O’Neil, the president of the Boston Police Superior Officers Federation, seemed to agree. "I don’t think they wanted any disruptions before the election," O’Neil told the Boston Globe. "What effect will it have now? None." In 1991, with the city still under Flynn’s watch, a commission headed by eminent attorney James St. Clair called for a massive overhaul of the BPD. The commission, which Flynn appointed in May of that year, convened after several controversial years for the department (including, most notably, the bungled investigation of Carol Stuart’s murder, in 1989) and was spurred by a four-part Globe investigative series that itemized the BPD’s woes. When the St. Clair Commission released its findings, in January 1992 — two months after Flynn was re-elected to a third term — it issued 30-some recommendations, from overhauling the BPD’s internal-affairs division and implementing community-policing methods to removing Roache and creating a community appeals board to guarantee some semblance of civilian oversight. Most of these recommendations were adopted, although Flynn opted to keep Roache, to whom he was close, on the job. Soon, Roache moved to create the appeals board the St. Clair Commission had recommended. But the board had less power than some police critics had sought; for example, it lacked subpoena authority. Nonetheless, it prompted a violent reaction from the police rank and file. Donald Murray, then-president of the BPPA, called the board the "ruination of the Boston Police Department," adding, "I feel I’ve been raped and sodomized." Flynn left office in 1993 to become ambassador to the Vatican. Had he run for re-election, the wrath he incurred by allowing civilians to encroach on the BPD’s autonomy would probably have cost him the support of the police. (As for the community appeals board created under Flynn’s watch, it’s heard only 50 cases in the past 12 years and hasn’t heard any in the past three. Beverly Ford, spokesperson for the BPD, says revitalizing the appeals board is a departmental priority. Demand for a stronger community appeals board with subpoena authority has periodically resurfaced — for example, following a botched 1994 drug raid, which caused a heart attack that killed the Reverend Accelyne Williams, a 75-year-old African-American man — but Menino has made it clear he isn’t interested, saying that such a board would be a "crutch.") These observations about mayoral deference to the police unions merit a few disclaimers. Menino did stand his ground with the BPPA during the nasty contract impasse that was resolved just before the Democratic National Convention, and eventually got the better of his nemesis, BPPA head Tom Nee. In addition, the independent commission led by former US attorney Donald Stern has yet to analyze the events of October 21 and assign blame. Until it does, agnosticism is the best policy. For Menino, however, a wait-and-see approach doesn’t make political sense. Once the Stern Commission has done its work, the BPD’s actions may well be deemed insufficient or even negligent. But until then — and maybe even afterward — don’t expect the mayor to criticize the police with any force. With the 2005 mayoral election looming, a horde of pissed-off city cops is the last thing Menino needs. — Adam Reilly

5) Race and community relationships

When Evans left office, many speculated that Menino would appoint the city’s first black commissioner. He did not, prompting Leonard Alkins, head of the Boston NAACP, to call O’Toole’s appointment a "sad day."

Internally, the department is facing a racial-bias lawsuit filed in March by two black officers — and a reverse-discrimination suit from a group of white officer candidates who feel robbed by the department’s affirmative-action policies.

Externally, the BPD is increasingly viewed with hostility and suspicion by Boston’s minority residents. In May, a survey by Atlantic Research and Consulting revealed that more than two-thirds of Mattapan and Roxbury residents feel that the department has a racial-profiling problem. They also gave police poor marks for fairness, respect, and handling confrontational situations. And that was before O’Toole launched Operation Neighborhood Shield, which Alkins publicly denounced as racist targeting of black residents.

O’Toole says that other than Alkins’s complaint, she has received only one letter of concern about the tactics, and that for the most part black residents have welcomed the additional police activity. But Alkins is hardly pacified. "Unfortunately, in the Boston Police Department there is a systemic culture that tends to treat the communities of color with disrespect," he says.

"I have absolutely no tolerance for any race profiling," says O’Toole. "I made a mistake when I launched Neighborhood Shield. The one person I didn’t make contact with was Lenny [Alkins]. Since then we’ve had an opportunity to talk, and I think he feels differently. But for the one comment Lenny made in the media, I received one letter, in general terms, asking us to make sure that we not randomly harass black men indiscriminately."

6) Rape warnings

On September 21, a woman was brutally kidnapped and raped at gunpoint by two men near Franklin Park. The BPD did not issue any public warning. Nine days later, the same thing happened to another woman, in Mission Hill. Only then did the BPD warn women to use caution, and still another week passed before sketches of the suspects were released, even though both victims had provided descriptions.

Deputy Superintendent Margot Hill, who heads the BPD Family Justice Division, has described the delay as BPD policy, and has not publicly declared a policy change or even that she is considering one.

"If I was a woman in Boston I would be nervous" about the lack of a publicly declared change in policy, says Sarah Graham Miller, spokesperson for the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, in Washington, DC. "In most places where they have incidents like this, they often do revisit and revise their policies, and make a public announcement."

"I questioned Margot [Hill], why wouldn’t we go out [with a warning] the first time," O’Toole says. "They had no reason to believe that the first incident was anything other than a single isolated incident. Maybe we should put out a warning every time there’s a rape like this. We have a very different perception now."

7) Lying cops

In April, the DA indicted BPD detective Miguel Pinto for perjury. Pinto allegedly testified to witnessing a bathroom drug deal that had taken place when he was not in the building.

In July, a US District Court judge rebuked the DA for allowing BPD detective John Broderick Jr. to lie on the witness stand concerning a February 2003 drug search.

In October, BPD sergeant Joseph A. LeMoure and another officer were convicted in US District Court for perjury, obstruction of justice, and witness tampering for covering up LeMoure’s beating of a man during a traffic stop.

That’s a lot of lying. Meanwhile, the BPD has resisted procedural changes that would help ensure honesty — in particular, recording of suspect interrogations. This summer, a commission charged with devising changes in eyewitness-identification procedures was not allowed even to consider recommending videotaping or recording interrogations from the beginning. In August, a frustrated Supreme Judicial Court ruled that judges should instruct juries to be skeptical when police fail to record interrogations. The BPD’s legal counsel criticized the ruling.

"I have absolutely no sympathy for rogue cops," O’Toole says. "I think I owe it not only to the residents but to the police department as well to speak out in the loudest possible terms. I think that this department in recent years is perceived by the cops to have a very strict disciplinary process in place. We have a strict anti-corruption team in place."

8) Overtime and detail abuse.

In October, the BPD removed Captain John Kervin from command of area B-2, just four months after promoting him, for abusing overtime and education reimbursements. An internal investigation is continuing; Kervin may have been the worst and most incorrigible offender, but not the only one.

The department recently put another 22 officers under internal investigation for allegedly scamming the paid-detail system, which allows cops to make extra money by taking security or traffic shifts on their off-hours. This came after a September Boston Globe investigation found multiple instances of police officers apparently getting paid for details and regular shifts at the same time. The BPD was forced to admit that it has never audited paid details.

"On the paid-detail issue, we’re likely to find at the end of the day that 90 percent of these were sloppy administrative details," says O’Toole. "Maybe a handful of them will be from fraud. The paid-detail issue is one more symptom of the lack of management systems. People come up through the ranks, and they’re great cops, but they’re not trained as managers.

"Jack Kervin, I feel terrible about that. By August or September I started having concerns with overtime issues. I started holding bureau chiefs responsible."

THESE ARE symptoms of long-standing problems, and they can’t all be cleaned up overnight.

But we do need to believe that they are being cleaned up. And that requires an openness and transparency that has long been anathema to police generally, and to the BPD specifically.

Menino’s lack of public concern does not suggest much urgency for change, however. "The mayor is appreciative of the efforts of Commissioner O’Toole in running the police department, says Menino spokesperson Seth Gitell, who would not comment on most of the specific points of concern above. "He is pleased to see the innovative approach the commissioner is taking with Operation Neighborhood Shield. The mayor has full confidence in [O’Toole’s] ability to move the department forward."

O’Toole has just hired Christopher Fox, senior policy adviser for Mass Inc., for a senior management position. A Menino man — he was executive director of the mayor’s transition task force back in 1993 — Fox has an impressive management résumé but no police experience. O’Toole will look to him for help in fixing a variety of outmoded systems and procedures.

Of course, the sworn officers may not take kindly to a civilian bean-counter trying to change the way they do things. But changes need to be made, and bad apples need to be tossed out.

As a first step, some of the city’s top brass might speak up about the need for change — show at least a little horror at the wrongful convictions, the low arrest rate for major crimes, the brutal rape that might have been preventable, or the needless death of a young woman on Lansdowne Street — instead of declaring themselves shocked, shocked, when the next stain gets added to this list.

David S. Bernstein can be reached at dbernstein[a]phx.com