Baltimore Mayor fires Police Commissioner
Union report: He “led us officers to slaughter”
Following the release of a scathing report, Baltimore’s Police Commissioner Anthony Batts is now jobless. Among other issues, the report alleges police officers were ordered not to engage protestors.
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According to The Guardian:
Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said on Wednesday afternoon that she had decided to replace Batts, who has led the police department for almost three years. Deputy commissioner Kevin Davis is to take over as interim commissioner, she said.
At a press conference on Wednesday, Rawlings-Blake said she made the decision in an attempt to reverse a “crime surge” being suffered by the city. “Families are tired of feeling this pain, and so am I,” she said.
“We need a change,” said the mayor. “This was not an easy decision, but it is one that is in the best interests of the people of Baltimore. The people of Baltimore deserve better.”
Batts, 54, had been under increasing pressure to tackle a spike in violent crime. So far in 2015 the city has sustained a 48% rise in homicides and 86% rise in shootings compared with the same period last year.
The mayor’s statement came just hours after a sharply critical police union report that lambasted Batts’s management of the department during riots and protests that broke out in the city following the death of Freddie Gray in April.
The Huffington Post explained further:
Some officers didn’t know who they were reporting to during the riots, according to a report released Wednesday by the Baltimore Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 3. The report also found that instructions to officers were unclear and that officers had “little to no training in riot/civil unrest situations.”
The union “received many reports from members who were deployed to the defensive efforts, stating that they lacked basic riot equipment, training, and, as events unfolded, direction from leadership,” according to the report. “The officers repeatedly expressed concern that the passive response to the civil unrest had allowed the disorder to grow into full scale rioting.”
The union said it released its “after action review,” which recommends giving on-the-scene commanders more latitude to make arrests, because Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and Police Commissioner Anthony Batts had taken no action to do the same.
Mayoral spokesman Kevin Harris sharply criticized the union in an emailed statement, saying an extensive review of the city’s response is underway.
“Our hope was that this report would shed some additional light on how we can better prepare our officers should there be future unrest,” he said. “Instead this report is no more than a trumped up political document full of baseless accusations, finger pointing and personal attacks.”
The report released earlier Wednesday included damning allegations that if true, make the commissioner’s firing understandable.
Baltimore police officers were ordered by their commissioner to allow rioters the space to destroy and loot property during a spate of unrest in the city following the death in custody of 25 year-old Freddie Gray in April, according to a partisan review by the city’s powerful police union.
On Wednesday, the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge Three published its scathing assessment (pdf) of police and city management during the unrest, which left 19 buildings and 144 vehicles burned, concluding the rioting was “without question, preventable” and argued police commanders “failed to meet professional standards on all levels”.
“As a result, chaos and lawlessness ensued,” the report states.
One account claimed Batts “led them to the slaughter.”
One officer's account from the FOP report: pic.twitter.com/YnQrS6vAuo
— Justin Fenton (@justin_fenton) July 8, 2015
The report can be read in its entirety here.
[Featured Image a Screen Shot from this YouTube Video]
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“Our hope was that this report would shed some additional light on how we can better prepare our officers should there be future unrest,” he said. “Instead this report is no more than a trumped up political document full of baseless accusations, finger pointing and personal attacks.”
Well, of course. And according to Montgomery, Operation Market Garden was at least 90% successful.
But the guys who died, were terribly wounded, and interned in German POW camps had a slightly different view…
As did the Dutch civilians who had to endure the worst winter in living memory as the Germans withheld food supplies in retribution for Dutch support of the Allies.
wash, rinse, repeat
A well deserved discharge. In this weakness he ended up pleasing no one.
Odd how the policy on the ground reflected exactly what the Mayor was saying to the press at the time, “let them riot.” I wonder if we will ever know if the policy was hers, his, or an agreed approach.
Of course it was her policy. On the other hand, he deserves to go for being completely spineless and refusing to stand up to her.
They both should go.
Look, I’m not the least surprised that the Mayor sacked the Chief. However, I’ll be shocked if any police officer agrees to take his place permanently.
Baltimore will burn again when at least five of the over-charged officers walk. The poor van driver will take the fall, but it will not be enough to satiate the appetite of the anarchists and racial grievance mongers.
Yea, but even the van driver will only be convicted on minor charges. Plus the unrest is part of the plan.
The Chief cannot do what the Mayor prohibits. Time to replace politicians, not appointed officials.
that report is damning, but his orders/direction came from the idiot at the top. She can’t fire herself, though, can she, being Preznit of US Conference of Mayors and shit?
think they’re rethinking that vote?
Looks to me like he is taking the fall. Whether he deserves it, or is giving her cover as the highest ranking black woman on the DNC, remains in doubt.
I think Batts did what he set out to do. Loretta has a job waiting for him when things settle down and he can be slipped in a side door under media noses. The obastard agenda is federal control of policing. The feds are there in Baltimore now. There will be a consent decree. Mission accomplished.
The mayor can’t hide her culpability in this. Batts may have told her he was experienced and he knew how to handle it. She was foolish to trust him. But she’s a really dumb broad – conniving, but dumb.
Now a white guy will be left holding the bag – consent decree, murder rate, poor police morale, and all, when the riots start again. The mood will have shifted back to “anti-police” when Mosby’s case falls apart. If Davis has any brains, he will not take the chief position if offered (he is interim chief). He would be wise to go elsewhere, even if it means a pay cut.
This link explains how the request for DOJ assistance occurred. As a side note,giving the oral report in this story is Jayne Miller, the reporter that put forward Donta Allen’s retraction of his first (recorded) statement to the police about the way Freddie was carrying on in the police van. She was reassigned or suspended just after her report. She is the live-in homosexual lover of Mosby’s top investigative prosecutor in the case, Janice (Janet?) Bledsoe.
http://www.wbaltv.com/news/police-commissioner-makes-first-comments-on-request-for-doj-investigation/32873344
“led us officers to slaughter”
Adoption of pro-choice doctrine or selective principles has consequences. Well, at least one symptom has been temporarily relieved with application of a salve. Good luck addressing the causes.
Maybe she’ll find a white man to catch the flak.
It seems he’s a big pro-black libtard. Que sera sera. Look for more room to destroy. What has endeared him to the likes of Batts and the moron mayor and people like Mosby are exactly what the cop on the street does not want to see. It appears that this guy will not have their backs, but time will soon tell.
Good. Nelson can sacrifice himself for the cause.
None of the officers will be convicted if they receive a fair trial. Gray was laid on the floor of the van by the officers and Pparently stood up where upon he fell killing himself. That was his own fault not That of the officers.
I don’t see what they convict the driver of. There is no allegation he drove recklessly.
When he was backing up to the police station, he had to put it in “R”, which the idiot mayor of Baltimore thought stood for “racism.”
This is the upside down world of Obama’s Marxist/racist leadership. The way to the top is giving them room to riot, calling out cops for acting stupidly, calling all of America racist … well, only white Christian America of course, has the KKK in it’s genes, and don’t forget we had those crusades against peace loving Islam. Freddie, Trayvon, Brown … despite their drugs and other problems … all sainted victims of the man.
So this Baltimore incompetent advances as a good foot soldier, and takes the fall for the black female boss. All the sanctuary cities are doing the same thing in a sense, advancing political correctness, breaking federal law by protecting the criminal illegal aliens, giving them room to “riot”.
The fish rots from the head down … Obama, Holder, Lynch, Hillary … criminals released onto the streets if they are illegals. The JustUs Department sees no problems with Hillary or Lerner and their lies and destruction of evidence, but cops get charged on thin air. It’s our national shame that we let racists and liars run this country with their lawless rubbish, trashing America from the top.
btw, the Ferguson riots seemed to follow the same protocol, and it seemed to come from conversations between Jarrett and Governor Nixon. The National Guard was on hand, but not guarding even the very store that Brown had robbed.
How is some greater good served by letting the angry mob tear down the store that the thug had robbed, allowing them to be victimized a second time? It incentivizes the thugs.
Well they do have a purpose, but it is not a good one.
Conniving Mayor (Room to Destroy) and Prosecutor ( I heard your call) Mosby and Chief Batts , who did you figure the fall guy would be. Truly amazing city ,I can say I called this one 6 weeks ago
The interim role of Deputy Police Commissioner Kevin Davis replacing the fired Anthony “give ‘em enough rope to hang themselves’ Battsinthebelfry will temporarily upset the racial quota system of the Baltimore police department. Ergo…
APB to Al “let’s make some money offa’ race” Sharpton and the Rhevverrend “we must deny Chicago’s black on black violence and focus on shaking down the government for education and jobs and equality ” Jesse Jackson.
Brings to mind a little enlisted man’s ditty from my days in the Corps. It began, “We, the unwilling, led by the unfit. . .”
It was the only option available. The Left couldn’t fail to support the political agenda of the mayor and prosecutor, AND they couldn’t fail to support a labor union. As non-political “management,” Batts was the only one in sight who could be fired.
New commish is English major.
There’s a news report out profiling the interim commish which includes the point that he overtly didn’t support Darren Wilson, or at least not his department’s police union’s support of him. Davis came from Anne Arundel and Prince George’s counties, not St. Louis, but he put his $.02 in on the subject. He’s a supporter of “21st Century” community policing. In other words, he’s a cog in the obastard administration’s quest for federal policing.
Let him get what he deserves. He can either throw himself onto the altar of black-run Marxist America as its latest white sacrificial lamb or he can wise up and beat feet the hell out before “it” hits the fan in B’more. He’s not going to improve morale or inspire the BPD rank and file with that little goodie in his past. One has to wonder why Batts hired an anti-Darren Wilson white guy to be his assistant chief just a few months ago. Davis overtly demonstrated lack of support for a rank-and-file officer on the hotseat.
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/latest-spiking-crime-spurs-baltimore-police-shakeup
http://news.wypr.org/post/mayor-fires-batts-appoints-interim-top-cop
Good points. Anyway, he’s only interim, in long enough to angry up the street with his white face, but he’ll be replaced by a black man soon enough.
April 5th, 2015 meeting with POTUS. Previous meeting, again with POTUS, December, 2014.
White House visitor logs.
Add to that, Mayor “Space to Destroy” Stephanie Rawlings Blake giving MD Governor Hogan’s liason the slip after the liason arrived in Baltimore in order for the Governor to be “Johnny on the Spot” should any assistance be needed were rioting to erupt.
Couldn’t let the Governor’s Liason overhear any delicate conversations being held with the White House.
Change city name to Baltiless.
Baltimore would do well to contract with Israelis to train the department on riot and crowd control. They’re the best in the world.
The blame here goes squarely on Mayor Blake’s shoulders.
The commissioner is a scapegoat. He’s taking the fall.
Blake set the rules in motion on this one.
It’s all on video.
She should be the one looking for a new job.
Yea, I smell the pungent aroma of scapegoat as well.
Dear Professor, Ms. Kaye, and my dear fellow commenters,
This post and those above rightly and even charitably chime “I told you so” in an chorus that is undeniable. Do something about it in the approach below that works because:
Batts was in over his head and that his mayor is completely out of her depth.
Innocent blood cries out from the earth of the US victims of sanctuary city misplaced sympathy.
Romney and Reagan and the 80’s approach was correct.
(Only three examples, as you know there is a litany)
I recommend that as well a comment on a blog, fellow commenters, take the few minutes needed to compose your thoughts into a single issue e-mail for your US senators and Congressional representatives and then send it.
Call on the phone (and take only a few seconds of the intern’s time: bill title and number, support/oppose, zip code and maybe your name) the state legislators in and around your districts about the legislation that you want them to endorse or to oppose.
It works.
Thank you!
DM