NYPD Commissioner William Bratton is resigning his post atop the nation’s largest police force.
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Bratton, who will stay on for another month to ensure a smooth transition before he goes into the private sector, said O’Neill’s acumen as a tough cop was honed in the subways, the streets, and later running precincts, narcotics and fugitive apprehension. In announcing that he would be replaced by longtime Bratton ally and the department’s top uniformed cop, Chief James P. O’Neill, de Blasio said he had an “intense bond” with the departing commissioner.
Bratton, 68, began his career as a patrolman in Boston in 1970 and built a resume unmatched in local law enforcement, heading police departments in Boston, Los Angeles and NY.
“Terrorism, cyber crime, really 20 years ago, police units didn’t spend much time on it, and the corporate world didn’t spend much time on it”, Bratton said. This type of policing evaluates officers on how they handle themselves, rather than how many arrests they make.
Some critics are calling it a retread of old approaches and are skeptical it can work.
Crime statistics in the city have never been better, but officer morale is an issue as is the level of distrust between officers and minorities, especially black New Yorkers. A Brooklyn native, O’Neill has risen through the NYPD’s ranks for over 30 years.
Nor will O’Neill be a police commissioner who by agreeing to come back to One Police Plaza in 2014 validated a mayor-elect’s ability not just to keep a lid on crime but also to manage the city despite limited executive experience.
O’Neill is known for implementing “community” or “neighborhood policing” – a strategy that was a consistent theme throughout the press conference.
During the press conference, O’Neill credited neighborhood policing with “lowering crime, but not at the expense of losing the vital support of the people we are sworn to protect and serve”.
Bratton explained his earlier-than-expected departure with word of an “extraordinarily exciting” offer, saying the public “will fully appreciate… why I chose to accept this one at this particular time”. Prosecutors say the officers accepted $100,000 in free flights, prostitutes, meals and other bribes, and in return arranged for police escorts, special parking and gun permits.
“You can be nice to people, but you can’t be nice to everybody”, he said.
Bratton had previously occupied the commissioner’s office between 1994-1996 under the administration of Republican Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, an administration under which there were notorious cases of police brutality.
Another demonstrator named Alexis Smallwood, 32, said she was there protesting on behalf of the residents of Far Rockaway, the New York Daily News reports. “So it’s the right time”.
He brought a prominence and political savvy to the nation’s largest police department that equipped him to deal with outsized expectations.
City Councilman Vincent J. Gentile (Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst, Bath Beach, Dyker Heights): “It is with sadness that I learn of Commissioner Bratton’s departure from the NYPD”.
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By comparison, O’Neill is admired within the department, but unknown on the national stage.
