After Police Commissioner Bill Bratton’s surprise announcement that he will retire in September, Rev. Al Sharpton said he had “mixed feelings” about the sudden departure of the city’s top cop-but wants to meet “immediately” with his replacement, Chief of Department James O’Neill.
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New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio speaks during a news conference, Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2016, in New York’s City Hall.
“The only challenge there is to give up an very bad lot of money, to do it”, Bratton said at the time.
Bratton is set to leave on September 1, which he said would be his exit from public service.
The police commissioner, who served as Los Angeles police chief from 2002 to 2009, was emphatic that his decision to leave the NYPD was unrelated to controversies now facing the department.
“Regarding the issue of race and community relations, we’re on a journey but it’s not a journey that’s unique to New York City”, he said. “Our next Police Commissioner’s decades of experience make him uniquely qualified to continue building on these incredible public safety achievements”, he added.
“Luckily in Staten Island we have a lot of civic groups, non-profits, organizations precincts that we all work together”, Marino said.
NY has tried various iterations of that idea over the decades.
James “Jimmy” O’Neill was introduced Tuesday at City Hall as the next commissioner of the New York Police Department.
Bratton, 68, acknowledged that now is a “challenging time” for policing, but he said things were headed in the right direction.
During his first stint with the NYPD, Bratton was instrumental in implementing Giuliani’s “broken windows” policing strategy, which targeted low-level offenders with the idea that those same people would eventually commit more serious crime. As police chief of Los Angeles from 2002 to 2009, Bratton expanded the use of stop and frisk. The death of Eric Garner, who died at the hands of police on Staten Island in 2014, sparked protests in NY and across the nation.
Bratton is in his second stint as commissioner in NY.
Boston police Commissioner William B. Evans said Bratton supervised him early in his career.
“The issues we’re facing now are going to require years to resolve”, Bratton said, listing mistrust of the criminal justice system, particularly by minorities, as well as immigration and anger directed at the city’s Muslim community.
Bratton said his retirement will have a “seamless transition”.
Regardless of the many controversies that marred his tenure, Mayor de Blasio praised Bratton during the statement. Citing anonymous city officials, CNN reported that Bratton was not forced out and was leaving on his own accord. “And he and I have developed an intense bond over these last 31 months”.
During his first stint as New York’s police commissioner from 1994 to 1996 under tough-on-crime Republican Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Bratton put the theory into action by cracking down on petty crimes at a time when the city was a far more unsafe place.
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The next commissioner began his career in the NYC Transit Police Department in 1983.
