Results tagged “cambridgepolicedepartment”

According to the Boston Herald, Cambridge police sergeant James Crowley has had eight citizen complaints filed against him since joining the Cambridge Police Department in 1998. Crowley arrested Henry Louis Gates Jr. on July 16 for disorderly conduct, a charge that was later dropped. According to Police Commissioner Robert Haas, those eight complaints represent "less than 1 percent" of Crowley's contact with citizens, which includes 422 arrests, 800 investigations, and 1,866 motor vehicle citations. Two complaints were filed by black men. Crowley was cleared of any wrongdoing in every case.WCVB reported Crowley is on vacation and not worried about the records being made public. more ›

In an interesting development in the arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr. over a week ago, the person who called in Gates for breaking into his own house says she didn't cite Gates' race when calling in the potential crime. Caller Lucia Whalen has "worked in Cambridge for more than 15 years, about 100 yards from where Mr. Gates resides," according to her attorney Wendy J. Murphy, and "never said she saw two black men." While this creates quite a twist for folks (including this Bostonist) who suspected that the non-crime might not have been called in were it not for Gates' race, it doesn't excuse the fact that Gates was arrested even though he didn't commit a crime. It is unfortunate that this information was not reported from the start; the way information is unfolding piece by piece suggests that someone—the Cambridge Police Department?—has been attempting to keep details under wraps. The police report specifically states that the caller reported "two black males with backpacks"—perhaps that should have been two males with black backpacks?—but at the end of the report Whalen is cited merely as having seen "a man wedging his shoulder into the front door to pry it open." The report also describes Whalen as white, when she actually has “olive-colored skin and is of Portuguese descent" according to Murphy. more ›