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| NEWS > 05 December 2006 |
Other related articles:
Police defend letting husband
Before Macomb County deputies began Friday night's search of the Grant family's Washington Township, Mich., home, they stopped Stephen Grant and detained him briefly. It was standard protocol for executing a search warrant, assuring that the investigators could begin their work without interruption or any last-minute alterations to the site.
But then authorities let Grant leave, before the grisly discovery of a woman's torso in the home's garage, three weeks after Grant's wife, Tara Lynn Grant, went missing. By the time of the find, however, the 37-year-old father of two had disappe... Read more
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Edmonton Journal (subscription
05 December 2006
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Retired cop says he won’t be i
EDMONTON - A retired former senior Edmonton police officer says he won’t be intimidated into silence by a scathing letter from the police union’s president barring him from union events because of his public criticism of police officers.
"It shows the need for me to speak my mind is more important than ever," said former Supt. Chris Braiden, one of the main architects of the city’s community policing initiative.
Braiden, who retired 15 years ago, now works as a consultant to police forces around the world.
Braiden has hired lawyer Tom Engel, a vocal critic of police, and has filed a formal complaint against Edmonton Police Association president Peter Ratcliff with the Edmonton Police Service and separate complaints against the union with the Alberta Federation of Police Associations and the Canadian Police Association.
Ratcliff’s Nov. 4 letter was prompted by Braiden’s appearance at an association event honouring retiring police officers. In the letter, Ratcliff tells Braiden he is "not welcome at association-sponsored functions or venues until further notice because of his "historic, shrill and continued vilification of our members in the media and in other public forums.
"To boldly state as you have many times that the members identified in the media in various venues should be ‘fired’ without knowing the facts and without the luxury of a hearing into their actions ... is expected from a hack lawyer, a tabloid journalist or one of the many self-styled advocates whose dream it is to have a member so treated."
Ratcliff acknowledged Braiden’s right to his express his opinion but he said: "We also believe that it is our right to express ours in this fashion and by doing so, in some way shield our members from your unwanted, inflammatory comments and your dated philosophy."
An angry Braiden said he has never publicly called for the firing of a police officer.
"I think the letter provides insight into their cultist thinking," Braiden said. "They have become detached not only from their service to the community but from their service to their own members."
University of Nebraska criminal justice professor Samuel Walker is considered one of the foremost experts on police accountability in North America. Walker said he found Ratcliff’s letter to be indicative of "backward thinking.
"The modern attitude is that you engage in a constructive dialogue with your critics. You don’t tell them to shut up. It certainly does not do much for their image. Frankly, it is just dumb and unprofessional."
Former Minneapolis police Sgt. Michael Quinn is the author of Walking With the Devil: The Police Code of Silence, a best-selling book about police ethics based on his personal experiences as a police officer.
Quinn, who knows and admires Braiden, called the association’s letter a "cheap shot. It was like, ‘We will show you’ but it just comes off as so petty.
"I can understand them getting mad when they get attacked from the outside. But if they were really open and had nothing to hide, they would invite Chris in and say, ‘You have been on the outside for 15 years, why don’t you come here, see what we are doing and look at it from the inside out?’
"They really should try to be more mature," Quinn said.
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