Breaking Rank Read Free Page A

dealt in pukes and assholes in those days. A puke was a longhaired youth who flipped you off, called you a pig, or simply had that “anti-establishment” look about him. An asshole, on the other hand, was a doctor, a lawyer, or a clean-cut blue-collar worker who gave you lip as you wrote him a ticket–or who disagreed with your informed take on current events. The world was conveniently divided into “good people” vs. pukes and assholes. There were, of course, regional, as well as generational, differences in the vocabulary of the cop culture. In the eighties, for example, Hill Street Blues Detective Mick Belker’s, “Sit, hairball!” or “Freeze, dogbreath!” was drawn directly from the streets of New York (and widely copied in PDs throughout the country).
    * Removing Managerial Barriers to Effective Police Leadership . Police Executive Research Forum, 1992.

CHAPTER 1
    AN OPEN LETTER TO A BAD COP
    On April 26, 2003, Tacoma Police Chief David Brame shot and killed his estranged wife, then turned the gun on himself. His eight-year-old daughter and five-year-old son witnessed the event.
    Dear David:
    What was it like just before you did it, inside that cocoon you’d spun around your brain? Had you convinced yourself it was a private matter, nobody else’s business? Were you at peace? I want to understand, David, I really do, as one ex–police chief to another. One ex-spouse abuser to another.
    You were angry, I get that. Crystal had filed for divorce. It made headlines. You saw your name attached not to the talented, visionary police chief you imagined yourself to be, but to the portrait of a monster. Unlike thousands of other abusive men in high places and/or respected positions, you got outed. Until that Saturday afternoon your public persona had been that of a sophisticated, well-mannered civic leader.
    The murder-suicide was hardly private, as you would have known all too well. It shook your city to the core, David. Women’s groups are demanding answers and sweeping reforms. The mayor and city council are scrambling to cover their tails. The guy who made you chief, the city manager? He’s been fired. Crystal’s family is suing the city for $75 million. Tacoma’s insurance company is threatening not to pay (remember, Chief, those premiums don’t buy coverage for the criminal actions of our employees). The FBI is investigating charges of impropriety in your hiring, as well as your ascension to the chief’s office. Your beloved hometown is reeling, people are saying it’ll take years to recover. Of course, you don’t have to worry about the “collateral damage” you caused.
    All your chiefly chatter about “valuing diversity,” treating citizens and your employees with dignity and respect—that wasn’t the real you, was it? I mean you raped a woman, for crying out loud. Someone you dated back in 1988. True, you got off on some bogus “he said/she said” internal affairs finding (and the inexplicable failure of your boss to submit the case to the prosecutor)—but you confessed to the crime. I heard that you broke down in a face-to-face meeting with your victim, sobbed to her that you were a “born-again Christian,” that you were “very truly, terribly sorry” and would “never, ever do that again.”
    But there were other women. Your own employees. One had begun making noises about your having sexually harassed her; it seems you promised her a promotion if she’d share the sheets with you. You pestered another female employee to join you and your protesting wife in a threesome. That would have been more recent, well after you’d pinned on your chief’s badge in January 2002.
    Wife beating, rape, sexual harassment. You couldn’t live with it, could you? Being disgraced publicly. Most likely losing the job you’d politicked so hard to win. Possibly going to prison.