[Baltimore Citizen’s Academy] — An Hour with Commissioner Kevin Davis

This is part of the series on the Baltimore Citizen’s Academy. Today’s entry is based on a presentation from Former Commissioner Kevin Davis

Its also not too late to take part in the current iteration of the Citizen’s Academy!

In November 2017, we got an hour of Commissioner Davis’ time, who has since been relieved of his duties. Many of his answers are not specific to his tenure, and he even covers a scenario about what happens after he leaves the department. He was also the person who promoted Darryl De Sousa, his successor, to Deputy Commissioner.

We were in the 9th week of the 11-week Citizens Academy, which allowed us to ask him questions about some of the things we learned. I took rough notes of the discussion and am summarizing it here, so these are not quotes.

Q: There are eight officers on the Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF) who were indicted. What percentage of the GTTF was part of the conspiracy?

A: The GTTF was created in 2008 as a specialty unit, and that kind of unit attracts alpha personalities. They were tasked with going after the worst killers and drug dealers, but without proper supervision, they started to drift from their initial tasking.

They were in plain clothes, and they started looking less like police and more like criminals. The investigation actually started with a BPD officer reporting the GTTF officers, which started an Internal Affairs investigation. There were 40 officers on the task force, and nine who were bad. Those individuals were robbing drug dealers and going into houses without search warrants.

Now they are working to rebuild the same work with clean officers (who have a low number of complaints), who are in uniform.

I also fired 23 officers in 2016, which is more than the last four commissioners (between 2003 and 2015). They were fired for things like use of force, illegal arrests, off duty DUIs, domestic violence, and other things. Reform is ugly, and change is painful.

Q: What is being done about recruitment?

ED: Read more about the recruitment discussion from a few weeks prior.

A: So far this year (as of Nov 2017), there have been three academy classes. There will be another one in December 2017. In 2012, the department had 500 more officers, but they have been lost through retirement, resignation, and termination over the last five years.

The department has had an attrition rate of 19–20 officers per month in the last few years, but it has slowed to 16 officers per month this year, which is a positive trend. Applicants can now apply online as well.

The department is targeting having 3000 officers total, and they have 2500 now. For comparison, DC has 3900 officers for their 680,000 citizens over 66 square miles (not including 1,700 Capitol Hill police and some 460 Metro cops). Baltimore has a similar population at 615,000, but it is much larger at 78 square miles. Of course, Baltimore is also reeling from over 300 homicides in 2017, compared to over 100 in DC.

Q: You seem very on board with the changes that the consent decree will bring around. How do we know the changes won’t be reversed after you leave?

A: I went through a CD in PG county in the 2000’s and found it to be a very positive thing. Baltimore’s CD will force the city to pay for things that need to be fixed, and the can can’t be kicked down the road anymore, and it gives political cover for decisions that might not be popular. In five years, Baltimore City will have a model police department.

Q: The department focuses on homicide, but what are they doing about more petty crimes?

A: The BPD used to focus on heroin and homicides. Police training, and implementing the newest technology took a major back seat to those two things, and got us into the situation that culminated with the CD. Homicides are very important, but muggings, robberies, break-ins and seeing community policing are important things as well.

Back on the issue of homicides, the average homicide victim is 15 years old. Most victims are in risky lifestyles, which is a result of many issues in the city, such as poor transportation, lead paint poisoning, schools, and many other factors.

After Detective Suiter’s death, there were six days without a homicide because people were scared of the police’s anger over the situation. People can decide not to murder, so these are decisions. These are not ‘heat of the moment’ encounters.

Q: Why was Suiter not wearing a body worn camera?

A: Detectives need confidential informants, and a Body Worn Camera (BWC) could make people less likely to talk to them.

I am open to figuring out who all should wear body worn cameras, as not every officer should, include detectives or the commissioner. BWCs are new to the department, so we are still trying to figure out some of these things.

Q: There are rumors that Suiter killed himself for insurance money. Are they true?

A: Those rumors are hurtful. He did not. It was not a setup. It was not a conspiracy. It was not a suicide. It was a murder. He was going to testify for the grand jury the next day. The FBI would take that investigation if there were any foul play involved with his upcoming testimony to the grand jury. [Editors note: three days later, he requested the FBI’s assistance with the investigation and a month later, they denied that request.

The press conference to the left is where he requested the FBI take over the investigation into Detective Suiter’s killing. This was only a request, and the BPD continues to investigate the killing. The Commissioner said the reason he waited until December 1 to announce he requested the FBI’s assistance was because he wanted to wait until after the funeral, as that happened that week.

The FBI responded on the 27th saying that they would not be taking over the investigation because they did not have any information about a conspiracy. You can see that press conference below.]

Q: We are at a breaking point. What is being done?

A: We are not at a breaking point. There was a 14-year-old who was caught with a gun for the second time today, but Maryland is setup to be rehabilitative for juveniles, not punitive. There is a case where rehabilitating a minor is the right course of action. It can’t all be rehabilitative. In the case of a 16-year-old with a handgun, they need to be tried as an adult.

What has changed since 2015 is that when we have kids with handguns being charged as adults, they have their lawyer or public defender ask for a waiver for it to be transferred back to juvenile court. Here are the percentages of those waivers that were approved:

• 2014: 35%
• 2015: 56%
• 2016: 71%
• 2017: 91%

For comparison, PG County has granted 32% of waivers in 2017. This is the driving force to the crime. Currently there is no option for the State’s Attorney’s Office to appeal those decisions, but the SAO is going to present a public safety package at the Maryland General Assembly that will include a law allowing for appeals of those waivers, among other things. That will be put together around the new year for the next session.

There is still a place for hearings for kids in juvenile court, but that shouldn’t apply to violent juveniles.

Having cameras in the courtroom might be a good thing for transparency. Allowing citizens to easily watch court room proceedings could offer the same benefits to the judicial process in the city that body worn cameras have for the police department.

Q: The information about juvenile court waivers are a data point. What does it tell us about their thinking?

A: Not all judges are involved in granting waivers for transfer cases. It is actually only four of the judges that hear those cases. I want to make sure people understood that I am not Atilla de Hun, and looking to just lock all kids up. I am liberal and have three kids, but currently Maryland just does not affect real penalties for carrying guns.

Let’s look at a hypothetical situation. Pretend there are two people who are stopped; one has a gun in their waist band, and one is carrying baggies of drugs. The person with the drugs will be going to jail with a felony, and the person with the gun will be processed and released with a misdemeanor.

That isn’t right. NYC was able to deal with their murder rate by instituting mandatory minimums, while the city council gutted an effort to add mandatory minimums for gun possession earlier in 2017.

Q: What can judges do about the gun problem?

A: Maryland judges have a lot of leeway in sentencing. Federally, there are guidelines, but there needs to be less leeway for the judges because some of these situations need to have some teeth behind them.

Q: Social psychologists could assess a 14-year-old and determine if that person is likely to re-offend and offer the judge advice (alternative sentencing). How do we handle the issue of potentially ruining someone’s life versus letting them off?

A: For juveniles, the bar for pretrial detention is so high, that, while we could evaluate them, we can’t detain them. And while we don’t need to just be locking everyone up, we do need to break their pattern of behavior. With the example of the 14-year-old who was arrested for having a handgun for the second time in two weeks, he was arrested, processed and released because he is a juvenile. What needed to happen was for him to be removed from his situation for a bit so that his routine is disrupted for more than an afternoon.

In situations like that, those kids need a timeout. They are in a cycle of dysfunction in their life and family, and we are not doing them a service with what we are doing now.

Q: How do we make our concerns known to the BPD?

A: Talk to your district commander. Twitter and Facebook are not great ways to reach out. You can find that information here.

Conclusion

He wrapped up with a broader look at the job of combating crime in the city. While the BPD are the most visible part of that battle, the justice system really involves a few parts: the BPD handles the arrest and investigation, the Baltimore City State’s Attorney’s Office reviews the case and brings charges, and the judges preside over trials and sentence convicted criminals. All of those parts need to be working correctly to send the right people to jail, which means not jailing innocent people or letting guilty people walk.

Then, we need to make sure criminals are held accountable and get rehabilitated. Throwing people in jail for a few years covers accountability, but also builds their personal network of other criminals before putting them back on the street. Rehabilitation is a critical element where we are failing.

While Davis was critical of the judges and jails, he was also critical of the job the BPD has been doing. He made no bones about the fact that the Gun Trace Task Force’s actions were completely unacceptable, and the BPD deserves the licks that it is taking over the issue now. He is concerned with the lack of transparency within the justice system. Most city residents know Commissioner Kevin Davis, State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby, Mayor Catherine Pugh, City Council President Jack Young, and their city councilperson, but few can name one of the 13 Baltimore City judges (I didn’t even know how many there were).

Hopefully, the consent decree and internal reforms within the BPD will put the force on the right path and help recruitment numbers. However, we need quality people, those who will operate constitutionally, to refill the ranks of the force.