Indiana

Resign, For What?

By Abdul Hakim-Shabazz

My brothers and sisters in the media today are all writing about the the calls for the public safety director, Frank Straub,  to step down.  The calls to resign center around recent scandals involving the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department.   Now some of you are going to say, “Abdul, you’re on that public safety advisory board so how can you be objective with what you are about to say?”   Easy, it’s my job and I have the facts to back me up on this one.   If you can present facts to the contrary, I will be glad to post them here.  Besides, even if I wasn’t on the advisory board my opinion would be the same.

I would agree with the calls for Straub to resign if he were involved in a crime, gross misconduct, or a violation of city rules and gross dereliction of duty.

• Straub wasn’t arrested for sexual assault in February.
• Straub didn’t steal $500 from an arrestee in March.
• Straub wasn’t investigated by the FBI for public corruption.
• Straub did not use excessive force against Brandon Johnson.
• Straub was not charged with arson.
• Straub did not strangle a resident in a fight.
• Straub did not discharge his weapon during a domestic dispute.
• Straub did not hit 4 motorcyclists, killing one and injuring two others.
• Straub did not wreck a police vehicle and then take it to a body shop in order to hide the damage.

Had Straub done any of these things, he should be fired.  If he tried to cover-up any of these incidents he should fired.  If he showed a pattern of failing to discipline any of the officers involved in these incidents, he should be let go.  Unfortunately for his critics, the facts don’t support any of those arguments.

If anything, one of the biggest complaints I will hear from the public is the perception that officers cover for each other and get away with everything.  We have a situation here where officers are behaving badly and are being held accountable for their behavior.  I would frankly be more concerned if this was going on and we didn’t know about it.

The real issues here are that partisans are using these incidents to attack the Mayor politically, and there is a strand of xenophobic in this community for anyone who comes from or has spent time outside the intellectual gene pool.

Can police do a better job at communicating with the public, yes.   Has IMPD’s reputation taken a major hit, without a doubt.  Does there need to be a major review and subsequent rewrite of policy, definitely.  Does IMPD need to step up its professionalism and do a better job of  weeding out the bad apples that tarnish the rest of the department, yup.  Should Frank Straub be fired or resign, only if  he’s not making these things happen.

Full post as published by Indiana Barrister on August 25, 2010 (boomark / email).