Controversial NYPD chief William Bratton stepping down
NEW YORK — New York City Police Commissioner William Bratton, the top cop in the largest city in the country, will step down next month after a tenure filled with a sharp reduction in crime and sometimes controversial policing tactics that set the agenda for departments across the nation.
Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Tuesday that Bratton, 68, will retire from his high-profile post in September to take a job in the private sector. He will be replaced by James O'Neill, the department's top chief.
Bratton, who signaled he would not remain head of the police force after de Blasio's first term ends in 2017, said he was confident in the future of the NYPD, despite the challenges it and other police forces across the country face.
“It is a challenging time for police in America and New York, even though all indicators are pointing in the right direction,” he said. “As we go forward and face the crises of race in America, crime in America, the threat of terrorism” and the divisiveness of the presidential election, he said, “there is no department that is better prepared.”
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The Boston-born cop started his career in his hometown, where he rose to police commissioner before heading to New York. He served as NYPD commissioner from 1994 to 1996 under Mayor Rudy Giuliani and was credited for the city's large decline in crime at the time. In 2002, he became chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, a job he held for seven years.
De Blasio, who on Tuesday called Bratton's contributions “inestimable and extraordinary,” brought him back to New York in 2014 to run the nation’s largest police force. During his most recent tenure, Bratton was again credited for reducing crime to new lows, with homicides and shootings for 2016 on track to achieve historic declines.
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At the same time, Bratton has been a frequent target of criticism by the city’s minority communities, particularly over high-profile civilian deaths during confrontations with city police officers. The list includes Eric Garner, who died in 2014 after cops held him in a choke hold while arresting him for selling loose cigarettes on a Staten Island street.
Activist organizations also criticized Bratton’s championing of the “broken windows” policy of policing — making arrests for minor infractions as a way to avoid the potential for major offenses in the future. Supporters of Black Lives Matter occupied City Hall Park on Monday in a demonstration calling for Bratton’s resignation.
Bratton previously said his eventual departure would be unrelated to such external factors.
“Criticism drives my wife crazy. To be quite frank, it doesn’t bother me at all,” Bratton said during a July interview with the New York Daily News. “I’ve been doing it for 45 years … and I’ve suffered a lot of slings and arrows. It comes with the territory.”