Wednesday October 17, 2007 11:58 PM

Delaying the Inevitable - Bruce Tait

“An incompetent attorney can delay a trial for months or years. A competent attorney can delay one even longer” – Evelle J. Younger, former District Attorney of Los Angeles County and Attorney General of California.

I can’t say I’m shocked or even surprised to report that Chief Cowardly Lyin’ King’s probable cause hearing for when he set-up a patrol officer has been continued (legalese for postponed) to a later date.

Now….would anyone care to guess whether the new hearing date is before or after November 6th, the day of the mayoral election?

After, you say?

DING DING DING DING!!!!!!

You win the prize!!!

The new date for the hearing is Friday November 16th at 2pm in Brockton District Court. Most interestingly, the officer who was ordered charged by CLK also had his hearing date moved to……the exact same date, time, and place as CLK’s hearing.

Why is this interesting?

Because the officer didn’t want a continuance, didn’t request a continuance, and wanted no part of a continuance. Our attorney who is representing him didn’t want a continuance, didn’t request a continuance, and wanted no part of a continuance.

So the obvious question is; why was the officer’s hearing continued also?

In my opinion, someone behind the scenes has apparently decided that these two cases are inextricably linked, when in fact they have nothing to do with each other. It’s obvious that someone, I have no idea who, is trying to set-up the “offsetting penalties” scenario, also known as the “you drop yours, and we’ll drop ours”.

I know I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating;

That’s not going to happen. The officer who was set-up by CLK has told me that he will not, under ANY circumstances, accept any sort of deal or scenario that allows CLK to escape his day in court. This officer said to me; “If I have to be the sacrificial lamb in order to hold this guy accountable, then I’ll do it”.

Therein lies the heart of this matter; Chief Robert F. Crowley has gotten away for YEARS with making bizarre, rash, vindictive decisions that have literally ruined people’s lives. Yet, when the time has come for him to face the music, he’s always been able to get out of it…somehow, someway.

Not this time.

In order for him to get out of this, the PTB are going to have to simply ignore the facts, ignore the law, and declare that if you’re a police chief, the law doesn’t apply to you. Besides the borderline public corruption such a decision would be, imagine what kind of message that would send to the patrol officers of the Quincy Police Department?

This is literally a matter of life and death to us. When I raised my right hand and took the oath of office as a police officer, I knew full well that the job was dangerous. The dangerous calls we go to….armed robberies, domestics, gang fights, shots fired, etc., they don’t scare me.

My alertness level jumps 10X when going to such a call, but I’m not afraid because I’ve been trained in how to deal with those situations, I’ve experienced them before, and I know I have 15+ other police officers who will move heaven and earth to get to me if I’m in trouble.

I can deal with that.

What I can’t deal with is my police chief looking to set me up, and even willing to break the law to do so. I correspond with police officers from all over the world, and I can guarantee not one single police department trains their officers in how to deal with the possibility of being set-up by their police chief.

That’s what scares me….my chief is looking to set me up, while my only higher recourse, the mayor, not only does nothing but actually encourages such behavior.

I was an emergency guest tonight on Don Kusser’s QATV show, The Constitution; Then and Now which will air one week from tonight (10/24/07). I say emergency guest because Don called me at the last second, once he found out about the date of the hearing being continued, and of course I was glad to go on the show.

It’s always revealing to discuss the Quincy Police Department with an outsider, since they invariably adopt our version of the Art Shell Face. Tonight was no different as I explained to Don the working conditions we now face;

Those of us in the patrol division, the ones who answer your 911 calls for help, come to work with the very real fear that our boss is going to plant something or otherwise set us up to be arrested or otherwise get in trouble.

You don’t believe me? You think that’s some sort of black helicopter, blue beret, New World Order conspiracy?

Let’s look at CLK’s track record, to highlight exactly how desperate he is to get us in trouble;

1) From his bedroom, against the advice of the people on-scene, without ever seeing or speaking to him, CLK ordered a patrol officer charged with drunk driving because he was involved in an off-duty traffic accident. The officer was placed on paid administrative leave as soon as he was criminally charged, then when a clerk-magistrate not only refused to issue probable cause, he stated there was “virtually no evidence whatsoever” the officer was drunk. Undeterred, CLK called THE district attorney to use a little known (unknown to me at the time) backdoor appeal to get probable cause reinstated. As soon as that was done, the officer was fired. He was found not guilty on all charges, reinstated to his job by an arbitrator, and is now fighting to get about $200,000 in back pay before he sues the city and CLK personally for well over $1 million.

2) CLK attempted the Wile E. Coyote ambush of ordering a sergeant to watch a patrol officer drive a cruiser onto a public street, knowing the officer’s license had expired, then wanted the sergeant to arrest the officer. Luckily for the officer, the sergeant couldn’t go through with the charade, and stopped the officer before he reached a public street.

Okay….so after those two examples, can we at least agree that CLK’s hatred of patrol officers is so deep-seated and permeating that he has absolutely no integrity or judgment? Look at the first two things I’ve listed.

What’s the next logical step?

Of course…..just outright planting something on a patrol officer, in his cruiser, or in his locker. CLK is not only capable of it, I’d be surprised if he isn’t planning it already.

Why?

Because he’s never been held accountable for his actions, and he sure as hell isn’t being held accountable now. Look at what happened to the officer who was charged with drunk driving by CLK while he was in his pajamas;

1) Charged criminally – placed on paid administrative leave. Duty weapon and gun permit confiscated, he was barred from entering the police station.

2) Probable cause issued – his employment was terminated.

Let’s compare that with how CLK has been treated;

1) Charged criminally – absolutely no sanctions, punishment, nothing. Comes to work (for his usual 2 hours per day) as if nothing ever happened.

As I said on QATV tonight, the mayor might as well come to all three of our roll calls, and slap each one of us in the face.

His message is clear; if you’re a political big shot, or someone who might embarrass him politically if he takes action, you can violate department rules and the law with impunity. If you’re a lowly patrol officer, you’re politically expendable and will be fired at the drop of a hat, future seven-figure lawsuits be damned.

That stops on November 16th. If the PTB are going to bag this case, they’re going to have to do it under intense scrutiny from the media and the public. I hope Brockton District Court has a lot of benches outside the hearing room, because there are going to be a lot of people there to see the process unfold. I realize that the hearing itself will most likely be closed to the public, but there will still be a lot of people there to tell CLK exactly what they think of him (in a polite, non-disorderly way of course) and who will wait for the clerk’s decision.

Almost a year ago, the public safety committee of the Quincy City Council convened a series of meetings to address, among other things, the morale of the Quincy Police Department. To say I walked into a mostly hostile crowd during the third meeting would be putting it mildly. I felt like the point man in an infantry platoon, avoiding the punji sticks and watching for ambushes. I did walk into an ambush that night, although I think I ended up giving as good as I got.

I think it’s high time for the public safety committee to hold a fourth meeting to take a fresh look at the morale problem within the QPD. For some reason, I don’t think the council will be nearly as sympathetic towards CLK as they have been in the past.

Wednesday October 10, 2007 3:27 AM

Policies!!!! Get Your Policies Here!!!! - Bruce Tait

“By definition a government has no conscience. Sometimes it has a policy, but nothing more” – Albert Camus

Today (Tuesday) the QPPOA had a mediation session with the Labor Relations Commission concerning the Stolen Summer of 2007. It was quite a revealing experience and as I sat on the Red Line train headed back to Quincy Center, I had plenty of time to think about it. This was a refreshing change from the ride into Boston, where a crazy woman who was talking to herself had her choice of 50 empty seats on the train, but of course chose the one right next to me and proceeded to ask me a dozen times if I wanted a sip of the Yoo-Hoo chocolate beverage she was drinking. I’m sure you’re thinking “Well, there are lots of crazies in Boston”.

She got on at Wollaston.

Anyway, I was thinking about the state of labor relations involving CLK, his minions, and the city itself in regards to the QPPOA. It really struck me….when CLK and his merry crew wants to stick it to someone, or even discipline someone who is 100% dead wrong, they can’t even do that right. One thing I learned from my time in the military is that when you discipline a subordinate, you need to do it after much consideration, and you can’t just lash out without any thought as to the overall consequences. To use a football analogy, if you want to discipline or just outright screw someone over, you need to utilize the running game; protect the ball and minimize the chances that things might blow up in your face with a deflected pass, interception, etc.

CLK and his minions simply can’t help themselves….they inevitably deploy a four wide receiver package, then send them all charging down the field on go routes while they throw the ball as hard as they can downfield, looking for the quick, big score. That might work once in awhile when you have Tom Brady throwing to Randy Moss while coached by Bill Belichick, but that’s hardly the case here. We’re dealing more with Ryan Leaf heaving a wounded duck to Reche Caldwell while coached by Bruce Coslet.

Much more often than not, the pass is batted away by a defensive back, and a good number of times it’s picked off and returned for a touchdown.

Well, when the infamous order that created the Stolen Summer of 2007 came out, we instantly deployed a dime defensive package and dropped everyone into coverage. Today, the pass was intercepted in the end zone, and now Ellis Hobbs is starting to run it back from 8 yards deep in the end zone.

Today, finally…..FINALLY….the city had to admit what I’ve known all along; that there is no written vacation policy for the Quincy Police Department. Well, they didn’t actually use those words, but for all intents and purposes that’s exactly what they did.

If you need to use the bathroom or get something to drink (I recommend hard liquor), better do it before I try to explain the reasoning the city tried to use today to the LRC Hearing Officer.

The city’s attorney David Grunebaum actually said that our collective bargaining agreement (contract) was the QPD vacation policy. When I heard that, I really thought he had either lost his mind, or he realized that in this case he’s at the Alamo while we’re the Mexican Army.

The city’s official position is that the contract between the city and the QPPOA is the QPD vacation policy. Okay….let me break out my contract book, and share what it says with you concerning the use of vacation time. Article XXI Paragraph 4 states;

“Effective September 29, 1998 vacation days may be used in full or half (1/2) day increments provided the employee requests such time off in accordance with present vacation policies. Half vacation days will only be granted when such absences will not result in overtime hiring”.

Pretty straightforward, don’t you think? We can use single vacation days, and there is no mention whatsoever that we can’t use them during the summer vacation period.

However, Attorney Grunebaum went on to state that the chief of police, through his management rights under Article III of our contract, can simply ignore the contract.

Confused yet?

Let me try to explain the city’s reasoning here. Have another shot of liquor before we get started; it helps, trust me.

The official vacation policy of the Quincy Police Department is what is contained in the QPPOA contract. That states we may take single vacation days in accordance with present vacation policies. The city has stated that the present policy is what’s contained in the contract, which states we may use single vacation days in accordance with the present policy, which places no restrictions as to when we can use single vacation days.

However, the city believes the chief can ignore what’s contained in the contract as part of his management rights contained in the contract. The official vacation policy of the Quincy Police Department is what’s contained in the contract, so by default that’s the vacation policy of Chief Cowardly Lyin’ King. So, he apparently wants to ignore his own policy, so therefore it doesn’t exist. If the vacation language in our contract doesn’t exist because CLK is ignoring it, then we apparently don’t have a vacation policy. And if CLK wants to ignore the contract, doesn’t that also negate his management rights that are granted to him by the contract?

Who’s on first?

Once again, this is a case where they tried to get cute, and it blew up in their faces. When we went to Norfolk Superior Court to block the theft of our Summer of 2007, the judge didn’t rule on our motion because she couldn’t issue a ruling on what she didn’t have, which was the Quincy Police Department’s vacation policy. If the QPD vacation policy is truly what’s contained in our contract, why didn’t they state that when the judge made her finding? It’s because they figured that would buy them some time…..as if we’re going to suddenly change our minds or just give up.

Immediately after the court finding, we filed an informational request under MGL 150E, asking for a copy of the vacation policy. That was in June. When we walked into the Labor Relations Commission on October 9th, we still hadn’t received any documents or even a response from the city in regards to our request.

When we subpoenaed Captain Parrott Head in August, the subpoena commanded him to bring with him a copy of the QPD vacation policy. He refused to answer when asked if he brought it with him.

Why didn’t he merely tell us that the contract was the policy?

Believe me when I tell you, the LRC Hearing Officer didn’t know what to think when he heard that piece of work. I actually somewhat feel bad for David Grunebaum, because after CLK and his crew lash out in anger without thinking, he’s the one who gets these absolute bags of crap dumped into his lap with orders to fix it.

I hate to use another football analogy, but my favorite sportswriter is Bill Simmons of ESPN. If this blog were about sports, it would bear a strong resemblance to Bill Simmons’ Page 2;

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/simmons/index

Simmons has a term he uses to describe NFL coaches whose teams are perennially bad and take horrific beatings on the field while they stand expressionless on the sidelines. He calls it the “Art Shell Face” in honor of the former Oakland Raiders coach who would stare vacantly at the field while his team stunk up the place.

The Art Shell Face is a legacy, to be passed down from coach to coach. Since Shell is no longer coaching, the current guardian of the Art Shell Face is Cleveland Browns’ Coach Romeo Crennel. If Crennel gets the axe this season, the likely successor will be Andy Reid of the Philadelphia Eagles.

Anyway, we have our own version of the Art Shell Face. I’ve seen it probably close to a half dozen times from arbitrators, hearing officers, other police chiefs and just plain everyday citizens. Instead of a blank stare, our version starts off as a normal expression, and then slowly morphs into a totally incredulous look. That’s the transformation of people as they listen to either the antics of CLK, or the city’s implausible defense of said antics.

I have to come up with a good name for our version of the Art Shell Face (feel free to e-mail suggestions), but for now I’m going to just call it our version of the Art Shell Face. The person who’s wearing our version of the Art Shell Face looks like they’re thinking “They can’t be serious”, or “Is this some type of elaborate practical joke?”.

During the Kaes arbitration case, the arbitrator broke into our version of the Art Shell Face when CLK responded to a question from our attorney with a dismissive wave of his hand, an arrogant smirk, and “Call it what you like”.

During our personal day arbitration case, the arbitrator broke into our version of the Art Shell Face when the city was trying to rationalize treating personal days the same as vacation days.

When I met the chief of police for another town, he broke into our version of the Art Shell Face when I told him about CLK setting the Wile E. Coyote trap for the officer who forgot to renew his driver’s license.

Well trust me, our version of the Art Shell Face was in full effect at 19 Staniford Street today while Attorney Grunebaum was spinning his ridiculously circuitous explanation of what the Quincy Police Department’s vacation policy was. After the city also tried to use the safe-staffing argument to justify the Stolen Summer of 2007, I explained to the hearing officer that the Quincy City Council passed a unanimous resolution instructing the police chief to staff all 13 sector cars 24/7, but that is routinely and regularly ignored.

I went on to explain that when the Stolen Summer of 2007 policy was issued, I was somewhat prepared for it, so I called Captain Dougan and asked him two questions;

1) Does this apply to every member of the department? – No, just patrol officers in the patrol division.

2) If during the summer vacation period, everyone decides to come to work and we’re literally tripping over each other, can I then use a single vacation day outside my vacation block? – No.

Our version of the Art Shell Face could not have been clearer at that point.

Today’s proceeding was merely an attempt at mediating this issue, and the city made it pretty clear they’re taking it all the way while we have no choice but to do the same. The eventual hearing will be in front of a three-person panel of LRC Commissioners, and I’m extremely confident that we’ll prevail. We have previous LRC decisions in our favor, particularly one from the Revere PD where the issues are extremely similar.

So, for the Labor Relations Commission mediation we finally received an answer as to the QPD vacation policy. A completely implausible, absurd answer, but an answer nonetheless. As I was riding that Red Line train, I got thinking as to the policies, or in some cases the non-policies, of the Quincy Police Department.

When CLK wants something, or wants to screw someone, there is insta-policy. For example, CLK recently blew a gasket when he observed one of the midnight dispatchers wearing shorts while on-duty. Now, our dispatchers are civilian support staff (although there is a patrol officer and a sergeant assigned to communications) who sit in a room full of computers and radio equipment (which generate heat), in a building that should probably be condemned.

Especially for the midnight shift, they’re completely out of the public eye and generally have no interaction with the public. They could wear something as ridiculous as a pink Izod shirt, some 80’s vintage Tom Selleck too-short shorts & sandals, and the public would have no idea.

For reasons know only to him, CLK had a meltdown when he saw the dispatcher wearing shorts, so it was almost instantly that a new policy of what dispatchers can wear was issued. Of course, the idea had been previously floated of providing uniforms for them, and when I say uniform I don’t mean the wool-polyester nightmares we have to wear. Something like an embroidered polo shirt and khaki trousers. That idea was rejected because it supposedly would cost too much. Doing some quick calculations, it would cost roughly $1000 to outfit all the dispatchers. About $1000 out of a $20 million dollar budget.

Anyway, we had insta-policy because CLK didn’t like someone’s fashion sense.

You would think what someone wears would be fairly low on your list of priorities as police chief, but we’re not dealing with a reasonable person. While CLK is issuing fashion mandates, his police department is crashing down around him and he’s doing his best impersonation of Emperor Nero.

As I’ve mentioned before, we received some surplus M16A1 rifles from the military, and about a year and a half after getting them, we’re finally starting to get some patrol officers certified to deploy them on the street. We have about a half-dozen patrol officers who recently completed the training course, plus the firearms instructors who are already certified. Not a huge amount of certified people, but it’s at least a start.

Well, the certified officers can’t deploy the rifles to the field because……there is no official policy as to how to deploy them. In the 3+ years that CLK has been the police chief, I can’t think of one single thing he’s done to change the policies and procedures of the Quincy Police Department. He’ll throw out a special order on occasion when he wants to screw someone, but as far as updating the “big book” of the official procedures, he wants no part of it.

QPD Sergeant Greg Goyette put in a lot of time, effort and research to update our vehicle pursuit policy, which is so old it has more time on the job than most of the current patrol officers. It’s antiquated and dangerous to the cops on the street, so Sergeant Goyette wrote one that’s current and tries to make things as safe as they can be during a vehicle pursuit.

That’s been sitting on CLK’s desk for probably two years or more.

Ditto for our use of force policy; the current policy makes no mention of collapsible batons, but guess what’s on the left side of my gun belt, just in front of my radio?

An ASP collapsible baton.

I was issued this, completed training, and was certified in its use, so I’ve held up my end of the bargain. If I deploy it in the manner I was trained and happen to injure someone as a result, I’m in the clear. It’s the city that’s going to be on the hook for a frivolous lawsuit, because CLK refuses to update the use of force policy.

For the “fourfecta”, CLK refuses to even consider our adopting so-called “Tasers” or other less-lethal energy weapons;

http://www.policeone.com/police-products/less-lethal/taser/articles/1270182/

Why? Because he doesn’t know what he’s doing, and adopting energy weapons would require implementing………a policy for their use.

We recently started working details at Gillette Stadium, so we’re coming in contact with many other police departments. The Foxborough Police, which is almost 1/10th of our size, has 10 Tasers for 24 patrol officers. The Attleboro Police also have them.

So…..policies, policies, policies. When CLK and his minions don’t have a vacation policy they intimated they did, they come up with some ridiculous theory about contracts and management rights.

No policy for patrol rifles which might save someone’s life? Not important to CLK.

Outdated pursuit policy? Not important to CLK.

Outdated use of force policy? Not important to CLK.

Energy weapons which might save someone’s life? Not important to CLK.

Policy which outlines what clothing items someone can wear to work? EXTREMELY important to CLK.

In addition to being completely unsuited to be a police chief, CLK is now not even doing the job of the police chief. New department policies sit unsigned on his desk for years while he’s out chasing kids drinking in the woods, committing a crime to set-up a patrol officer, and acting as a fashion critic. In the meantime, the mayor can’t pull his head out of the hole in the sand long enough to even acknowledge there is a SERIOUS problem at 1 Sea Street.

Does anyone really wonder anymore why I refer to the QPD as Bizarro World?

Sunday October 7, 2007 2:10 AM

Mailbag - Bruce Tait

Yes indeed friends, based on the e-mails I’ve been receiving it’s once again time to dip into the mailbag. As always, some of these questions have been edited for clarity, and some duplicate questions have been merged into one;

Q: I don’t live in Massachusetts, is there any way I can listen to your talk radio appearance on Sunday on the internet?

A: As a matter of fact, there is. Just go to this website and click “Listen Live”;

http://www.wtkk.com

Just remember we’re on Eastern Standard Time, and I’ll be starting at 3pm our time. If you’d like to call in, the phone number is 1-617-822-1969.

Q: On October 19th, do you think the clerk-magistrate will dismiss both cases, sort of like offsetting penalties in the NFL?

A: I don’t think so, for a couple of reasons. The first being that what the officer is charged with isn’t even a crime, and is heard by a clerk solely for procedural purposes. It’s an arrestable civil infraction, because we obviously need to have the option of placing unlicensed drivers into custody if we don’t know who they are. Someone wanted for murder in another state could be stopped in Massachusetts, and if there wasn’t the option of arrest, we’d have to let them go and never know what we might have found out with fingerprints.

As far as I’ve been able to remember I’ve never arrested someone who had an expired driver’s license, unless they gave me an absolute ration of crap. Having driving privileges suspended or revoked is a totally different animal, as is someone who just never got a driver’s license. Unless the person is a total asshat, I’m not going to arrest someone who forgot to send their $40 to the RMV to renew their license.

Here’s the thing; even if that officer submitted a sworn confession written in his own blood, the clerk can do nothing more than make a finding that probable cause exists, or it doesn’t. Once it went to a trial, the judge could look at the blood-signed confession and do nothing more than fine him a maximum of $1000.

What I charged CLK with is absolutely a crime. If convicted, he could be theoretically sentenced to one year in the house of correction. Of course, even if CLK submitted the sworn confession in blood, I don’t expect him to do a single day in custody, but the disparity is clear.

The biggest reason of all why CLK should be held accountable is because he used his position as chief of police to set-up this officer to violate the law. His actions were deliberate, intentional, and he used the power of his office to do it.

He needs to be held accountable, if the citizens of Quincy are to have any faith whatsoever in their police department.

Offsetting penalties? That would be like one NFL team’s offense committing a false start (5 yard penalty), and while the officials are blowing their whistles, someone from the defense charges in and spears a lineman who was knocked known as the result of the false start.

The two offenses aren’t even in the same ballpark. If the clerk-magistrate or DA’s office are thinking along those lines, I’ll be submitting a public records request to make sure all their names are spelled correctly in both the relevant newspapers and in this blog.

We’re not screwing around….these court proceedings will be conducted to the highest ethical and professional standards, or the participants will have to face the court of public opinion. The officer who Crowley set-up is not budging….he wants his day in court, and he wants the man who set him up to be held accountable.

My personal opinion is that the clerk-magistrate, even if he had any ideas of dismissing both cases, will change his mind when he sees video cameras, news reporters, and many concerned citizens of Quincy in the hearing room. At least two non-police fans of the QPPOA have already taken vacation days on October 19th so they can see the hearing for themselves.

Q: What do you think about the Revere Police Officer who was shot and killed?

A: I think he was murdered, that’s what I think.

I was positively disgusted to read all sorts of conjecture and opinion on the internet that he was the victim of “friendly fire”. After the weapons of the other police officers present were tested with negative results, the criticism shifted to “What was he doing behind the high school late at night when there’s gang activity there”?

Does it really matter?

Have we reached the point in our dysfunctional society that we have to explain why police officers gather in a public place? Should police officers avoid areas of gang activity, just because it might provoke the “gangstas”? Have we really sunk that low as a society that the law enforcers have to concede certain areas to the law breakers?

As with so many other things in our lives as police officers, we’re damned if we do, and damned if we don’t. It’s been a tradition for many years that when police officers socialize after work, we want to be amongst ourselves and want to be left alone. For that reason, I haven’t entered a bar or nightclub in a social capacity in probably over 10 years.

Why? Because if I were recognized as a police officer, the chances increase exponentially of my getting sucker punched or a beer bottle off the head, or I’ll be besieged by people with the “I got a ticket the other day” routine.

The overriding reason why some cops have “choir practice” is to avoid any problems in a barroom or nightclub. We feel 100% comfortable with each other, and don’t have to worry about trouble starting. Unfortunately for Officer Dan Talbot, trouble found him anyway, and it’s disgusting that people were playing Monday morning quarterback before he was even laid to rest.

If Officer Talbot were stabbed to death inside a bar, would that have silenced the police critics? Of course not….then the mantra would be “Why was he inside a barroom where a lot of seedy people hang out”?

See the dichotomy police officers face in society? We're literally pariahs.....a lot of people seem to think we should live our personal lives in hermetically sealed bubbles and apparently not be allowed to socialize under any circumstances. Of course, having twin children effectively did that to me anyway, but that was my own choice.

Q: And about the Boston Firefighters killed while allegedly drunk and on drugs?

A: I’m not sure why my opinion about that situation matters, but since you asked, here is my opinion as Joe Citizen;

Two firefighters lost their lives while fighting a fire inside a burning building. That’s the bottom line, and everything else to me is just mindless static. I really don’t know what else to say, other than I find some people’s hue & cry to deny death benefits to their families reprehensible.

These two firefighters, regardless of their condition, were doing their jobs when a two-ton A/C unit crashed through the ceiling and created a fireball which killed them both. Does anyone reading this really think they may have survived such a fireball if they were members of the local Christian Temperance Union?

If the reports in the media are true, and we don’t know if they are, then the Boston Fire Department needs to seriously examine their internal supervision. Sometimes, it takes a tragedy or major scandal to implement change in a para-military organization. That’s how I view the Boston Fire debacle….if there is a problem within the BFD in regards to substance abuse and it’s dealt with, then at least some positive things can come from the deaths and the positively shameless rapes of two dead firefighter’s reputations.

Q: What is the real deal? What is it actually like to be a Quincy Police Officer?

A: It sucks. How’s that for some in-depth and insightful analysis?

Since I was 5 years old, all I ever wanted to be was a Quincy Police Officer, and now I hate it with every fiber of my being. And, it’s 100%, positively, absolutely due to one person....Chief Robert Crowley. We told Mayor Phelan back in 2004 that he would be making the biggest mistake of his political career if he made Crowley the chief, but he went ahead and did it anyway. Now that it’s obvious to anyone with a room temperature IQ that Crowley shouldn’t be police chief, Phelan refuses to take any action (or even issue any comment) because it’s politically inconvenient.

Let me ask you this; how would you like to come to work every day with the possibility that your boss was going to plant a bag of cocaine in your desk, then show it to the police? That’s exactly the conditions we’re working under right now; our police chief is willing to commit a crime in order to get us in trouble.

How much more outrageous can things get? It’s gotten so bad, I carry a gun with me every time I leave my house, and have made counter surveillance measures an everyday part of my life. I don’t even keep a locker at the police station, because I wouldn’t put it past CLK to plant something in there, and then have a surprise locker inspection. Quite simply, my boss is capable of anything at this point, and I have to be on my toes at all times.

So let me ask you; how would you like to have all that on your mind as you’re racing lights & siren to a violent domestic or an armed robbery in progress?

Q: Is it necessary to have police street details and if so, are they fairly distributed and are the rates of pay urban myths? There are those who argue that every street construction detail is a ridiculous waste - the office "gets $150 per hour" or something similar off the top of their heads but little information about where that came from.

A: As I'm sure you probably suspect, "the office" doesn't receive anywhere near $150 per hour for police details. There is a 10% service fee added to the cost of a detail officer, which funds the salary of the patrol officer assigned to administer details, as well as a supervisor who checks on detail officers. Currently, our detail rates are $37 per hour for an "inside" job (Stop & Shop, Citizen's Bank, etc.) and $39 per hour for a road construction detail or anything involving alcohol (bars, nightclubs, weddings, etc.).

So, for every hour a Quincy Police Officer works a detail, the city receives either $3.70 or $3.90 depending on what type of detail it is. I'll be honest...the city makes a serious profit on details, but we see none of it. All detail fees beyond what funds the detail officer & supervisor go into the black hole known as the "general fund".

There has been serious debate & criticism (some warranted) of requiring police officers at road construction details. In a perfect world, the utility companies and road construction crews could be counted on to decide which job sites need a detail officer and which don't. However, those crews are under intense pressure from management to keep costs down, and if the decision were left to them, then no job sites would have any traffic control beyond some orange cones.

Requiring police officers at road construction details makes the most sense on several levels;

1) It takes the decision out of anyone's hands. This sometimes results in officers being assigned to road details when they're really not required, but as a taxpayer myself I look at that as insurance. Better to have it and not need it, then need it and not have it.

2) Police officers are the only people in our society who are empowered to control traffic. So-called "flagmen" would have nothing beyond a "STOP/SLOW" sign with which to control traffic. It would be nothing more than a suggestion, which motorists could ignore with no other repercussions than chancing a car crash.

3) Exactly how long do you think it would take for the newly minted flagmen in Massachusetts to unionize, then demand prevailing wage, health insurance, and other employee benefits? Police officers require no health insurance or other benefits when working details because we already have them. I conservatively estimate that a flagman would cost $50 or more once salary and benefits are factored into things. Exactly how does that save anyone a single dime?

4) Police officers on detail are free additional officers on the street. I can cite many instances where detail officers have made arrests (including myself) or provided information that led to arrests. QPPOA Treasurer Peter Curley arrested a rape suspect while working a road detail, and Officer Jay Borden while working a road detail obtained information that led to the arrest of a man who was frequenting gay cruising spots and attempting to kill those who solicited him (in one instance slashed a man’s throat).

5) To underscore how much of a political boondoggle flagmen would be, some current and former Massachusetts legislators incorporated companies that would supply flagmen to utility companies should the law change. As always, and as usual, the politicians have their hands poised to thrust into the cookie jar.

Q: Ok this is a joke right? A Chief of Police couldn't possibly be so petty and vindictive?! (from the comments section on our Youtube page)

A: If even half of what I wrote here wasn’t true, I’d be out of a job and probably facing a libel lawsuit. And if even half of it is true, haven’t I more than made my case that the chief of the Quincy Police Department isn’t fit for the job?

Everyone enjoy the holiday, and perhaps I’ll be speaking with some of you tomorrow afternoon.

Friday October 5, 2007 2:04 AM

The War Continues On Yet Another Front - Bruce Tait

Never let it be said that I'm not a man of my word. I've received confirmation that I'm going to be a guest on Jimmy Myers' talk radio show on WTKK 96.9 FM on this coming Sunday (October 7th) starting at 3pm.

I have no idea how long I'll be on, but I've been asked to call right at 3pm, and the show goes until 6pm. I seriously doubt I'll be on the entire 3 hours, but I'll be more than happy to do just that if asked.

So....Sunday October 7th 3pm on 96.9 FM Talk. Feel free to call in with your questions and/or opinions. Unlike Mayor Failin' I don't stick my head in the sand when faced with an inconvenient situation, so if you want to call to tell me what a jerk I am, then have at it. Just be prepared to defend your position.

It should make for very interesting radio.

http://www.wtkk.com

To the mayor; this all goes away when you treat your out-of-control police chief the same way EVERY other member of the Quincy Police Department has been treated when facing a criminal charge punishable by jail time.

The really ironic and somewhat amusing thing about this is that because we're so single-minded of purpose (getting rid of Chief CLK), it would be a simple matter for the mayor to kneecap us by doing the right thing and placing CLK on paid administrative leave, pending the court proceedings. That would effectively neutralize us, at least until after the election, because what could we complain about when we had a reasonable acting police chief?

Yet, he just can't bring himself to admit we were right and he was wrong. To me, that's not a trait of an effective leader.

Believe me, I'll be banging that drum with both hands on Sunday afternoon.

IDLE THOUGHT OF THE DAY - Take a zoomo at this delicious little nugget from the brain trust that call themselves the Patriot Ledger Editorial Staff;

http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2007/10/04/opinion/opin01.txt

In particular, pay attention to this part;

"But when a candidate blatantly defies local, state and federal laws and creates a potential danger, then questions are legitimately raised about the person’s judgment and what ordinances the candidate would honor and which he would snub should he win office".

Now....let's substitute some words, delete others, and see what that looks like;

"But when a police chief blatantly defies state law and creates a potential danger, then questions are legitimately raised about the person's judgement and what ordinances the chief would honor and which he would snub if allowed to continue serving as police chief".

At the Crown Colony Drive branch of Bizarro World, it's the crime of the century to moor a boat off Wollaston Beach. I've read the Quincy Municipal Code from cover to cover, spoken with a former harbormaster, and have yet to find any violation of the law. If a boat isn't moored in a channel, then it's fine as far as I've been able to research. The fact that the current harbormaster has done nothing but posture and bluff should tell you something.

So, okay....mooring a politically inconvenient boat is worthy of a damning editorial by the Pravda Ledger.

However, when a police chief uses his office and authority to commit a crime, the Ledger can't even just sweep it under the rug, they have to put forth a positively pathetic defense of this criminal behavior;

http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2007/09/04/opinion/opin01.txt

Go ahead and read those two editorials, one after the other, and then try to tell me with a straight face that the Patriot Ledger is an unbiased media source.

Mooring a boat off a beach in October when there are no swimmers or jetskiers is a major problem.

Setting an underhanded trap for a police officer to drive a cruiser while unlicensed, which is a crime in and of itself, is not only acceptable to the Ledger, they seemingly applaud CLK for doing it.

I know it's only October, but I officially bequeath upon the Patriot Ledger Editorial Staff the QPPOA 2007 Official Bizarro World Award for their positively breathtakingly hypocritical double-standards.

Many thanks to Secret Agent 23 for his help with this.

Wednesday October 3, 2007 12:28 AM

Day of Reckoning - Bruce Tait

I've received a witness summons that Chief Cowardly Lyin' King's probable cause hearing for setting-up the officer to drive a cruiser while unlicensed has been scheduled for October 19th at 2pm in Brockton District Court (moved from Quincy to avoid a conflict of interest). Be there or be square.

Interestingly, the officer's probable cause hearing is scheduled for the exact same date and time. Perhaps I'm just cynical to the core, but that smacks of the tried-and-true deal, "We'll drop our case if you drop yours".

Well, that's not going to happen.

The officer in question wants to take this to the wall, and also wants his day in court. I want my day in court to finally see an out-of-control police chief have to answer to someone other than the president of the patrol officers' union. I want to see what Mayor Failin' is going to do when probable cause issues against the unstable person he appointed as police chief, after we practically begged him not to.

I know the mayor is in full-blown ostrich mode right now, but if probable cause is issued against CLK and the mayor doesn't do anything, it will be all-out war. If it comes to that, the attorney general needs to get involved, because that would rise to the level of public corruption when a police chief uses his position as chief to commit a crime, and his boss does NOTHING about it.

And, just to make sure everything is on the up and up on October 19th, we're going to hire a video company to record both the hearings if allowed by the clerk (you can guess where those video clips will go), and I've already notified reporters from the Boston Herald, Boston Globe, and Patriot Ledger of the date & time of the hearing. If the PTB are going to bag the case against CLK, they're going to have to do it under the intense spotlight of media & public scrutiny. Good luck.

After CLK's case was transferred to Brockton Court, I didn't bother asking the Norfolk County DA to appoint a special prosecutor, since Brockton is in Plymouth County. I have full faith that the Plymouth County DA will do the right thing, but we have to be prepared for all contingencies. It’s sometimes customary that for a clerk’s hearing, the charging officer (that would be me) acts as the prosecutor.

Believe me, that would be a dream come true. With all due respect to the very capable men & women of the Plymouth County DA’s Office, I most likely know this case better than any of them, and I salivate at the thought of acting as the prosecutor. Combine that with the fact our litigation attorney Richard Bardi will be there anyway for the officer’s hearing, and will therefore be able to give me some coaching and tips beforehand, I fervently hope I get to act as prosecutor.

To answer a question I received, this is not some type of publicity stunt or retaliation. The punishment for violating MGL 90-12 was changed under Melanie’s Law from a civil infraction to a criminal offense specifically to discourage people from allowing unlicensed persons to operate motor vehicles either owned by them or under their control. After reading my police report, I have no idea how a clerk-magistrate could come to any other conclusion that Robert F. Crowley allowed (actually encouraged) someone who he knew to be unlicensed to operate a motor vehicle (police cruiser) under his control.

If the chief of police does not have control over who operates police cruisers, I’d love to know who does.

October 19th 2007 is going to be a very pivotal date in the history of the City of Quincy. That day will determine whether or not you can break the law with impunity if you’re a political big shot. These proceedings are open to the public, so feel free to come on down to be a part of history.

See you there.

Saturday September 29, 2007 9:26 PM

A New Front in the War - Bruce Tait

I'm pleased to announce that the QPPOA has been dragged kicking and screaming into the technology age. Thanks to the wonders of Youtube, you can now see our latest appearance on the Quincy Access TV show "The Constitution; Then and Now". Myself and QPPOA Treasurer Peter Curley discussed several items of interest to the Quincy Police Department with host Don Kusser.

Youtube has a 10 minute limit on video clips, so the show is broken into 10-minute segments. The first 4 segments are online with the rest to soon follow. And to nip a potential problem in the bud, we have full permission from Don Kusser (who owns the show) to post these clips, so CLK and his minions shouldn't waste their time by complaining to Youtube about copyright infringement.

The QPPOA Youtube page;

http://youtube.com/user/qppoa

Enjoy!

Saturday September 29, 2007 2:13 AM

Let's Make a Deal: Quincy Style - Bruce Tait

Before I say another word, I want to thank from the bottom of my heart everyone who sent cards and e-mails concerning the death of my father. I simply haven’t had the time to respond to everyone yet, although I’m slowly getting there. Believe me, I’ve read every single one of them, and also shared them with my family.

I can’t say this enough……thank you.

And, allow me to take this opportunity to give a little shout-out to CLK. I’ve been on hiatus for a short time, but now the party is over. My father’s illness weighed very heavily on my mind for the last year but now that he’s at peace, an enormous burden has been lifted from my shoulders.

I now officially have no distractions, and can refocus all of my efforts to where they do the most good for the membership of the QPPOA. I was operating at about 70-80% after I learned my father had terminal cancer, but now I’m back to 100%.

I’m sending by registered mail a public records request to the Brockton District Court, requesting the docket number as well as the date & time of the clerk-magistrate’s probable cause hearing where Robert F. Crowley stands accused of committing a misdemeanor under MGL 90-12.

Needless to say, I’m going to make that hearing as bag-proof as possible. Reporters from the Boston Herald, Boston Globe, Patriot Ledger, and Quincy Sun will all be notified, and I believe that at least 2 of those media outlets will send a reporter to the hearing. If anyone has any ideas of making this quietly go away, they best think again.

Speaking of clerk’s hearings, the one for the officer who was the victim of CLK’s illegal set-up is on October 19th at 2pm in Brockton District Court. I realize that’s a bit of a drive for many of you, but if you want to see some pure, unadulterated entertainment, come on down. Our litigation attorney, Richard Bardi, is going to have an absolute blast when he gets to question CLK. And, I imagine one of the first questions that he’s going to ask is whether or not he ordered the sergeant on duty to wait until the patrol officer started driving the car, and then pull him over. CLK can answer only one of three ways;

1) Yes – thereby sealing his fate at his own probable cause hearing and subsequent trial.

2) No – thereby committing perjury.

3) Take the 5th – that will speak for itself.

Having my summer stolen from me by CLK and Captain Parrott Head sure did suck, but this fall is shaping up to be very rewarding for the QPPOA.

Anyway, the night before my father’s funeral I was in my hotel room and couldn’t sleep, so I was watching some TV when I saw the old show “Let’s Make a Deal” on the Game Show Network. This brought back a lot of memories for me, because that was one of my favorite shows when I was a kid. For those who have never seen it, this was a game show where the audience would dress in outlandish costumes to get the attention of host Monty Hall. The contestants were chosen by Monty, and he offered them all sorts of deals….take what’s in this envelope or what’s behind Curtain Number 1.

Sometimes, the items behind the curtain would be something valuable like a new car, and other times they would be worthless “gag” items like a live donkey or a rusted-out Studebaker. My favorite part was at the end of the show as the credits rolled, when Monty Hall would go around to the audience and pull out a wad of cash, offering $50 for anyone who had a rubber band, $75 for someone with a can opener, etc. Here’s a clip of the show, if you’re interested;

http://youtube.com/watch?v=elgjgJIHZiY

As I sat there watching Monty wheeling and dealing, it occurred to me I was watching a Bizarro version of the way the City of Quincy handles labor relations. Whenever the QPPOA or our members are 100% in the right, that still isn’t good enough for the city. The big difference between the TV show and Quincy’s labor relations is that instead of handing out envelopes of money and offering to trade them for prizes like Monty Hall, we have Mayor Bizarro Monty Hall as our host.

What he does is takes our money out of our wallets, then offers to give half of it back to us, or we can let him keep all of it for what’s behind Curtain Number 2, which is always some version of being flogged with a rattan cane.

Example 1: As I’ve mentioned here ad nauseam, Officer Tim Kaes was the victim of an intentional tort by Chief CLK that resulted in him being wrongly charged with drunk driving. After being cleared of all criminal charges, he was ordered reinstated to his job by a mutually selected arbitrator….one of the most respected in the field of labor law.

To no one’s surprise except perhaps CLK and the mayor, the arbitrator’s award was totally in our favor. Officer Kaes was ordered reinstated to his job; in legal terms, he was ordered to be “made whole”. In other words, his termination was completely bogus, and he should be compensated for it. In every other corner of the planet I know of, that means financially compensated.

However, when the city made their calculations of how much they owed the officer, the figure wasn’t even close to what we had figured. In our opinion, since the officer shouldn’t have been fired, he should be compensated not only for lost wages, but also averaged details and overtime. The officer is young and was saving to buy his first home when he was fired, so he worked quite a bit more than just his 40-hour workweek.

It shouldn’t exactly surprise you by now to learn what happened when we pointed out this obviously unfair discrepancy. The city refused to average in the officer’s overtime and details in their calculations, causing us to file another motion with the arbitrator. We’re now going back before the arbitrator on December 5th in order to get his opinion on who is right, since he didn’t specify averaged overtime and details in his written ruling, probably figuring that was a given.

Well, the arbitrator obviously has never dealt with Mayor Bizarro Monty Hall before.

And just to underscore the fact that the city is having a serious case of sour grapes over us achieving 100% victory in this officer’s case, they still haven’t paid him a dime of what he’s owed.

Yes, you read that correctly. Eleven months after being ordered reinstated with full back wages, the City of Quincy has yet to pay anything to the officer, other than his weekly wages since he came back to the department.

You would think a reasonable course of action would be to pay the officer what the city believes they owe him, and then they can argue their case to the arbitrator over the difference of what we think he’s owed. However, that’s not the way of Bizarro World. That might give even the slightest inkling that we’re right, while Mayor Bizarro Monty Hall and Chief Cowardly Lyin’ King are wrong.

What’s most ironic of all is that the mayor is running for re-election partly on the platform that his leadership of the city benefits the taxpayers. I’m sure some of you have seen the bumper stickers “Taxpayers for Phelan” around the city.

What I’d like to know is if those are the same taxpayers who got soaked with an 18% increase in their property taxes, the same taxpayers who are going to pay over $50 per day in interest to what Officer Kaes is owed in back wages while the mayor digs-in his heels like a petulant child, and the same taxpayers who are going to foot the probable seven-figure civil judgments and attorney’s fees when Tim Kaes and Siobhan O’Connor have their days in US District Court in Boston.

If I need to beat you over the head anymore about how the mayor’s actions & inactions are going to cost the city big, I’m sure the jury in Kaes’ lawsuit is not going to like how Kaes was placed on paid administrative leave as soon as he faced criminal charges, while Mayor Bizarro Monty Hall has done absolutely, positively nothing……not even a public comment, while the person he appointed as police chief is facing a criminal charge.

Note to Mayor BMH; everyday people do not like it when political big shots get preferential treatment. Unless you do the right thing with your out-of-control police chief, you can probably tack-on another zero or two to Kaes’ settlement check.

Example 2: A member of the QPPOA, a regular patrol officer assigned to the patrol division, got injured in the line of duty. This isn’t some malingerer who “slipped on the ice” or “fell out of my chair” 6 months before the next promotion exam, he was just hurt and missed a couple of weeks of work. He came back as soon as he could.

You would think the reasonable course of action when a police officer is hurt on the job would be to put them on injured status, then review the facts of the case. If for some reason the officer’s injury doesn’t meet the guidelines of being injured in the line of duty, then take the appropriate amount of sick days from the officer.

Once again….Bizarro World. Even though by law the person who makes the decision whether a police officer goes on injured status is solely CLK’s, every case is always sent to city hall, where some lawyer who thinks he has a medical degree passes judgment on the injured officer.

This particular officer has had to jump through more hoops than a trained poodle, trying to be reimbursed for the 14 sick days the city took away from him while he was out injured. The city apparently didn’t like what the officer’s doctor said in his medical report, so he was sent to the “city doctor” for another evaluation.

Let me just say, the city doesn’t exactly have a great track record in selecting physicians. The city doctor when I was appointed was sentenced to prison for sexually assaulting female patients;

http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2001/06/22/news/export10735.txt

Apparently not happy with what their own doctor told them, the city wanted the officer to go to a third doctor, a so-called “IME” (Independent Medical Evaluation). We filed a request for an IME in June of this year, but our request fell into the black hole of 1305 Hancock Street.

Now, in true Bizarro Monty Hall fashion, the city wants to play “Bizarro Let’s Make a Deal” with the officer and the QPPOA. The officer has been offered the deal of getting half his sick time back, which is seven days.

In other words, Mayor Bizarro Monty Hall is wheeling and dealing. What he’s saying is “I’m acknowledging that your injury was legitimate, but I’m offering to give you half of what I owe you, or you can take what’s behind Curtain Number 1”.

What’s behind Curtain Number 1 is a long, drawn-out arbitration proceeding which will cost the city and the QPPOA probably $2-3K each.

Now, when it comes to decisions involving individual QPPOA members, I almost always leave the decision of how to proceed with the individual member. I’ll offer my opinion, and if I really think the member is making a mistake I’ll have our labor attorney speak with them, but unless it’s a case we positively can’t win, I let them decide to take it to arbitration or not. Time and money are our biggest commodities, and if a member thinks they’re being screwed and there’s even a chance we can win, the QPPOA stands behind them 100%. That’s one of the biggest benefits of union membership.

Rightfully so, the officer being offered half of what was wrongfully taken from him doesn’t want to take half, so he’s going for what’s behind Curtain Number 1.

Not a problem….our treasurer can write $2-3K checks in his sleep, and having one of the best, if not the best, labor attorneys in Massachusetts on our side is always comforting.

So off to arbitration we go, again. Using classic Bizarro World Economics, Mayor Bizarro Monty Hall is going to spend $2-3K of the city’s money to fight against giving a patrol officer who was injured in the line of duty 14 sick days that were taken from him. Because we only get $50 per day for our sick time when we retire, Mayor BMH is going to spend $2-3K in order to try to save $700.

Bizarro World Economics, fuzzy math, the new math….whatever you want to call it, does that make a bit of sense to anyone reading this?

ASSORTED NOTES: I’d like to give a big “GOOD JOB” to the detectives of the Quincy Police Special Investigations Unit for recently obtaining a conviction of the “Bad Breath Rapist”. This was good solid police work, and the men & women of the SIU should be really proud of themselves. Excellent work, ladies and gentlemen;

http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2007/09/19/news/news0.txt

Because the Bad Breath Rapist decided to not stick around for his conviction, he’s now a wanted fugitive. He’ll soon be featured on an episode of “America’s Most Wanted”, and is already on their website;

http://www.amw.com

Friday September 21, 2007 1:35 AM

The Circle of Life - Bruce Tait

No amusing picture or inspiring quote this time, I just don’t have it in me tonight.

Yesterday morning, my father Lindsay Tait died after a long battle with cancer. He was suffering so much in the end that it’s actually a blessing, but it was devastating beyond words to see that horrible disease rob a strong, proud man of his strength, vitality, and eventually his dignity.

I mention this to you because I’m often asked why I’m so tenacious and relentless in fighting for what I believe is right. A large part of it is how I was raised, and while my mother deserves a lot of credit in that regard, so too does my dad.

What do you say about the man who taught you how to ride a bicycle without training wheels, how to throw a curveball, how to talk to girls (although I was never a good student in that regard), and who held your hand as you walked up the ramp into Fenway Park for the first time? The man who was always at the bottom of the pool slide to catch you, until he purposely didn’t one day and you realized, hey, I can do this.

My dad was hard on me, make no mistake. He didn’t put up with any crap, and made it perfectly clear who was in charge. Unlike some parenting theories of today, my dad didn’t want to be my friend. I had enough friends; I needed a father, and he gave me one.

He had the quickest hands I ever saw….the first time I came home roaring drunk as a teenager at 2am, he had smacked me in the face a half-dozen times before I even realized what was happening. Then for good measure, he went out at 7am the next morning and parked a running lawnmower underneath my open bedroom window to make sure I didn’t sleep it off. When I staggered out of bed, he forced me to drink a glass of warm beer which of course made me puke my guts out.

Suffice to say, that was the end of my underage drinking career.

The one story which sticks in my mind as it relates to this website was when I was a young grade-schooler at the Adams School on Abigail Avenue (it’s now condos). There was one kid who was a few years ahead of me that was the consummate bully….I swear they based the Scott Farkas character in “Christmas Story” on him. He would terrorize the younger kids, and back then a couple of years’ difference was an eternity. Finally one day, he grabbed my Boston Bruins knit cap off my head and tossed it on top a huge shrub at the apartment building right at the intersection of Faxon Park Road and Phipps Street. It was so high up I couldn’t reach it, and had to go home without it. Making matters worse, my dad had bought the hat for me when he was at a Bruins game the week before.

I absolutely dreaded having to tell my dad what happened, but it turned out he was more disappointed in my not standing up for myself than losing the hat. I pleaded my case of being a couple of years younger than the bully, but he made a very good point;

“If he’s so tough, why is he not picking on kids his own age”?

My dad told me; just fight him as hard as you can. He may beat you in the end, but keep fighting him. If you get a few good whacks in, it won’t be fun anymore and he’ll want nothing to do with you.

And, that’s exactly what I did.

I would always lose in the end, but usually managed to get one good shot in. I was relentless….I’d go after this kid as soon as I saw him, and if it were 2007 instead of 1973, I probably would have been committed for having “anger management issues”.

Well wouldn’t you know? It worked. It wasn’t fun anymore, so the bully stopped messing with me. He not only stopped, he’d take a different way home just to avoid me altogether.

So when people wonder why I’m doing what I’m doing on this website, I’m standing-up to a bully just as my dad taught me.

One of my professors in graduate school said this about having kids. He said “Your children will cause you a lot of heartache, but it’s all worth it in the end”.

When I look at my son who’s only a couple of years younger than I was when I got the bully speech, and my daughter who’s the spitting image of my mother who’s been dead for almost 20 years, I wonder how much heartache they’re going to cause me in the coming years.

I know I caused my father his share of heartache during his life. Hopefully, he thought it was all worth it in the end.

Rest in peace, dad.

I love you.

Tuesday September 18, 2007 12:07 AM

Secret Agent Man - Bruce Tait

“There is no place where espionage is not used” – Sun-Tzu

One of the nice things about modern technology, especially the World Wide Web, is that we have fans literally all over the world. While our fan base seems to still be mostly local, just this past week I received e-mails from Australia, California, Texas, and Nevada.

Many of these people want to help us, and become undercover operatives. Trust me…..your jaws would drop if I revealed the identities of some people who have supplied us with information or otherwise assisted us. For example, you may have noticed that we’re starting to use (and will continue to use) customized images for this space. At least one person noticed, because they asked if it’s me who’s coming up with these. If I tried to use a computer graphics program, it would be like a caveman banging rocks together, so I’ll just say it’s a fan of the website and leave it at that.

I’ll mention here that there’s always room for more undercover operatives. Send me an e-mail if you’re interested in volunteering for the position.

Another one of our undercover operatives sent me an e-mail that’s absolutely priceless. Everyone is aware of the Quincy Police Officer who’s currently under suspension for enforcing the city’s leash and pooper scooper laws in his neighborhood (“Back to Bizarro World” below). Well, it seems that Chief CLK is an even bigger hypocrite than I imagined, because our operative uncovered this absolute gem;

http://ledger.southofboston.com:80/articles/2005/11/10/news/news07.txt

Go take a few minutes to read that, and then come on back.

What took you so long? Anyway, can you believe your own eyes? That article is chock-full of absolutely golden quotes concerning dog ordinance enforcement from CLK. He no doubt puffed-up his chest when he stated;

‘‘there will be more enforcement, I promise you that.’’

Sure there will be…..until the dog owners complain about it to city hall and file complaints with the chief’s office. Then, the officer who was fulfilling the chief’s promise gets his gun taken away and suspended for 5 days.

‘‘There isn’t a dog owner in the world that doesn’t realize they need to pick up after their pet,’’ Crowley said. ‘‘I don’t think there’s any other answer but enforcement or bringing these people to court if we have to.’’

Apparently there are a few people like that, chief. And you’ve absolutely, 100% taken their word as gospel. You went so far as to suspend one of your officers as a show of support for dog owners who don’t think they have to pick up after their pets. You’ve apparently thought of another answer all right…..declare a neighborhood in the city as immune from city ordinances.

Another one of my favorite quotes is from the animal control officer, concerning enforcement;

‘‘Unless you see it happen, it’s a tough nut to crack’’ Conboy said.

Tougher than you think, Officer Conboy. It’s impossible to enforce it, even if you do see it happening and have videotape evidence of it happening, provided the people you’re writing-up have some political juice.

My absolute favorite quote concerning this whole imbroglio came when the officer in question was interviewed by Channel 7 News the other night. I went to the officer’s house when I found out the news crew was on the way, because I figured it might help to have a uniformed presence there, considering how contentious the relationship is between the officer and the irresponsible dog owners. I also didn’t think it would be fair to dump that mess into the lap of another patrol officer, so I went down there to keep the peace.

It’s a good thing I did. A group of the irresponsible dog owners noticed the news truck, and gathered down the street shouting obscenities. All that was missing from the scene were some torches and pitchforks as the neighbors were screaming about their “family neighborhood”. Of course, that was a little tough to take with a straight face, considering the F Bomb was sprinkled liberally throughout their tirades.

Anyway, my favorite quote from that broadcast came when the reporter interviewed the lynch mob. One woman who looked like she had a few cocktails onboard had a brilliant line of reasoning. She was upset because the officer’s normal duty assignment covers the Quincy Center area. In this woman’s mind, the officer’s badge and patch state “Quincy Center Police” and his law enforcement authority ceases at the end of Coddington Street.

Another nugget of wisdom by this woman was that the dogs were strays that don’t live in the area. I guess she hasn’t yet seen the videotape of one of the dogs taking a dump on the beach, and then walking into one of the neighbor’s houses.

Einstein’s Theory of Relativity is safe with this woman around, believe me.

The next step for this officer is a hearing at city hall, where we plan on asking some very interesting questions of CLK. Questions about calls from city hall concerning this issue, questions about names on the mayor’s political contribution list, we have many of them. I imagine he’ll also be asked to explain his sudden reversal of philosophy concerning enforcement of dog ordinance violations.

That segues nicely into another point I want to make. Someone e-mailed me, asking me to elaborate on “The Incredible Folding Man” I mentioned, concerning CLK. That all started during the Kaes arbitration hearing where CLK found himself in the one spot he’s terrified of the most; on a witness stand, under oath, with a stenographer present.

As he’s known to do, CLK first strutted into the hearing room with all the pomp and swagger of a Prussian Field Marshal. He was sworn-in, asked to state his name, and then sat down in the chair upright, chest puffed-out, and his elbows on the table with his hands propped up in front of him.

Then, the beating commenced.

Our labor attorney Paul Hynes began throwing solid jabs, and they all connected. It was like watching the first round of the second fight between Rocky Balboa and Clubber Lang in “Rocky 3”. About the only difference was that Clubber got infuriated by being constantly jabbed in the face while being unable to land a glove in return. CLK had quite a different reaction.

First, the hands dropped. Then the chest deflated. Over the next 2 hours, CLK began to literally fold-in on himself, becoming smaller and slouching lower with each tough question. Those of us on the executive board were giggling and nudging each other, making sure everyone was catching the show.

By the time he was completely beaten into submission, he looked like he was onboard a 747 that was going down in the Pacific, because he had assumed the airplane crash position. This is a pretty accurate representation of what he looked like;

http://www.answers.com/topic/airnzsafetydemobrace-jpg

While in that position he suddenly raised a finger, and with a barely audible croak;

“Bathroom break”.

Unfortunately for CLK, it only gets worse from here. He’s going to be on the stand and under oath quite a bit in the coming weeks and months. There’s the Kaes civil lawsuit (where CLK is personally on the hook for an intentional tort), the probable cause hearing of the officer CLK allowed to operate a cruiser with an expired license, the O’Connor civil lawsuit, and possibly a few more civil lawsuits that will be coming down the pipeline shortly.

The Kaes lawsuit will be one for the ages. I think I’m going to get to the John Joseph Moakley Federal Courthouse very early on the day that CLK has to take the stand, just to get a front row seat. Our litigation attorney Richard Bardi is going to absolutely crucify CLK, and you may well witness a nervous breakdown on the witness stand. It will be like hunting baby seals with a machine gun and hand grenades.

The big rumor around the city is that the mayor gently felt-out how CLK might feel about gracefully exiting before the election, but CLK refused. Here’s some free advice for Mayor Phelan;

He’ll NEVER leave voluntarily, unless he’s backed into an absolute corner from which there’s no escape.

Here’s what to do; your police chief is currently facing a criminal charge in court, for which the punishment is possible jail time. Treat him like every other member of the Quincy Police Department has been treated in the same situation….confiscate his duty weapon, his license to carry firearms, and place him on paid administrative leave.

Then, when probable cause issues (and it will), call him on the phone and say to him what was said to several patrol officers back in 2002; accept this deal (retire) or your employment will be terminated. CLK is not particularly intelligent, but he’s not stupid. He’ll take the retirement rather than risk losing his pension, and will go gently into that good night.

You’re happy, I’m happy, and the Quincy Police Department is happy. The only unhappy person in that entire scenario is CLK, but of the 300 million people in the United States, how many really care if he’s happy?

I often have to remind myself to not fall victim to the Stockholm Syndrome and believe that every police chief is a megalomaniacal narcissist. Just this past Sunday, I had a very pleasant conversation with a police chief for a small town southwest of Boston. He’s been chief for over 10 years, and has never received a grievance from the patrol officers’ union. I had to ask him that twice, just to make sure I heard it right. No grievances in over 10 years…..I think we’ve had 10 going on at once before.

As I shared some CLK highlights with this chief, I saw the pleasant smile he was wearing slowly fade away into an incredulous look. When I told him about CLK setting-up the officer to drive the cruiser with an expired license, his response spoke volumes;

“What the hell is wrong with that guy”?

Chief….if you ever figure it out, please give me a call.

To be perfectly honest, I really don’t want to do the things I listed in the entry immediately below. In spite of how completely screwed-up the Quincy Police Department is right now, I still love the City of Quincy and I would hate to see it become the subject of an embarrassing sideshow of police officers picketing mayoral debates and renting billboards to advertise how out-of-control our police chief is.

I swear on my life, I don’t want to do it.

But, I will if I have to. I’ve already received 2 unsolicited e-mails from police union heads, saying “name the time and place, and we’ll be there”.

The relationship we have with our police chief is officially beyond repair. He actually broke the law in an attempt to get one of us in legal hot water. How much more outrageous can his behavior get before something is done about him?

We’re literally fighting for our lives here.

Put an end to it, now.

Saturday September 15, 2007 2:16 AM

Time is Ticking Away - Bruce Tait

“There is no stigma attached to recognizing a bad decision in time to install a better one” – Laurence J. Peter

For those keeping track, it’s been 11 days since a criminal complaint was lodged against the chief of the Quincy Police Department, alleging a crime for which he could be sentenced to a year in the house of correction. To compound the situation, the chief used the power of his office to commit this crime. In case you’re arriving late to the game, ever since I’ve been a Quincy Police Officer (appointed in 1994), EVERY time a member of the department has been charged with a crime punishable by jail time, they have been immediately placed on paid administrative leave, their duty weapon has been taken away from them, and their license to carry firearms was seized.

Yet the chief, the person who is in charge of us, the person who should be held to the highest standard of any employee of the Quincy Police Department still has his duty weapon, still has his license to carry firearms, and is coming to work every day as if nothing ever happened. As a matter of fact, he’s apparently taken the fact that the mayor is sticking his head and the sand and completely ignoring the problem as a sign of weakness on the mayor’s part. He’s actually emboldened by it, because he’s up to his bullshit again. In addition to suspending yet another patrol officer for enforcing the law and protecting his property (see entry below), he’s “asserting his authority” by getting on the police radio and making an ass of himself. The other day, he got on the radio and asked if anyone knew the laws concerning “net fishing”.

Someone should throw a net over him.

Mayor Phelan (I’m using the correct spelling because I seriously want him to read this), whether he believes it or not, has been treated relatively kindly in this space compared to what’s in store for him if he doesn’t do the right thing very shortly.

This coming Wednesday, Don Kusser’s Quincy Access TV show will air, with yours truly and QPPOA Treasurer Peter Curley as guests. We gave it to Phelan and Crowley with both barrels, and actually ran out of time before we could get it all off our chests.

I recently was a guest caller to Jimmy Myers’ Sunday talk show on WTKK radio. I just happened to find out that he was discussing the fiasco with CLK setting up one of our officers, so I called in and was given a good amount of time. Again, I let both Crowley and Phelan have it.

However, all that is small potatoes compared to what we’re planning. If Mayor Phelan doesn’t treat his police chief the same way that patrol officers have been treated, we’re going to kick it into a higher gear.

I’ve already been in contact with a media company, concerning billboards on Route 3A. I’ve been in contact with a mass mailing company, concerning a mailing to every residence in the city. We’re planning on contacting other police unions throughout the state (including the Boston PD, MA State Police, and Transit Police) to request their assistance with a picket of city hall.

Or, perhaps a picket of a mayoral debate.

In case Mayor Phelan doesn't know, we (police officers) tend to take the view of NATO when we're attacked; an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us.

Speaking of mayoral debates, we’ll have plants there to ask the mayor why he continues to enable his out-of-control police chief. I’m also going to aggressively solicit more talk radio shows, making myself available as a guest to talk about how our police chief committed a crime in an attempt to set-up one of us.

At this point, the mayor is like an abused domestic violence victim. He’s taking beating after beating in the paper, but he refuses to do anything to stop the abuse. Unfortunately for us, we’re the real victims of the abuse, he’s merely collateral damage.

If you’re a Quincy taxpayer, you should be positively outraged at this despicable double standard for a very simple reason. When Officer Tim Kaes was criminally charged on the orders of the police chief and against the advice of the on-scene supervisor, he was immediately placed on paid administrative leave, his weapon and license to carry firearms seized. After a finding of probable cause was issued (after a back-door reinstatement of charges), his employment was terminated. He’s since been ordered reinstated, and will soon file a multi-million dollar lawsuit against the city and CLK personally.

And, he will win.

Tim Kaes is going to be a very wealthy man soon enough, because the damage of his firing and being out of work for almost 2 years is already done. However, the chief of police now stands charged of committing a crime for which there is a sentence of jail time, exactly as Tim Kaes was. Yet, CLK just soldiers on, business as usual.

For every day that Mayor Phelan doesn’t take action and place CLK on paid administrative leave, pending the outcome of the court case, the liability for the city grows and grows. I can just imagine the fun that attorney Richard Bardi is going to have when he highlights for the jury the disgusting double standard applied to the chief of police. If I were a juror and heard that, I’d probably double the amount of the award, because everyday people don’t like big shots getting preferential treatment.

Mister Mayor, it’s still not too late to do the right thing.

How much more should we be expected to take from this guy? For every day that our chief of police comes to work as if nothing happened, it sends a clear message to us that we’re expendable peons. This job is hard enough without having to worry about an unstable police chief who spends his days looking for ways to get us in trouble. How bad is it? I don’t even maintain a locker at the police station, because we have to use an issued padlock to which the command staff has the combination. I’m not going to give CLK the opportunity to plant a bundle of heroin in my locker, than conduct a locker inspection.

You don’t think he’s capable of it? He’s already broken the law in an attempt to get one of us arrested, why is it unthinkable that he’ll plant something on one of us? Especially me!!

Enough is enough. If the mayor doesn’t do the right thing, and soon, we’re going on the warpath. And, whatever else the mayor thinks of me, I’m pretty sure he knows I’m a man of my word.

If I say I’m going to do something, I’m damn well going to do it.

Thursday September 13, 2007 1:01 AM

Back to Bizarro World - Bruce Tait

“What sane person could live in this world and not be crazy?” – Ursula LeGuin

Welcome back to Bizarro World, where up is down, right is wrong, and good is bad. We live here on a daily basis.

BIZARRO WORLD – VERSION 3.0

It’s not too often that I’m at a loss for words, but today was one of those days.

To say the last couple of weeks haven’t been kind to Chief Cowardly Lyin’ King would be a major understatement. You can’t be having too much fun when the head of the patrolman’s union files a criminal complaint against you with a rock-solid case, and a prominent Boston attorney tells the leading newspaper in your city that you need a psychiatric evaluation.

If I were CLK, I’d take some time off with my tail tucked between my legs and lick my wounds for a couple of weeks. Then again I have integrity, so if I were CLK I would have placed myself on paid administrative leave and turned in my duty weapon & license to carry firearms until the court proceedings were over. That’s exactly how patrol officers are treated, and it’s disgusting beyond words that he is still coming to work, business as usual. The mayor should be absolutely ashamed of himself, and he might as well slap each one of us in the face because he’s doing it figuratively.

Today, while facing a court hearing where he stands accused of using his office to commit a crime punishable by jail time, CLK suspended yet another Quincy Police Patrol Officer for the stupidest, most outlandish reason imaginable. You would think after having his last suspension blow-up in his face, he’d take a break for awhile, but he was back today with a vengeance.

Typical of him, he couldn’t even face the officer when he did it. Like the total coward he is, CLK was hot-footing it out of the police station when QPPOA Treasurer Peter Curley came in to accompany the officer into the chief’s office. I’ll add that this was at 3pm, which is important for a couple of reasons. The first is that the chief’s hours are 8am-4pm, yet he was leaving an hour early. We only get 30 minutes for a meal break, and we can’t take a meal break within 2 hours of our shift ending.

As with so many other things in his life, CLK’s mantra of “8 hours work for 8 hours pay” only applies to the plebeians.

I’m sure you know the drill by now…..the officer was relieved of his duty weapon and given the maximum suspension a police chief can give, which is 5 days. He then had to go home in a police uniform without a firearm, and do the perp walk out of the police station with an empty holster.

Here’s the other reason why it’s important to take note of the time; the officer worked almost his entire shift before they dropped the hammer on him.

As I’ve mentioned before, there is absolutely, positively no reason to relieve a police officer of his/her firearm, other than for ballistic testing after an officer involved shooting, or if the officer presents a danger to himself or others. In the case of an officer involved shooting, the officer is given a replacement weapon as soon as possible, because police stress counselors realize the stigma of a police officer with an empty holster. It’s considered a belief that you did something wrong.

CLK takes the duty weapons of every patrol officer he suspends. They haven’t been involved in a shooting, so the only possible reason would be he believes they present a danger to themselves or others. So in the case of the latest suspension victim, apparently he didn’t pose a danger to anyone from 8am to 2:59pm, then he posed a danger. In 5 days, he apparently won’t present a danger anymore.

Of course, CLK doesn’t believe that these officers present a danger to anyone. He just enjoys inflicting embarrassment and humiliation on patrol officers, because he hates us. Each and every one of us, because he knows he never did our job, and certainly couldn’t do it now. I’m sure he gets a chuckle when a patrol officer has to walk out of the police station sans firearm.

Just to make this whole situation even more worthy of Bizarro World, CLK isn’t even satisfied with a 5 day suspension. He’s sending the case to city hall for an appointing authority (mayor) hearing with a recommendation of even harsher punishment.

By now I’m sure you’re wondering what it is this officer supposedly did to deserve the maximum punishment allowed by a police chief, with a recommendation for even more punishment.

He enforced the law and protected his own property.

This officer lives in Quincy, and recently bought a new home of which he’s justly proud. He keeps his yard and home in pristine condition, and was just notified he won a “neat neighbor” award from the Quincy Parks Department. However, other people who live on this officer’s street have apparently decided the law doesn’t apply to them, and they have the full backing of both the mayor and the police chief.

The other people on this street believe they have the absolute right to ignore the Quincy Municipal Code (city ordinances) by allowing their unleashed dogs to run amok in the neighborhood, crapping on people’s lawns, digging holes, etc. The officer in question tried to be nice about this at first, and asked these people to rein-in their out of control canines. He was told “that’s not how we do things down here”.

In other words, we’re above the law.

The officer then asked the animal control officers to start enforcing the leash law on his street, but nothing was ever done. In my opinion, they were ordered to ignore the officer. Having no alternatives, the officer decided to do something himself.

This officer is, obviously, a Quincy Police Officer and as such can enforce the Quincy Municipal Code within the city. It’s a violation of the Quincy Municipal Code to allow your dogs to run around unleashed and not pick-up after them;

http://municipalcodes.lexisnexis.com/codes/quincy/_DATA/Title_6/04/index.html

After waiting for animal control to handle it with no results, the officer started enforcing the law himself. This officer is meticulous to say the least, and has videotapes and photographs of these dogs doing their “duty” on his property. When he identified the owners, he cited them for violating a city ordinance.

Most normal people would, at that point, just leash their damn dogs. But remember….that’s not how they do things down there. Some self-important big shots, one of whom we believe is connected to the mayor, filed complaints against the officer. What I’d like to know is, what exactly about the officer were they complaining about? That he was enforcing the law?

Like waaaaaay too many people these days, these complainants apparently suffer from the “surely that doesn’t apply to me” syndrome. Trust me; it must be contagious, because we see it every day at work.

Instead of telling these people to leash their dogs as required by law, their complaints were, as always, given 100% veracity by the chief’s office. The officer was told to refer all his dog-related complaints to animal control, and he complied. Do you suppose the dogs were still running loose after animal control was notified numerous times?

I think you know.

So, the officer started enforcing the law again, as he is sworn to do. The big shots apparently didn’t like being held accountable to the law again, so in June the officer was called into the chief’s office where he was brow-beaten by CLK and about 4 other high-ranking supervisors. He was so intimidated, he didn’t really understand what was going on.

When CLK asked him something along the lines of “Do you understand what I’m telling you?” the officer said he didn’t understand, and asked it be clarified in writing. Of course, CLK refused for the same reason he wants no part of a stenographer at a meeting. He might actually be held accountable for his words and actions.

After CLK refused to put what he said in writing, the officer requested union representation. He has an absolute right to do this, thanks to a 1975 US Supreme Court case, NLRB vs. Weingarten;

http://clear.uhwo.hawaii.edu/wein.html

Hearing this, CLK exploded and ended the meeting, with the officer still not understanding what just happened.

Veteran readers of this spot can probably guess what’s coming next.

The unleashed dogs kept crapping on his property, so the officer once again enforced the law.

Now, CLK and his minions are trying to say they ordered the officer to stop enforcing the leash law on his street, and the suspension was for disobeying a direct order. Of course, if the order really existed, don’t you think it would be in writing? If CLK actually issued that order, and I don’t believe he did, he should have put it in writing for two reasons; the officer wouldn’t have violated the order, and if he did, CLK would have him dead to rights. No misunderstandings, no “he said he said”.

That’s not the way CLK operates. When something is highly questionable and/or controversial, he wants to operate in the ether….nothing in writing, everything vague and shadowy.

Whether the order was issued or not is something we’ll have our attorneys deal with. I’m sure they’re going to have a jolly old time getting CLK onto the witness stand at city hall, under oath and with a stenographer present. If history is any indicator, he’ll go into his “Incredible Folding Man” routine, where he folds up on himself and literally shrinks in the chair as the questions get tougher.

Putting all that aside, it’s positively unbelievable what else this officer was told. Besides being given a direct order to not enforce the law on his street, he was also prohibited from calling other patrol officers to enforce the law. Effectively, CLK has designated this officer’s neighborhood immune from the law. Unleashed dogs can run wild, defecate on people’s yards and damage their property, and the patrol officers of the Quincy Police Department have been prohibited from doing anything about it.

All because some big shot who knows the mayor probably made a couple of phone calls. The officer actually asked the mayor about this, and he was told “Let it go”. In other words, let other people’s dogs defile and damage your property, just because it’s politically inconvenient to do anything about it.

As this officer succinctly put it, his neighbors are laughing at the badge of the Quincy Police Department, because they know it means nothing to them. They’re above the law, and if they violate the law enough times, a patrol officer is suspended.

And, he’s suspended by someone who’s an absolute disgrace to that badge. Someone who used his chief’s badge to commit a crime. Someone who is facing possible jail time, but is still coming to work every day like it’s business as usual.

The mayor should be ashamed of himself for pulling the ostrich routine. We intend to hold him accountable, because at this point he’s grossly negligent for not taking action against his out-of-control police chief. Many people (ordinary citizens) have e-mailed me, disgusted by the current situation and offered to help the QPPOA. I’m going to take these people up on their offer; if any of the upcoming mayoral debates have questions from the audience, we’ll have people there, people you would never suspect, to ask the tough questions of the mayor. Why he isn’t doing a blessed thing while his police department spirals into total chaos, why has he allowed his police chief to remain at work while facing a criminal charge, we have all sorts of questions we want answered.

We simply can’t work for Robert F. Crowley anymore. He’s resorted to committing a crime to set us up, and now he’s suspended an officer for enforcing the law and protecting his property. How are we to have the slightest shred of trust, confidence, or respect for someone who engages in that behavior?

He needs to go, and he needs to go NOW.

What else does the mayor need to see before he takes action?

BIZARRO WORLD – VERSION 3.1

I’m sure some of you are wondering if Captain Parrot Head showed up for his deposition today. He did…..sort of.

In the entry below, I detailed our ongoing fight concerning vacation time. Captain Parrot Head was the author of the policy which steals 4 months of the year from officers in the patrol division, and today was his day of reckoning. He was subpoenaed to be at our labor attorney’s office at 10am, but we seriously wondered if they’d show.

Well, Captain Parrot Head showed, but the city attorney (David Grunebaum) was nowhere to be found. He was called, and of course didn’t answer. After a 20 minute courtesy wait, the deposition started. It didn’t last very long, because they pulled a stunt that is totally mind boggling, but a perfect example of the galling arrogance displayed by city hall and the Quincy Police command staff.

After being sworn, Captain Parrot Head acknowledged he received a subpoena, and was then asked if he brought with him a copy of the city’s vacation policy, which we’ve been waiting nearly 3 months to receive.

It’s been over 12 hours since I got the news, and I still can’t believe it.

Captain Parrot Head refused to answer any questions, allegedly under orders from David Grunebaum. He basically took the 5th, without using that actual terminology. I ask you……why would someone refuse to answer questions under oath? It sounds to me like someone has something to hide.

So, back to court we go to file a motion to compel discovery. What that means is we’re going to ask the court to order Captain Parrot Head to answer the questions, under the penalty of a contempt of court citation where he could be jailed if he doesn’t cooperate. If you told me 10 years ago that such tactics would be necessary to enforce our labor rights, I would have suggested a Richard Bardi-approved psychiatric evaluation.

Unfortunately, these are the cards we’ve been dealt. The most infuriating thing is that since the beginning of this vacation time brouhaha, we’ve played absolutely by the rules. We had 4 months of the year, including the summer of 2007 unlawfully stolen from us, so we sought relief in court. The city was basically rewarded for their sloppiness and laziness, because they didn’t provide a copy of their mythical vacation policy. As such, the judge couldn’t rule on something she didn’t have, and passed on ruling in the case.

Immediately after the judge’s decision, we filed a request for the policy which has been ignored for almost 3 months. Since we decided to go on the offensive to break the deadlock of the stall & delay tactics of the city, they’ve tried every cheap trick in the book to avoid being held accountable. First they asked for a postponement on the first deposition date. No problem, things come up sometimes. Then they asked for another postponement while at the same time trying to block our subpoena of Captain Parrot Head. However, their sloppiness was featured again when they didn’t file their motion to block by a time deadline, so the deposition went ahead. Not content to abide by the subpoena, Captain Parrot Head comes to the deposition and refuses to answer questions.

Basically, what the city and the command staff want to do is block our attempts to get answers about the vacation time policy. They want to go back into limbo, where they ignore our requests for the policy, and everything stays stuck in neutral.

As George Bush 41 used to say, “Not gonna happen. Wouldn’t be prudent”.

The city can play all the games they want. Sooner or later, they’re going to have to produce the vacation policy, or admit it doesn’t exist. And sooner or later, Captain Parrot Head and CLK are going to have to answer some very tough questions while under oath. Time and money are our biggest commodities, and I don’t mind using either for an issue so important to our membership.

In meeting police officers from other agencies, especially from Massachusetts, I frequently hear that the Quincy Police Department is one of the best police jobs in the state. Unfortunately, I have to correct them by telling them it used to be one of the best police jobs in the state.

When you have an unstable police chief who commits a crime in a backfired attempt to get you in legal hot water, that’s not one of the best police jobs in the state. When you have an enabling mayor who steadfastly refuses to do anything about your unstable police chief and responds to an embarrassing fiasco of the chief's making by sticking his head in the sand, that’s not one of the best police jobs in the state. When you’re the target of vindictive harassment by the command staff for filing legitimate labor grievances, that’s not one of the best police jobs in the state. When that vindictive harassment includes having 4 months of the year stolen from you, that’s not one of the best police jobs in the state. When you play by the rules and the city just flouts the rules, that’s not one of the best police jobs in the state.

One of the best police jobs in the state? Captain Parrot Head recently complained to an e-board member that he gets laughed at during training seminars once they know he’s from the Quincy Police Department.

Gee captain, I wonder whose fault that is? You, your hero CLK and your assistants keep me well-supplied with material, I just expose it to the light of day.

ASSORTED NOTES: I’m appearing on Don Kusser’s Quincy Access Television show, “The Constitution; Then and Now” on Wednesday September 19th. You can probably guess what the topic of discussion is going to be. We taped the show tonight, and will air a week from tonight (the 19th).

The criminal hearing for CLK has officially been moved to Brockton District Court, we’ll let everyone know the date when we find out. If you have nothing to do that day, come on down and see the criminal justice system in action.

I'd also like to apologize to those who have e-mailed me in the last couple of weeks and haven't yet received a response. The support has been overwhelming, and I just haven't had the time to respond to everyone yet. E-mail from QPPOA members takes obvious priority, but I hope to get caught up shortly.

Saturday September 8, 2007 5:43 AM

Problems.....what problems? By the way, where's my nuclear launch codes? - Bruce Tait

“The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them” – Albert Einstein

I’d like to thank everyone for the incredible support shown by so many people, especially Quincy residents, in the form of direct e-mails and also the “Contact Us” feature of the website over the last week. It’s nice to know our message is getting out there, and that the citizens we serve really do care about their police officers.

Someone asked me a question that was submitted too late for the last mail call, but it’s a compelling one that goes to the heart of the chaotic mess that is currently the Quincy Police Department. “M.L” from Adams Shore asked me what the most frustrating thing is about being union president.

There are actually two things that really infuriate me, and they really go hand-in-hand. The first being the way things are handled by Chief Cowardly Lyin’ King and his minions in the Quincy Police Department and also city hall, and the other being the incredible double standards we have to work with.

You see, problems within the Quincy Police Department are handled by the command staff and city hall one of two ways;

1) The ostrich approach; they stick their head in the sand, ignore it, and hopefully the problem will go away. It never does.

2) The kamikaze approach; they concoct the most vicious, underhanded, vindictive response possible, and then apply it with the zeal of an al-Qaeda terrorist. This almost always backfires, with predictable results.

For the ostrich approach, look no further than the current turmoil of Chief Cowardly Lyin’ King’s botched set-up of one of our officers. The mayor was called by the Boston Herald, but he was unavailable for comment. Can you believe that? In the middle of a bruising election, the mayor won’t return the calls of a newspaper reporter looking for a comment about his police chief being charged with a crime by the police union president. Classic ostrich approach.

This smoothly ties into the double-standard issue.

Since I’ve been a Quincy Police Officer, EVERY member of the Quincy Police Department who has been accused of a crime that involves possible jail time has been relieved of their duty weapon, had their license to carry firearms pulled, and placed on paid administrative leave, pending the outcome of the court proceedings.

EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM.

Whether the mayor likes it or not, CLK now stands accused of a crime. There is a pending criminal hearing in court where he’s accused of committing a crime where the maximum punishment is a year in the house of correction.

Why does he still have possession of his duty weapon?

Why does he still have possession of his license to carry firearms?

Why is he not on paid administrative leave?

I’ll tell you why, and as with almost everything else with the Quincy Police Department, it makes no sense whatsoever.

CLK still has his gun, still has his gun permit, and isn’t on paid administrative leave because the person accusing him of committing a crime is just a dumb patrol officer. I’m not a Very Important Person, and I’m most certainly not in The Club. What’s most ironic about that is that CLK couldn’t carry my jockstrap as far as actually enforcing the law, yet his word that someone committed a crime is treated as absolute gospel, while my word that CLK committed a crime apparently means nothing.

I would be more than pleased to publicly compare my arrest record with CLK’s when he was a patrol officer, or even his arrests for his entire career for that matter. Let the public decide who is more qualified to determine whether or not a crime was committed.

I’m going to repeat it, just so it’s perfectly clear;

Since I’ve been a Quincy Police Officer, EVERY member of the Quincy Police Department who has been accused of a crime that involves possible jail time has been relieved of their duty weapon, had their license to carry firearms pulled, and placed on paid administrative leave, pending the outcome of the court proceedings.

EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM.

Could there be any more perfect example of the disgusting double-standards we have to work with?

Of course, if CLK had a shred of integrity in his body, he would place himself on paid administrative leave and turn-in his duty weapon. That would never happen in a million years, because we all know that in his mind, the law and the rules only apply to other people. Not to him.

It bears mentioning that that whole mess could have been avoided, had CLK not chosen the kamikaze route. He had that officer dead to rights for violating department regulations by allowing his driver’s license to expire, but he just couldn’t help himself. He had to get cute, and the bomb he was arming subsequently detonated in his face.

Needless to say, the ostrich approach is used quite frequently when it’s a member of The Club who’s in the jackpot. When a patrol officer is the target, the kamikaze approach is wheeled out.

Exhibit A: Former Detective Bob Curtis. When I appeared before the city council in February and gutted CLK fore and aft, it was Bob Curtis who led the standing ovations in support. For that show of loyalty to the union of which he’s been a member for more than 30 years, he was unceremoniously kicked out of the detective bureau, where he served with distinction for 22 years and assigned to uniform patrol.

If that occurred six months after the city council meeting, that would be suspect enough. CLK and his command staff couldn’t even wait a week, they were so desperate to retaliate;

http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2007/03/08/news/news04.txt

We recently had our so-called “Step 3” grievance hearing concerning the Curtis reassignment, and it couldn’t have gone better. CLK never seems to think his rash decisions will eventually come back to bite him on the butt, and unfortunately is usually a sacrificial lamb who’s tossed under the oncoming freight train. The lamb-du-jour for the Curtis matter was the captain in charge of detectives.

I actually like the guy on a personal level, and he’s never been anything but nice to me and innocuous to the union, so I’m not going to name him, but to say he was shish-ka-bobbed by our labor attorney would be putting it nicely. I wasn’t even at the hearing since I had a doctor’s appointment, but I actually felt bad for him after I heard the blow-by-blow from our attorney and other E-Board members.

It got so bad, our attorney actually called a halt to the proceedings and offered to postpone the hearing so the city could re-examine their position. An offer they most graciously accepted.

Here’s an example of the kamikaze approach, followed-up by the ostrich approach by the very same person;

Veteran readers of this space know of the fight we’re currently involved in, concerning vacation time. This year, for the first time in the history of the department as far as we’ve been able to research (and our files go back to the late 1960’s), we were prohibited from using vacation time, outside of our contractually protected summer vacation period. Just to underscore that it was purely retaliatory harassment, it doesn’t matter if we have 6 extra officers working a shift, we can’t get the night off.

Of course, I figured this was the work of CLK, but I was eventually proven wrong. When we filed an action in Norfolk Superior Court to block this order, the city’s sole “witness” was Captain Paul Keenan, who submitted a signed & sworn affidavit that showed it was he who was the architect of the vacation time manifesto. Captain Keenan is in charge of day patrol, which comprises 1/3 of the patrol force, but he made this decision that affects the entire patrol force.

I think everyone knows I like to assign nicknames to people, and besides being humorous, I think it also helps people follow the plot line better. Since Captain Keenan is proving to be the biggest impetus besides CLK to this union, the time has come to bequeath upon him an official QPPOA nickname.

The good captain is quite the fan of Jimmy Buffet. I must admit, I never “got” the whole Jimmy Buffet thing. I don’t see the attraction of paying $100 or more to go watch some washed-up burnout sing about a non-existent Utopia called Margaritaville, but; to each his own. I’m currently obsessed with researching the Spartan’s courageous last stand at Thermopylae, so who am I to criticize anyone’s personal interests?

Anyway, given his admiration of Jimmy Buffet and to keep things straight, Captain Keenan will henceforth be known in this spot as Captain Parrot Head.

So anyway, Captain Parrott Head was the man behind the curtain with the vacation time boondoggle. Unfortunately for him, he seriously overestimated his popularity with the members of this union, but it really shouldn’t be surprising. When you steal the summers of almost 100 people, what other reaction should you expect?

You see, Captain Parrott Head and some other gold badges in the Quincy Police Department want it both ways; they want to play nice to your face, while sticking a red-hot poker up your backside. Then, after your remove the poker from your rectum, they’ll want to trade you Deion Branch for Shaun Alexander in fantasy football while wearing a big smile.

And, if you dare to question them or otherwise challenge their colossal but fragile egos, they come out swinging The Flaming Sword of Righteousness to smite with great vengeance all who speak ill of them.

For example, the patrol officer I mentioned who I accompanied into CLK’s office last week had some harsh criticism for Captain Parrot Head at a union meeting right before I went on vacation. Isn’t it a convenient coincidence that this officer was the first to fall victim to CLK’s sick note purge?

When I filed a legitimate grievance to enforce a portion of our collective bargaining agreement that is perhaps the most important issue to the membership of this union, Captain Parrot Head went into a frenzy of harassment against patrol officers, because in my opinion that grievance derailed some big plans he had.

Within a day or so of my filing that grievance, Captain Parrot Head was showing-up at detail sites, relieving patrol officers of duty for the most petty reasons imaginable. It couldn’t be more obvious if he was wearing a sign.

However, when we challenged Captain Parrot Head’s court affidavit, he switched from kamikaze to ostrich in record time. In spite of him telling QPPOA Treasurer Peter Curley that “I stand behind every word of that affidavit”, he’s now doing everything short of an appeal to the US Supreme Court to block us from asking him questions about it.

Our action in Norfolk Superior Court concerning vacation time resulted in a temporary victory for CLK and Captain Parrot Head, just by default. The judge refused to rule on our vacation time suit, simply because the city couldn’t provide a copy of their vacation policy. So, immediately after getting the ruling we filed with the city, asking for a copy of the policy.

Almost 3 months later, we’re still waiting.

Instead of playing the stall & delay ostrich game with the city, we decided to go on the offensive and file a motion to reconsider with the court. As such, we are absolutely entitled to depose members of the Quincy Police command staff, and since he was the author of the vacation time affidavit, Captain Parrot Head is first up. He was subpoenaed to appear in our labor attorney’s office just before Labor Day, but the city’s labor counsel requested a postponement, which we granted.

However, most interestingly, the city has filed a motion in court to block our subpoena of Captain Parrot Head. I wonder why that is? He very confidently stated he stood behind every word of his affidavit, why is he now trying to stop us from asking questions about it?

For that same case, I also had to file a sworn affidavit. If the city would like to depose me concerning this, just name the time & place and I’ll be there with bells on. Ask me any question you want, and I’ll not only swear under oath, I’ll swear on the lives of my wife and children that I’ll tell the truth, and they can then ask me any damn question they want.

I suspect why the city is so desperately trying to block our subpoena. They probably want no part of us getting Captain Parrot Head under oath with wide latitude to ask questions concerning exactly what his role has been during this labor strife. Questions concerning harassment of patrol officers over a legitimate grievance, questions about trying to intimidate and/or influence union members into changing union leadership…..we have a lot of very interesting questions for Captain Parrot Head.

And, we also have a very compelling and interesting timeline with which to question him.

Apparently, judging from documents filed by the city in support of their motion to block our subpoena, the city’s main reasoning for their motion is that I’m a Big Old Meanie Pants.

Good luck with all that.

The deposition is scheduled for September 12th at our labor attorney’s office in downtown Boston. If the city’s motion to block the subpoena fails, then Captain Parrot Head and his attorney better be there. If not, we intend to aggressively pursue the maximum sanctions allowed by law, including a contempt of court citation against both the city and Captain Parrot Head personally.

The ostrich approach only works for so long. Sooner or later, in spite of all the cute excuses the City of Quincy is going to attempt, we’re going to get Captain Parrot Head under oath, and he’s going to have to answer some very tough questions from our labor attorney.

Of course, Captain Parrot Head would have never landed on our radar screen, had he chosen to stay out of the fight. I’ve made it perfectly clear since Day One that our fight is with Robert F. Crowley, and no one else. If anyone else jumps into the fray, they will be treated by us as enemy combatants.

Some other gold badges have learned this the hard way, but apparently Captain Parrot Head never got the message.

One of my drill sergeants in basic training was one of three survivors from an entire platoon ambushed in Vietnam. He had 4 Purple Hearts, a Silver Star, a couple of Bronze Stars with the “V” attachment, a Combat Infantryman Badge, and just about every color you can imagine on his “fruit salad”. I considered it an honor when he dropped me for push-ups, and we looked at him as if he was God himself. He earned that type of respect.

I’d seriously like to ask people like Captain Parrot Head and his assistants if they really expect me to be impressed with their gold stars after serving under such a man.

HINT: I’m not.

Many people have e-mailed me, asking when CLK’s criminal hearing is. I still don’t know where or when that’s happening, but I will let you know as soon as possible.

LAST NOTE: I’m sick as a dog, and have been coughing-up green stuff. If I lie down for more than 10 minutes at a time, I cough uncontrollably, so here I am, awake at an unreasonable hour because I can’t sleep. I think I may well use a sick day for my upcoming shift, so I should probably just hire a bonded courier to give my duty weapon to CLK and get it over with.

That’s exactly the environment we have to work under; if we (patrol officers) make the slightest, most infinitesimal mistake of law and/or department policy, we get the maximum possible punishment.

If our chief of police stands accused of a crime, which has in the past automatically resulted in patrol officers being stripped of their duty weapons and placed on paid administrative leave, he’s allowed to retain his weapon and come to work, as if nothing ever happened.

Bizarro World….double standard…..violation of past practice…call it whatever you want. It’s hack politics at its worst, and I have no idea how the mayor can show his face in public while his police chief stands accused of using his office and authority to commit a crime, while he has no public comment on the matter.

Wednesday September 5, 2007 2:05 AM

Mail Call - Bruce Tait

It's probably a good time for another mail call, since it took over a minute with a broadband connection to download all the e-mails I received this weekend.

Let's get to it;

Q: Can you really charge your police chief with a crime?

A: Looks like I already did, doesn’t it? Contrary to what he really believes, CLK is not above the law. And, this isn’t the first time he’s broken the law; he’s never filed the financial disclosure as a former member of the Quincy College Board of Governors. As long as it remains unfiled, he’s in violation of the law.

You see; laws, rules, regulations, proper procedure….if it’s inconvenient to CLK, he just ignores them. Things like that are for everyone else, not him.

Q: Explain to me what’s going to happen now.

A: The court complaint was filed today (unless the PTB are stupid enough to try to “lose” it), so it will be scheduled for a clerk-magistrate’s hearing. For the uninitiated, this is kind of like a Judge Judy episode, where each side gets to present its case to a clerk. The clerk’s sole decision is whether or not probable cause of a crime exists. They make no finding of guilt or innocence; they can only decide one of two things;

Yes – there is probable cause.

No – there is not probable cause.

That’s it.

Now that the media is aware of the case, I expect this will shipped out to Dedham District Court to avoid any conflict of interest. I also think it would be extremely unfair to expect the Quincy Police Court Prosecutors to handle this case, so I’m going to write to DA Keating and ask for a special prosecutor (from outside the DA’s Office) to be assigned. I’d actually like to prosecute the case myself, but I don’t know if that’s possible.

If there is a finding of probable cause, then the case is sent for a criminal trial in front of a judge.

Q: What exactly did you charge Crowley with?

A: Violation of Massachusetts General Law, Chapter 90 Section 12; Allowing an unlicensed person to operate a motor vehicle.

http://www.mass.gov/legis/laws/mgl/90-12.htm

The relevant part of the law reads; “Whoever knowingly permits a motor vehicle owned by him or under his control to be operated by a person who is unlicensed or whose license has been suspended or revoked shall be punished by 1 year in the house of correction and a fine of not more than $500 for a first offense or, for a second or subsequent offense by a fine of not more than $1,000 or imprisonment in a house of correction for not more than 2 1/2 years, or both”.

My contention is that as chief of police, the vehicles of the Quincy Police Department are under Robert Crowley’s control, and he allowed the patrol officer in question to operate one of those vehicles after he knew he didn’t have a valid license. It’s so simple, I thought even a Patriot Ledger Editor could understand it, but I was wrong in that regard.

The really ironic thing about this is that the offense CLK ordered the patrol officer charged with, unlicensed operation of a motor vehicle, requires the operation take place on a public way, or where the public has a right of access. Where the patrol officer drove the cruiser for a few feet is a parking area restricted to police vehicles only. If we see a citizen trying to drive into that area, we stop them and turn them around. It’s no more a public way than my bathtub is.

However, for the crime I charged CLK with, the operation doesn’t have to be on a public way. The way a lawyer explained it to me, I could take an unlicensed driver into my garage, close the door, and if I allowed the unlicensed driver to start my car and move it, then I’ve violated 90-12.

Q: What if the complaint is “lost” in the shuffle?

A: I’ll just refile the complaint, and also contact the Massachusetts Attorney General – Public Corruption Division, as well as the US Attorney in Boston. Tampering with criminal cases in not something to be taken lightly.

Q: Do you really think he’ll get in trouble over this?

A: The way I look at it, he’s already in trouble. If the clerk doesn’t issue a finding of probable cause, it will make me lose whatever faith I have left in the justice system. It will also be pretty obvious, since a reporter for a major media outlet has already asked to be notified when the hearing is, because the reporter wants to attend.

When I sat down to write the police report that accompanied the criminal complaint, I acted as if I was writing the affidavit for a search warrant to find one of my children who was kidnapped. I knew it would come under intense scrutiny, so I covered all the bases and went into painstaking detail about nearly everything. If no probable cause issues, it will be the bag job of the millennium.

And….if the clerk does issue a finding of probable cause, then Robert Crowley should be fired immediately, because that’s exactly what happened to Officer Tim Kaes. That was even worse, because a clerk initially found no probable cause, and CLK used a favor with the district attorney to get the charges reinstated.

That puts the mayor in a most uncomfortable position; if he fires CLK, then he’ll have to admit he was wrong and we were right. If he doesn’t fire CLK, that adds a couple of more zeroes to the Tim Kaes settlement check from his upcoming lawsuit.

And if he doesn’t fire CLK, expect billboards and huge newspaper advertisements, pointing out the mayor’s double standard as applied to the police chief.

What a great decision when you’re in the political fight of your life, eh?

Well, he has no one to blame but himself and who he appointed as police chief.

Q: What did you think about the editorial in the Ledger that was highly critical of you?

A: You can ask my wife because she saw my reaction…..I laughed when I read it. I might have gotten angry if it wasn’t so pathetic. It looks like it was written by a pissed-off prepubertal schoolgirl throwing a temper tantrum.

After you cut through all the theatrical crap, what the Ledger is saying is this; we think the chief of police should be allowed to break the law in order to get a solid disciplinary case against a union member.

That’s…..that’s……that’s……I want to say pathetic, but I already used that, and it really isn’t a strong enough word anyway.

Pitiful. That’s what it is, pitiful.

I also have to say I'm pretty disappointed. The Patriot Ledger did an award-winning series on drunk driving and the subsequent groundswell of support for "Melanie's Law" that was outstanding journalism;

http://www.southofboston.net/specialreports/drunkendriving/index.shtml

Well, the sole reason why CLK is now facing a criminal charge is because of Melanie's Law. That upped the punishment for a violation of MGL 90-12 from a $35 ticket to a criminal offense with a year in the house of correction.

The Ledger was steadfast in their support of Melanie's Law, and I honestly believe that law would not have passed without the Patriot Ledger's relentless exposure and criticism of defense lawyers who double as members of the Massachusetts Legislature, who did their best to torpedo the bill before it became law.

Now, one of their prodigal sons is on the hook for Melanie's Law so they want to toss it out the window. It's an absolute disgrace that they would tarnish their prior good work by supporting someone who blatantly violated a provision of the very law they fought so hard for.

The fools on the Ledger Editorial Staff act with indignant outrage when a patrol officer forgets to renew his driver’s license. That's an offense where the maximum punishment is a $1000 fine, but they concurrently think it’s a noble thing when a chief of police commits a crime where the maximum punishment is a year in the house of correction.

They apparently have no concept that there's a HUGE difference between forgetting to do something, and deliberately doing something.

Welcome to Bizarro World – Crown Colony Drive Branch.

Let me ask the geniuses of the Crown Colony Branch a few questions;

Does Robert Crowley a.k.a. CLK have control of Quincy Police vehicles as police chief?

Yes.

Is a Quincy Police cruiser a motor vehicle?

Yes.

When CLK told a sergeant that the officer’s license was expired, then ordered the sergeant to wait until the officer drove onto a public way, stop him & bring him back to the station, did CLK allow the unlicensed officer to operate a motor vehicle under CLK's control?

Yes.

Am I a Quincy Police Officer, and therefore empowered to enforce Massachusetts General Law within the geographical boundaries of the City of Quincy?

Yes.

Is the Quincy Police station (where the officer operated the cruiser) within the City of Quincy?

Yes.

Does the Quincy Police Chief have immunity from Massachusetts General Law?

No.

Is it a crime under Massachusetts General Law to allow an unlicensed person to operate a motor vehicle either owned by you or under your control?

Yes.

So, please explain to me why CLK should get a mulligan for this.

I’ll explain their reasoning, as I don’t really expect an answer.

What it comes down to, is the Crowley bum kissers at the Ledger are having a hissy fit because a bunch of dumb cops who work details and have Quinn Bill college degrees outsmarted their hero, and caught him dead to rights.

We’re the proletariat, while they consider CLK part of the bourgeoisie.

And, they know we got him this time. The shrill hysteria of that editorial tells me they know their “source close to the investigation” is in serious trouble.

One of the most amusing things is how the Ledger said that attorney Richard Bardi’s comment that CLK needs a psychiatric evaluation was “absurd”.

Trust me…if you’ve ever seen CLK in action, you’d agree with him.

To me, it’s absurd for a newspaper editorial staff to support a police chief who uses his office and authority to commit a crime, but that’s just me.

Q: What does your membership think of your actions?

A: Everything I’ve heard so far has been 100% positive. Even some members who have been critical of some of my tactics in the past are supporting this, because they know it’s our only recourse. When our police chief tries to set traps for us to be arrested, that calls for drastic action.

Q: You have to admit the officer was wrong for not having a license.

A: I’ve never said otherwise, and neither has he. If anyone can point out anywhere on this website or in any newspaper where I said the officer did nothing wrong, I’ll send you a check for $1000. In spite of what the Ledger wants you to believe, my anger has never been directed at the officer being disciplined, it’s at the fact the police chief broke the law in an attempt to make things worse for the officer.

Here’s the thing….without looking, when does your driver’s license expire? If you knew without looking, you’re very much in the minority. I had to look at mine to know for sure.

How would I have handled the situation? I would have called the officer on the phone and said “Hey dummy….take a taxi to the registry and get your &*^%$#@ license renewed, then come see me”. When he came to see me, I would have pinned his ears back for a few minutes, then maybe given a written reprimand and assigned him to drive a desk for a couple of weeks.

That’s just the thing…having a valid driver’s license is a condition of our employment. By allowing it to lapse, even unintentionally, the officer was already fair game for discipline. CLK just couldn’t help himself, and had to leap for the brass ring. I imagine one question our labor attorney will ask CLK at the officer’s appointing authority hearing will be something like;

“Chief, if the officer was already in violation of department rules and regulations by simply not having a valid license, then why did you order the sergeant to wait until the officer drove onto a public way before taking action?”

At that point, the music will start and the soft-shoe will commence.

Q: Has Crowley tried to contact you?

A: Are you kidding me? Two other members of the QPPOA Executive Board recently received a message from Captain Dougan that he’s no longer allowed to speak with any of us on union matters, we have to contact CLK directly.

Well, I don’t think it would be such a great idea if I had any dealings with CLK until his legal troubles are sorted out. I’m not exactly his favorite person right now, and I’m a witness for his criminal hearing, so I don’t want to be put into the position of having to arrest him for intimidation of a witness if he has an eruption directed at me during a phone call or meeting about union business. I’m going to designate QPPOA Vice-President Terry Downing to be my CLK liaison, which is probably for the best. Some people have told me I have a way with the written word…well trust me, Terry has a way with the spoken word that far exceeds mine.

Q: What’s your next move?

A: Nothing. As much as the historical revisionists at 1 Sea Street will attempt to say we’re the hotheads, just about every drastic or controversial action we’ve taken has been retaliatory to some foolishness perpetuated by CLK or his minions. We just take one day at a time, and play the cards we’re dealt.

Q: I heard rumors that you were going to quit the union?

A: That was a whisper campaign, part of an amateurish coup d’etat attempt by a certain member of the command staff who was furious I filed a grievance that upset the big plans he had. It failed miserably.

I’ve told the members of the QPPOA….as long as I have their support, I’ll never quit on them. I work for them, derive my decision-making authority from them, and I have to answer to them. As long as I get the green light from them, the accelerator will remain on the floor.

Tuesday September 4, 2007 2:34 PM

Comrade!!!! - Bruce Tait

Well, that certainly didn't take long. Exactly as I suspected, the members of the Patriot Ledger Editorial Board have donned their sweaters, skirts, & saddle shoes, and picked-up their pom-poms to once again slavishly defend Chief Cowardly Lyin' King in the face of all evidence they're on a sinking ship. Take a gander at this;

http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2007/09/04/opinion/opin01.txt

Below is the full text of my response. It will be very interesting to see if they even have the cojones to print this, and if printed how much will be censored. I think my response speaks for itself, so with no further adieu;

To the Editor,

As usual, the Patriot Ledger Editorial Board has ignored the facts, because they're once again devastating to their argument.

The Ledger disgustingly applauds the Quincy Police Chief using his office and authority to commit a crime, while at the same time criticizes me for enforcing the law as I am sworn to do ("OUR VIEW: Theater of the absurd"). In that editorial, I'm painted as somehow trying to excuse the fact that a police officer allowed his license to expire and didn't renew it for months. Nothing could be further from the truth, as this officer will be the first to admit he made a mistake. This happens sometimes with human beings.

Not content to correct the mistake and deal with the disciplinary issue later, Chief Crowley attempted a shameless set-up where he knowingly allowed the unlicensed officer to operate a police cruiser. It was only the intervention of a quick-thinking sergeant that stopped the officer from driving onto a public way. The Ledger opined on the liability the city faced if the officer was involved in an accident while unlicensed. What of the liability if the officer drove out onto Sea Street on 8/29 and was involved in an accident while the police chief knew full well he was unlicensed, and in fact wanted the officer to drive on a public way?

To answer the Ledger's question as to whether I'm looking for different rules for police officers, the answer is no. What I'm looking for is a fair and consistent application of the law. Chief Crowley believes that a police officer committed a criminal offense by starting a police cruiser and moving it a few feet in the police station parking lot, where the public does not have a right of access. Fair enough; that officer and our lawyers will deal with that in court.

By deliberately creating the circumstances that allowed the officer to get behind the wheel of the cruiser, Chief Crowley committed a criminal offense. His position as police chief does not insulate him from the law, and he should answer for that in court. Should the clerk-magistrate find probable cause that Crowley committed the offense (and I have no reason to believe s/he won't), then using Mayor Phelan's and Chief Crowley's own standards of conduct for members of the Quincy Police Department, the chief should be fired immediately.

That's how patrol officers have been treated in the past. Why should the chief of police, who should be held to the highest standard of all, be treated any differently?

Saturday September 1, 2007 2:57 AM

Chief....Acme is on the phone for you - Bruce Tait

“You finally did it to yourself” – Steve Martin to John Candy in “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles”.

There is a saying that in wartime, things get worse before they get better. Never has that been truer than since the day that Mayor Failin', over our strenuous objections, appointed Robert Crowley as Quincy Police Chief. We told the mayor that he would be making the biggest mistake of his career if he did that, and while we’re not always right, it’s been very rare that we’ve been wrong.

It’s always a nice feeling to be absolutely, positively proven correct, and the events of the last week or so have completely validated everything I’ve ever written on this website. If anyone ever doubted the truth of what’s written here, they’ll soon be true believers or they must be brain dead.

In that time period, Chief Cowardly Lyin’ King has gone on a frenzy of employee suspensions that is simply breathtaking for both its magnitude and its carelessness. It culminated a couple of days ago when CLK made one of the biggest blunders of his career, one that will soon land him in court facing criminal charges.

Let’s back-up for a second. Last week the captain in charge of night patrol, who is a true gentleman and universally respected by the people under his command, called me at home about an hour before my shift was to start. He asked me if I could come into the station a little bit early, skip roll call, and bring a QPPOA member also scheduled to work with me into the chief’s office. Of course, I agreed.

Now, I may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I do know the inner workings of CLK’s Quincy Police Department like I know my children’s names. If CLK invites the union president to bring a union member into his office, it’s most certainly not a social call. What it means is that the union member should probably just hand CLK his issued weapon as soon as he walks into the office, just to save time.

I suspected what this was all about, so I called our labor attorney to advise him of what was happening. He told me to tell the member to not say a word, just comply with whatever orders were given and leave as soon as possible.

Sure enough, I and the QPPOA member walked into the chief’s office, and there CLK sat. Also present were the night captain, who looked like he would rather be in downtown Baghdad, the day captain (who really had no business being there), and Captain Dougan who looked like he would rather be on a flight to downtown Baghdad.

To absolutely no one’s surprise, CLK handed a notice of suspension to the QPPOA member, and it was ridiculously out of proportion to the “infractions” alleged. CLK suspended this officer for 5 days, which is the maximum a police chief can suspend a police officer by law. Any harsher punishment must come from the appointing authority, which is the mayor.

What was this officer’s offense, for which he received the maximum suspension allowed by law?

He called in sick.

Well, more accurately, he called in sick, and then didn’t turn-in extremely detailed letters from his physician, describing exactly what the circumstances of his illness were. In other words, he didn’t sign-away his patient/physician confidentiality rights.

You see, even though we earn 18 sick days per year, CLK thinks we shouldn’t take any. Since he has the luxury of just not coming to work while putting himself in for a full day, he thinks we shouldn’t take any sick time either, even though we actually have to put in, as he likes to say “8 hours work for 8 hours’ pay”.

Since CLK never worked the in the down-and-dirty world of patrol, he has not the slightest clue that sometimes the stress of the job gets to us, and manifests itself with headaches, sleeplessness, and other physical ailments that don’t really require a physician’s visit. Believe me; my physician has better things to do than write sick excuse notes like he’s the parent of a grade-schooler.

And just to add a dollop of absurdity to this situation, physician’s notes from the physician of our spouses and children are not acceptable to CLK. One of our members has a child who is recovering (nicely, thank God) from a life-threatening illness, and our member had to use a sick day to take his child to an important medical check-up.

When the child’s physician supplied an excuse note, CLK wouldn’t take it. He actually wanted this prominent physician to take time out of his world-renowned, critically important research, which has saved countless children’s lives, to fill-out an administrative paperwork nightmare called FMLA (Family Medical Leave Act).

Connecting the dots now? Instead of just using our earned sick time when our children are sick or hurt, CLK wants us to apply for FMLA.

By the way, I’ve noticed I’m getting a lot less “It can’t be that bad” e-mails. After the above, I wonder why?

So anyway, the sick-note-challenged officer was stripped of his entire duty belt, not just his police weapon, and sent home.

Now, why would a police officer have his weapon taken away, barring after a shooting for ballistic testing? Obviously, the supervisor taking the weapon thinks the officer is a danger to himself or others, and can’t be trusted with a firearm.

Remember that, there will be a quiz shortly.

Less than a week after this officer was called into the chief’s office, suspended for 5 days, stripped of his weapon, and sent home, a sergeant was also suspended for exactly what the officer was suspended for; not turning in physician’s notes for sick time.

Do you suppose this sergeant was immediately stripped of his weapon?

No.

Was this sergeant suspended for 5 days?

No.

Was this sergeant immediately sent home, forced to walk out of the police station with his union representative while everyone noticed he had no gun belt?

No.

The sergeant was suspended for 4 days, but told that his suspension would be served the following week. In the meantime, he remains on-duty, with his issued weapon.

My question is…..if CLK is the least bit fair and consistent, then won’t the sergeant also be stripped of his weapon while out on suspension?

If so, remember the reasoning of taking a police officer’s weapon…..they probably present a danger to someone, right?

I guess in the mind of CLK, the sergeant does not currently present a danger to anyone, but he will next week when he serves his suspension. Then after 4 days, he magically will no longer serve as a danger to anyone.

Got a headache yet? Unfortunately, it only gets worse from here. A lot worse.

Before I get to the nitty gritty, I’ll mention that two civilian employees of the police department were also recently suspended for the sick time nonsense. This particular purge is the most far-reaching I’ve seen during CLK’s tenure.

The latest QPPOA suspension victim is a much different case than sick time. This QPPOA member also got whacked for 5 days, the maximum allowed by law, but for a much different reason.

I’ve stated before here that police officers are most certainly not perfect. We are subject to the same frailties and human weaknesses as anyone else, and as long as we have to draw our recruits from the human race, that’s going to be true.

This latest suspension victim moved several times in the last couple of years, and as a result his driver’s license expired without his knowledge. This isn’t exactly the crime of the century….I’ve stopped many people who had expired licenses, and except for a few who admitted they knew about it, every other person either truly didn’t know, or were very accomplished liars.

Invariably, I let these people call a friend or family member who has an active license to come to the scene and drive them home, after I give them a stern lecture to get their license renewed.

No harm, no foul.

What I most certainly do NOT do is let these people drive away, because it’s a crime to allow an unlicensed person to operate a motor vehicle.

Keep that in mind.

So anyway, after reporting to work this past Wednesday (8/29) this officer was stripped of his duty weapon (seeing a pattern here?), told he was suspended until he could renew his license, and sent home. He in fact did renew his license the very next day.

He was then initially told that he was suspended for one day. Then, he was told he wasn’t suspended, he was placed on paid administrative leave. Then he was suspended for one day again. Then, he was suspended for 5 days.

Then, he was suspended, but the suspension wasn’t going to take effect until next week. However CLK wouldn’t give him his weapon back so he really was suspended….but not really, but he really was because he couldn’t come to work with no weapon. The end result (if I’ve done my math correctly) is that the officer will be suspended, at least in spirit, for at least 11 days, which is over double what a police chief can do by law.

After dreaming-up the above, CLK probably donned an aluminum foil beanie and started covering his floors, walls, and ceiling with Reynolds Wrap.

Let’s get to the heart of the matter…..the circumstances under which this officer was suspended. Was the officer technically in the wrong to allow his license to expire? You bet he was, and he’ll be the first to tell you that.

Is that worthy of a 5 day suspension? That’s something an arbitrator will probably have to decide.

However, in a totally amateurish, desperate attempt to get this officer into legal hot water in addition to being suspended, CLK attempted to spring an ambush that would have made Wile E. Coyote proud.

And, the results were the same for CLK as they always are for Mr. Coyote.

Not content to pick-up the phone and tell this officer to stay out of work until his license was renewed, then deal with the disciplinary issue later, CLK simply couldn’t help himself. He had to go the extra mile in order to make things about 1000 times worse than they had to be.

On that fateful Wednesday, CLK knew full well that this officer’s license was expired. He probably knew about it in the two days prior, but since I was working both those days, he probably decided to wait until there were no union representatives working to spring his trap.

CLK contacted one of the sergeants who was responsible for supervising this officer that evening. What transpired before roll call that evening is irrelevant for the purposes of this blog, but it will come out at the criminal hearing.

This sergeant was ordered by CLK to watch this officer after roll call get into his assigned cruiser and wait until he drove out onto either Sea Street or Southern Artery, then pull him over and bring him back to the station.

The sergeant saw this officer get into the cruiser, start it, and move about 5-6 feet before he probably realized he couldn’t be involved in such a shameless set-up. He motioned the officer to stop and brought him into the station, where he was disarmed and suspended.

Undeterred, CLK ordered this sergeant to criminally charge the officer with Unlicensed Operation, and of course the sergeant followed this lawful order. If you’d like to read his incident report, it is public record. File a public records request for Quincy Police Department Incident Report # 07043727. It will cost a few bucks, but open even more eyes.

The officer was issued a traffic citation, and appropriately filed for an appeal hearing.

The big problem is that by knowingly allowing someone who he knew to be unlicensed get into a police cruiser, start it, and begin to drive away, CLK committed a criminal offense.

When I heard about this absolutely shameless attempt to set-up a QPPOA member, it was the last straw for me. I’ve been telling anyone who will listen how completely out-of-control the Quincy Police Chief is, and if this isn’t prima facie evidence, I don’t know what is.

I was so infuriated, I wrote a traffic citation to CLK, but veteran readers know I’m not much on traffic enforcement. I wrongly believed that the crime of Allowing an Unlicensed Person to Operate a Motor Vehicle was a $35 civil infraction, because it was for years. Under Melanie’s Law, this was changed to a criminal offense, punishable by a year in the house of correction.

So, yesterday (Friday 8/31/07) I voided the civil infraction I wrote to CLK, and on Tuesday morning (Monday being a holiday), I’m applying for a criminal complaint in Quincy District Court against Robert Crowley for the misdemeanor of Allowing an Unlicensed Person to Operate a Motor Vehicle. For you legal junkies, the law is Chapter 90 Section 12(B) of the Massachusetts General Laws.

This isn’t a joke….I wrote an extremely detailed report of the incident (Incident# 07043985 in case you're interested), and I believe I more than adequately established probable cause that this crime occurred, and that Robert Crowley committed it.

You may be asking yourself…..why is a patrol officer filing criminal charges against the police chief?

You know why I am?

Because someone has to.

This guy has been running amok for many years, doing his level best to ruin the lives of innocent people while he completely flouts the law and department regulations. He’s as despicable a hypocrite as you’ll ever meet if you live to be a hundred years old.

Well, he really stepped in it this time. Besides being a Quincy Police Officer, and therefore empowered to enforce the law in Quincy, I’m also in a very unique position as QPPOA President to stand-up for the membership of this union who have been terrorized by Crowley for years.

I’m not letting this go.

CLK can certainly take my criminal application and send it through the shredder before it leaves the police station on Tuesday morning, at which point I’ll contact the US Attorney’s Office in Boston.

He can certainly have the case “disappear” at Quincy District Court, but the media is watching this case. More media than just the Patriot Ledger, trust me.

The case could get dismissed at a clerk’s hearing at Quincy District Court. Good luck explaining why every other criminal case involving a member of the Quincy Police Department for the last 15+ years has been shipped out to Dedham District Court to avoid a conflict of interest, but this one wasn’t.

The case could be dismissed at a clerk’s hearing in Dedham District Court. That’s probably going to be the ultimate disposition of the case, although after reading my report I’d like to know how a clerk could dismiss it with a straight face.

In the end, the ultimate disposition of the criminal charge against CLK is pretty irrelevant. The main value, if you can call it that, is that it’s prima facie evidence that he is completely out-of-control, and needs to vacate his position as police chief as soon as possible.

Simply put, he’s not stable. Now he’s resorting to ham-handed set-ups in order to get his patrol officers in trouble….what else does anyone need to know?

We went to Mayor Failin’ at least three times with our concerns over the absolute train wreck that Robert Crowley’s “leadership” style has brought to the Quincy Police Department. All three times we were paid lip service by the mayor, and if anything has changed, it's that things have gotten worse.

A LOT worse.

Our police chief is now setting illegal traps for us to break the law, then have us arrested.

Is there a single person reading this who still wonders why this guy has to go…..immediately???

UPDATE: http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2007/09/01/news/news04.txt