Dearborn's police chief and mayor announced they will be working with the Department of Justice's Community Policing Services (COPS) to assess how they can improve the police department's best practices during critical responses.
This all comes after two people died during police involved shootings recently.
“I wanted to make sure that our immediate community here in Dearborn knows that we are transparent, that we are committed to providing service to which each one of them is an equal partnership at the table with public safety,” said Chief Ron Haddad.
COPS will be doing an assessment on practices used by the police department during critical responses.
According to Chief Haddad, he reached out to COPS after 36-year-old Kevin Matthews was shot to death by an officer after a chase which led to a struggle over and officer’s gun, according to investigators in December.
In January, an officer shot into 31-year-old Janet Wilson’s car, killing her after a traffic stop.
State police said she almost ran over a Dearborn officer.
“Clearly, you know, these two incidents which were quite rare in 33 days has caused me great concern,” said Haddad. “We want to make sure that our policies are equal for this and future times.”
According to COPS, they do assessments around the country, in cities with similar or high profile cases. They implement programs custom-made for particular municipalities.
“We think that we will walk away from Dearborn with some best practices that we can share with the industry,” said Nobel Ray of COPS.
The Dearborn Police Department is made up of 186 officers. In a city with a 40 percent Arabic population, there are 16 Arab-American officers and 14 African-American officers.
Chief Haddad was not too specific about anything, including the investigations of Matthews’ and Wilson’s deaths.
Wilson’s case is being investigated by state police while Matthews’ case is being investigated by Detroit Police.
Chief Haddad added he wants to bridge the gaps with any communities the department may not have such a great relationship.
“I’ve been at this for 43 years and I clearly recognize that nothing splits the community more apart than use of force by law enforcement,” said Chief Haddad. “So I want to make sure that our use of force policy is not only a best practice but most civil to our community and I’m very confident when it’s said and done that we will have a national, best model that we can share with the rest of the country because i’m very proud of our men and women and the work that they have already done.”
The assessment will take until the end of the year.
