Boston city councilor and mayoral candidate Andrea Campbell on Wednesday renewed her call for the U.S. Attorney’s office to investigate the Boston Police Department's handling of Patrick Rose, Sr., the former officer who remained on the force and became the patrolman's union president despite credible child abuse allegations against him as early as the 1990s. Rose is currently in custody facing 33 accounts of various sexual crimes.
Campbell resumed her push for an investigation of BPD’s internal affairs unit after GBH News reported that acting Mayor Kim Janey, who is seeking a full term, is withholding a report on Rose. When Janey appointed Stephanie Everrett as director of the city's new Office of Police Accountability and Transparency, or OPAT, she asked Everrett to produce a report on the Rose case within 45 days of her start date. Everrett began on May 3.
On Wednesday, Campbell accused Janey of giving the high-profile Rose case an inadequate response, saying the U.S. Attorney's Office was better suited to investigate the internal affairs unit.
"Forty five days has come and gone and we're still waiting," Campbell said from the steps of City Hall. “From where I sit, there is absolutely no reason that report should not be released.”
In April, Janey took the rare step of releasing a handful of documents related to the BPD's handling of the Rose case, but has since resisted calls for more disclosure.
On Wednesday, Janey responded with a statement, saying "I ended decades of silence that protected an accused child predator within BPD and directed the Office of Police Accountability and Transparency to recommend how to keep this from happening again."
The transparecncy office is still mostly unstaffed, and its civilian review board’s nine members and chair have yet to be named. Janey said she will share initial recommendations from OPAT in the coming days, and that she hopes members of the Boston City Council "will do their duty to nominate members to the [OPAT's civilian review board] and join me in making BPD accountable to our residents."
Campbell rejected idea that inaction by the council, or anything else, is preventing Janey from releasing the report.
"It is really disturbing to me,” said Campbell, “given how horrific this case is that we and residents and the public are still waiting for transparency, for an investigation and, of course, for a report to come out.”
Campbell said the issue is part of her continuing role in demanding police reform.
"I really am proud,” Campbell said, “that my drafting of legislation and working in partnership with the previous mayor's task force created the Office of Police Accountability and Transparency, but I knew months ago that this office would not be set up [and] would not actually have the resources it needed to be able to do an investigation given the magnitude and the scope of this case. The U.S. attorney's office is in the best position while we set up OPAT."
