Five years ago, our city returned local control of our police department for the first time in more than 150 years. In these past five years, we have worked together to make sure that police leadership is held accountable to the people of St. Louis, not some bureaucrat in Jefferson City.
In the past week, this ability to hold our leaders accountable has been incredibly important as we learned that the Circuit Attorney’s Office would no longer accept criminal cases involving 28 former and current St. Louis Metropolitan Police officers.
The disclosure of this “exclusion list” of officers is deeply troubling. More troubling, is the contradicting information put forward from the Circuit Attorney’s Office and the chief of police as to the origins of the list.
The citizens of St. Louis deserve to know the truth. If the Circuit Attorney’s Office no longer trusts the word of more than two dozen former and current police officers, the people should know why and how this trust was broken.
Right now, we need facts and we need transparency. We do not need a continued war of words between the city’s top law enforcement leaders.
That is why I formally requested that the St. Louis Board of Alderman’s Public Safety Committee immediately hold hearings into this “exclusion list” so that we can protect and restore the public’s trust in its keepers of peace and justice.
As the Missouri state senator representing the 5th Senatorial District in the City of St. Louis, and as sponsor of House Bill 71 that returned local control of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department to the City of St. Louis, I look forward to a positive resolution of this issue for the people we serve.
Until then, I will continue to fight for the families, businesses and people of St. Louis who deserve openness and honesty from all their leaders.
