After months of silence, former Baltimore police commissioner Anthony Batts told The Baltimore Sun that Mosby “is in over her head” and that she shouldn’t “create more flaws in that broken [criminal justice] system and you don’t do it on the back of innocent people just to prove that.”

Batts, who was head of police from 2012 and fired in July 2015 following the city’s unrest and homicide spike of last summer, defended the six officers involved in the Freddie Gray case.

“I didn’t see any malice in the heart of those police officers,” he said. “I don’t think those officers involved are those you would put in the class of bad or malicious or evil police officers.”

The former commissioner went on to say that Mosby never should have never filed the charges in the first place.

“She’s immature, she’s incompetent, she’s vindictive, and that’s not how the justice system is supposed to work,” he said. “The justice system is supposed to be without bias for police officers, for African Americans, for everyone.”

Mosby’s office responded by referencing a speech First Lady Michelle Obama made at the DNC on Monday night.

“Today Donald Trump and former commissioner Anthony Batts have attacked the State’s Attorney in numerous ways, but as our First Lady Michelle Obama said, when they go low we go high,” said spokeswoman Rochelle Ritchie.

On the contrary, current Police Commissioner Kevin Davis released a statement yesterday praising Mosby’s announcement to drop the charges, calling it “a thoughtful decision that will help move our city forward.”

“Our police officers and detectives work with the State’s Attorney’s Office every day to bring solid cases against criminals who seek to harm others and attack our quality of life,” Davis said. “It’s an inherently strong relationship that can not and will not miss a single beat. We will continue to work together. That’s what we do.”

Davis also added in that the internal investigation of the police department, including the imbedding of The Sun‘s Justin George, speaks volume’s for the department’s transparency.

“As the quality of this investigation has been called into question, I want to remind our residents that over 30 ethical, experienced, and talented detectives worked tirelessly to uncover facts,” he said. “They are more than willing to hold persons who commit crimes accountable for their actions.”

He concluded by reiterating that “the tragic death of Mr. Freddie Gray has stirred emotions in all of us. And while we are all entitled to our own opinions, we are not entitled to our own facts. Our American criminal justice system has run its course, and today’s decision by State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby is a wise one that will undoubtedly help Baltimore to continue to heal.”

To what extent Batts’s remarks reflect some personal animosity toward Mosby after her public demeaning of his former department’s investigation of the Gray’s death, or serve as the objective analysis of an ex-Baltimore police commissioner, may be hard to discern. Davis, of course, remains tasked with working with Mosby and her office, as well as both his officers, the community, and local activists. Since he has taken office, Davis has been responsible for many reforms to the department since he took office, namely adding more officers on foot patrols and overhauling a decades-old “use of force” policy.

“Our police department continues its journey to get better each and every day,” he said. “Together with our community, we have made remarkable strides over the last year that will serve as the foundation for the equitable police-community relationship we all deserve.”

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Judge Barry Williams ruled against motions put forth by attorneys for Baltimore City police sergeant Alicia White and officer William Porter, concluding their statements were legally obtained by internal oversight investigators after White and Porter signed Miranda and state Law Enforcement Officers’ Bill of Rights waivers.

In announcing his decision, Williams said prosecutors had met the burden of proof that White and Porter—whose interviews with police internal oversight detectives were videotaped and briefly shown in court—had been made voluntarily and were not coerced by investigators.

“She had the opportunity to say, ‘No,’ to say she didn’t want to give any statements,” Williams said, referring to White.

“The interview was not done with undue influence,” Williams said in denying Porter’s motion to suppress his statements to police investigating Gray’s death from spinal cord injuries suffered while in custody.

Williams also canceled a pre-trial motion hearing set for Wednesday morning and placed a gag order on attorneys for the remainder of trials, banning prosecutors and defense lawyers from discussing the cases with the media and anyone beyond their legal teams. Among other leaks in the case to date, The Baltimore Sun obtained a copy of the autopsy report.

Prosecutors from the city state’s attorney office allege that Gray asked police officers for medical attention, but that he did not receive care until he was found unresponsive upon reaching the police station after multiple stops. Prosecutors have also said—as did then police commissioner Anthony Batts earlier this year—that Gray was not secured and seat-belted in the police van, contrary to department policy.

Motions to suppress statements by three other officers charged were withdrawn by their defense attorneys Tuesday morning.

The sixth defendant, officer Caesar Goodson Jr., who faces the most serious charge, second-degree depraved heart murder, had refused to give a statement to police investigators. Goodson was the driver of the transport van in which Gray suffered his fatal spinal injury.

All the officers facing criminal charges, White, Porter, and Goodson, as well as Lt. Brian Rice and officers Edward Nero and Garrett Miller, appeared in court Tuesday, sitting together.

Baltimore city state’s attorney Marilyn Mosby, who announced the charges against the police officers in a high-profile press conference last spring, was also present in the courtroom. However, Mosby sat a row behind chief deputy state’s attorney Michael Schatzow and deputy state’s attorney Janice Bledsoe, who handled the prosecution’s efforts in front of Williams.

Porter’s trial is scheduled first, for Nov. 30, and his statement—allegedly confirming that Gray asked for medical care, according to reporting by The Baltimore Sun—is considered critical to prosecutors’ cases against other officers. Porter is charged with involuntary manslaughter, reckless endangerment, and second-degree assault, as is Rice.

White, as well as officers Nero and Miller, is charged with second-degree assault, reckless endangerment, and misconduct in office.

Goodson’s trial is set for Jan. 6 and White for Jan. 25, with the other trials scheduled for February and March. The six officers, all free on bail, have pleaded not guilty to every charge.

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Starting immediately, two special agents each from the FBI; Drug Enforcement Agency; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; U.S. Marshals Service, and U.S. Secret Service will begin working alongside detectives from the Baltimore Police Department homicide unit.

The goal of the new “B-FED” partnership is simple, city police say: accelerate the rate of homicide closures, improve the current 36 percent homicide clearance rate, and remove violent individuals from the streets.

To date, 191 people have been killed in Baltimore this year, including more than 40 people in both May and July. The 116 people killed in May, June, and July—a surge that began in the weeks after 25-year-old Freddie Gray died from injuries while in police custody—mark the highest three-month total since 1970, according to reporting by the Baltimore Sun. In 1970, however, the city also had nearly 300,000 more residents.

Baltimore is not the only U.S. city seeing an increase in homicides, and acting city police commissioner Kevin Davis noted he’d spent the morning and afternoon at a one-day summit in Washington, D.C. to address the recent nationwide spike in homicides. St. Louis, New Orleans, Milwaukee, and Chicago are among the cities facing significant increases in the number of murders this year.

At Monday’s press conference at police headquarters announcing the new task force, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake was joined by Sen. Barbara Mikulski, Rep. Elijah Cummings, Rep. John Sarbanes, City state’s attorney Marilyn Mosby, and Davis, along members of the City Council and several federal law enforcement officials.

“We all know the level of violence in our city over the past months is unacceptable,” Rawlings-Blake said. “I’ve seen the resolve in our communities [to do better].” She said that the new task force will increase the resources, collaboration, and partnerships city police have at all levels. “This is the next step.”

Mikulski said the federal agents bring “knowledge and know-how,” in forensics and weapons, for example, that can assist in solving local cases. Baltimore Police Department officials also said the federal agencies can identify creative approaches in building cases against targeted individuals.

Cummings, in somber tones, said it has been painful “to see so many young lives snuffed out” and called upon community members to work with police in bringing violent individuals to justice. “If you stand back and don’t do anything, all you do is allow a murderer to do it again.”

Davis, who took over the leadership of the city police department on an interim basis after former police commissioner Anthony Batts was fired last month, said the task force will remain in place for 60 days, at which time its status will be evaluated.

Specifically, the federal-city partnership will go after “highly motivated repeat violent offenders,” said Davis. “We know who they are.”

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With the Freddie Gray tragedy, aftermath, and the recent increase in homicides in mind, we spoke with retired Baltimore City Police Department Lt. Stephen Tabeling, a former homicide investigator and police academy instructor. Tabeling (below photo) is also the co-author of You Can’t Stop Murder: Truths About Policing in Baltimore and Beyond with longtime investigative reporter Stephen Janis.

What was your initial reaction last month to the sudden increase in shootings and homicides?

Homicides around the United States are cyclical, but when this [spike] hit, it seemed to me that the police had stopped aggressively policing.

When you say “aggressively policing”—what do you mean by that?

The best tool we have to get guns off the street is “stop and frisk.” But it has to be done properly, with reasonable cause. Whether you make an arrest and charge someone, or don’t find anything and let him or her go—you have to write a report. The Supreme Court gave police that authority in Terry v. Ohio, an 8-1 decision. In my book, I say you can’t stop murder because it’s a crime of passion, but you can get guns off the street and prevent murder. You have to follow the law, but you also have to be a little aggressive. Unfortunately, some policemen have strayed away from the law and that’s how this started.

But by taking someone’s gun away [via stop and frisk], you limit their opportunity to commit a homicide, to commit a lot of crimes.

What do you believe is the reason for police becoming less aggressive and making fewer arrests over the past several weeks?

I think police are doing their jobs, but when the prosecutor [Marilyn Mosby] brought the false arrest charges [against officers involved in the Freddie Gray case], police officers became a little leery about aggressively making arrests. They’re worried about putting their hands on people and getting charged. You can’t police when you’re in fear and, when I say that, I don’t mean physical fear—these guys would take a bullet for a citizen—I mean fear of not being backed up and supported.

You don’t think the City State’s Attorney should have brought forward the false arrest charges, which, we should note, were later dropped in the grand jury’s indictment?

I’m just one person, but it’s not just me—a lot of people feel that way. Police officers deal with a lot of problems and have to make a lot of instantaneous decisions. They don’t often have time to sit and think things through and consider everything—they have to act and react in the moment. They will make mistakes in judgment.

Do you think criminals feel emboldened currently because arrests are down and maybe they feel like police are more hesitant to confront them?

They know if they’re carrying a gun, they’re less likely to get caught right now.

What can be done in the short-term to turnaround this active violent stretch we’re in?

The police need to know they have the support of the commissioner [Baltimore City Police Commissioner Anthony Batts], the mayor [Stephanie Rawlings-Blake] and City Hall.

You don’t feel like they do right now?

I’ve been to the Western District and I’ve spoken with a number of officers and morale is low. I can tell you as a former police detective, on the job for 25 years, and then another 10-11 years teaching at the police academy, I was embarrassed watching police officers being told to “stand down” while rocks were being thrown at them and building were being burned and looted in front of them. I’ve never seen that before in my life and I was took part in some riot situations. Police rush in, in those situations.

You know for a fact that police were given an order to “stand down.”

I know what I saw on television [as riots were taking place]. I know what I’ve read and what I’ve heard from police officers I’ve spoken with.

Other than working to improve morale, do you see specific areas where improvements can be made?

I don’t think there is good police supervision from the top on down. I also think there is too much of an emphasis on using plainclothes officers. You need uniformed officers on the street, getting to know people and building relationships to prevent crime and violence before it happens.

Longer term, how can the police respond to the challenges in the city, address and help reduce the violence?

Better training. It all comes back to training. Not just in policing, but training in the law. Police come from all walks of life today. They need to understand the Fourth [protection against unreasonable search], the Fifth [protection against self-incrimination] and the Sixth Amendments [right to an attorney] to the Constitution. They don’t need to know case law, but they need to know the concepts. And they need to be trained in how to testify.

So it all comes back to training.

That’s the other theme of my book. Ninety-seven percent of cops are good cops, good at their jobs. However, training today is not what it was in my day—and you also have investigators who don’t have the same level of experience. That’s why the closure rate is higher today that it was in the 1970s, for example, when we had more violence and fewer homicide detectives. You go out now and you see supervisors looking over the shoulders of detectives—that tells you right there they don’t have confidence in them.

Last question is about the Freddie Gray case specifically. According to the Baltimore City Police Department’s own investigation, he was handcuffed, but left unsecured in the back of the police van where his fatal injuries are said to have occurred. How did you handle arrestees and those taken into custody?

We didn’t have the police vans with the partitions in my day. We had police cruisers that came around, but you sat in the back with them. We had larger wagons that came around, too, but you always sat in the back with them—it may have been a little more dangerous—but they were never left alone.

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Gray, who was arrested and taken into police custody April 12, died April 19 at the University of Maryland Medical Center’s Shock Trauma from injuries that included a broken neck and severely damaged spinal cord.

At a short press conference following the meeting with faith-based leaders as well as the leadership of the Baltimore chapter of the NAACP, Rawlings-Blake praised the faith community and those in Baltimore who have been peacefully protesting Gray’s death and the handling of his case all week.

Rawlings-Blake said she shared the faith-based and broader community’s desire for justice, but she indicated she still has more questions than answers about how and why Gray died.

“I still want to know why procedures for transport were not followed,” Rawlings-Blake said. “I still want to know why none of the officers called for immediate medical assistance despite Mr. Gray’s apparent pleas…I know that this is absolutely unacceptable and I want answers.”

Rawlings-Blake went on to say that Baltimore City Police Commissioner Anthony Batts has assured her that the BCPD is moving as quickly as possible “with a responsible investigation and we will determine how exactly this death occurred.”

“If necessary,” Rawlings-Blake continued. “We will hold the appropriate parties responsible.”

At the same time that the mayor said she recognizes the growing frustration around Gray’s unexplained death, she said the investigative process must be followed. “In order to have justice, and not just seek justice, there are procedures that have to be followed,” she said.

Batts held a press conference to provide an update on the city police department’s investigation into Gray’s death later Friday, but the results of the BCPD’s initial probe are not slated to be completed and handed over to the city’s state’s attorney’s office until May 1. At that time, the city’s state’s attorney office will consider bringing any charges. According to
live tweets from the press conference, Batts said, “If someone harmed Freddie Gray, we’re going to prosecute them,” but added few substantial new details about the case. He also said he will not be stepping down after calls by some for his resignation.

Six city police officers involved in Gray’s arrest and transport are currently suspended with pay while the matter is being investigated.

Rawlings-Blake said she understands the community’s desire for accountability, but also dismissed calls by some for Batts’ resignation, adding that despite the current tragedy, Baltimore has made “progress” recently in reducing police brutality in the city.

A
Baltimore Sun investigation last year detailed $5.7 million in court judgments and settlements involving more than 100 lawsuits alleging Baltimore City police misconduct since 2011.

Rawlings-Blake acknowledged that the apparent “rough ride” Gray was given in the police van—meaning that he was shackled, but not seat-belted as required by procedure—was not a “one-off.”

“Clearly not,” Rawlings-Blake said. “The reason we have that policy is because of an incident that happened previously. The
Sun published a piece about so-called “rough rides” earlier this week.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan
said Friday he plans to sign a bill that would double maximum payouts in police brutality cases. On Thursday, he said he would sign legislation to encourage police departments in the state to launch body-camera initiatives.

The U.S. Department of Justice
announced Tuesday that they will open an investigation into the Gray’s death.

Funeral arrangements for Gray have been made for Sunday and Monday. Gray’s family will receive visitors from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. at Vaughn Greene Funeral Home in North Baltimore on Sunday. The funeral service will be held at the New Shiloh Baptist Church in West Baltimore on Monday at 11 a.m.

“It doesn’t matter if you celebrate your holy day on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or another day of the week, [Baltimore] is our community,” said Rabbi Andrew Busch of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation after Rawlings-Blake spoke. “If we have greater income or are searching for work, it is our community. Regardless of our color, regardless of our education, regardless whether we were born here or came here—this is our community. We must ask difficult questions, but we must remember at every given point, [that] we are all different, but we are all the same in that this is our community.”

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Gray died at the University of Maryland Medical Center’s Shock Trauma unit after suffering a broken neck following an arrest in West Baltimore. The Baltimore City Police Department has not provided the cause for Gray’s fatal injuries, which included a nearly severed spine, according to multiple reports, but identified and suspended with pay six officers involved in Gray’s arrest yesterday.

The unexplained circumstances of Gray’s death and arrest—caught on cellphone video when he appeared possibly injured, but not fatally so—has sparked days of protest in Baltimore.

According to the initial
police report, Gray was stopped because he “fled unprovoked upon noticing police presence” and that officers placed him under arrest. A knife was also found clipped to the inside of his pants pocket, according to police. “The defendant was arrested without force or incident,” the report states. “During transport to Western District via wagon transport the defendant suffered a medical emergency and was immediately transported to Shock Trauma via medic.”

In an interview Wednesday morning with CNN, Rep. Elijah Cummings said that the Baltimore City Police Department requires a “Ferguson-type” study by the Justice Department, adding that the police “. . . do not have a right stay silent.”

“They say it happened without force,” Cummings told CNN. “It’s ridiculous . . . We will have transparency. Who will speak for Freddie Gray? I want to make sure [Gray’s relatives] are treated fairly.”

Members of Maryland’s congressional delegation, including Cummings, U.S. Sens. Barbara Mikulski and Ben Cardin, and Reps. Dutch Ruppersberger and John Sarbanes, had called upon the Department of Justice to open an investigation yesterday in a
letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

“I think folks have been crying for this,” City Councilman Nick Mosby, whose district includes the neighborhood where Gray was arrested, told
The Sun, referring to the federal investigation. Mosby’s wife, Marilyn, is the Baltimore state’s attorney.

Following the announcement by the Justice Department yesterday, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake issued the following statement in support of the decision to open a civil rights probe into Gray’s death:

“From the outset of our investigation, I have repeatedly affirmed my support for an outside review into the death of Mr. Gray. Whenever a police force conducts an internal investigation, there are always appropriate questions of transparency and impartiality. My goal has always been to get answers to the questions so many of us are still asking with regards to Mr. Gray’s death. Any effort that adds additional transparency and builds community trust in this process is welcomed. This outside review will assist us in getting to the bottom of what happened to Mr. Gray in the most objective and transparent way possible.”

The Justice Department’s Community Oriented Policing Services Office was already in the midst of conducting a “collaborative review” of the Baltimore City Police Department at the request last fall by the mayor and the police commissioner Anthony Batts. A
Sun investigation last year detailed $5.7 million in court judgments and settlements involving more than 100 lawsuits alleging Baltimore City police misconduct since 2011.

As protesters chanted “No justice, no peace!” Tuesday evening near his Sandtown-Winchester home, according to reporting by
CNN, Gray’s mother, Gloria Darden, collapsed in tears at the spot where her son was arrested. Demonstrations are planned today in front of the Western District police station where Gray was taken after his arrest.

Demonstrators say they will rally in front of City Hall on Thursday.

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