Boston’s police commissioner says he isn’t sure he would want his children to become police officers
In the wake of recent attacks targeting police officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge, Boston Police Commissioner William Evans isn’t sure he would want his children to follow his career path.
“Eight cops have been killed over the last 10 days, and it’s making our job harder,” Evans said Monday in an interview with WGBH’s Boston Public Radio.
“Who is going to want to come on this job now?” he said. “I have three children; I don’t think I would want them to come on this job, given the animosity out there right now.”
Evans said he emphasizes to his officers to stay safe while directing them to “continue to go out there” and do their job.
The remarks came after a former Marine ambushed and killed three police officers Sunday in Baton Rouge and an Army veteran fatally shot five officers July 8 in Dallas. Both shooters were said to be explicitly targeting law enforcement. The killings followed a week in which two black men were fatally shot by police in Minnesota and Baton Rouge.
Evans said Monday that certain groups had responded by driving an “anti-cop dialogue.”
“We continually hear from the ACLU, groups that have always been, no matter what we do, they’re anti-police,” he said, when pressed on which group he was alluding to. “That can be really harmful.”
Referring to a peaceful protest against police brutality last week in Boston, Evans said that the demonstrators were “out there for the right reason,” but that “the dialogue has to be toned down.” Boston police escorted the demonstrators during the four-hour march and no arrests were reported.
Evans specifically mentioned footage of demonstrators chanting “What do we want? Dead cops!” that has been falsely attributed to a recent Black Lives Matter protest in Baton Rouge. The video reportedly originated from a secluded group of people during a 2014 protest in New York. WGBH host Jim Braude noted that such chants have been “few and far between.”
Regardless, Evans said people needed to “come together, as opposed to being drawn apart” to solve the issues they were facing. To address race relations, the police commissioner said they teach officers about “unconscious bias” and have been working with neighborhoods to bring down crime rates.
A poll released Friday by MassINC Polling Group found that 73 percent of residents view Boston police favorably.
However, the poll also found a racial divide: 82 percent of white residents in Boston viewed the police favorably, compared to a 65-percent positive view among black residents. Additionally, 32 percent of black residents and 15 percent of white residents said they do not believe Boston police treat minorities fairly.
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