At a press conference, Cambridge Police Commissioner Robert Haas issues a statement saying that when Sgt. James Crowley arrested Professor Henry Louis Gates in his own home, he “acted in a way that is consistent with his training… I do not believe his actions in any way were racially motivated.” Haas adds that he does not consider Crowley “a rogue cop,” as Gates dubbed him.
When asked to respond to President Obama’s criticism of the arrest the night before during a primetime news conference, Haas said: “This department is deeply pained” and “taking this seriously.”
Police union condemns Obama’s comments
The Hill
President Obama’s Wednesday night criticism of Cambridge, Mass., police has drawn a rebuke from the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP).
The criticism comes after Obama said Cambridge police officers acted “stupidly” when they arrested Henry Louis Gates, a friend of the president’s, after he broke into his own home. Gates was arrested on disorderly conduct charges, which were then dropped. The president said it highlights ongoing problems with race relations in the U.S.
Jim Pasco, executive director of the FOP’s legislative office, noted that before Obama made the remarks, the president acknowledged that he was only vaguely familiar with what happened.
“That being the case, it’s unfortunate that he chose to say anything,” Pasco said. “He wasn’t there, and he doesn’t know what happened.”
Pasco said it appears that Gates was the “provocateur” because he called Officer James Crowley a racist instead of producing identification as requested.
On Thursday, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs sought to walk back the president’s comments.
“Let me be clear. He was not calling the officer stupid, OK?” Gibbs told reporters on Air Force One. “He was denoting that … at a certain point the situation got far out of hand, and I think all sides understand that.”
Gates Arresting Officer: Obama ‘Way Off Base’
Boston Area News
The white police sergeant who arrested black Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. said Thursday President Barack Obama was “way off base” claiming Cambridge officers acted “stupidly” during the incident.
Sgt. James Crowley, who is a police academy expert on racial profiling, responded to Gates’ home near Harvard University last week to investigate a report of a burglary and demanded Gates show him identification. Police say Gates at first refused and accused the officer of racism.
Gates was charged with disorderly conduct. The charge was dropped Tuesday, and Gates has since demanded an apology from Crowley.
“I acted appropriately,” Crowley told WBZ Radio’s Carl Stevens Thursday.
“Mister Gates was given plenty of opportunities to stop what he was doing. He didn’t. He acted very irrational he controlled the outcome of that event.”
“There was a lot of yelling, there was references to my mother, something you wouldn’t expect from anybody that should be grateful that you were there investigating a report of a crime in progress, let alone a Harvard University professor.”
According to the police report, Crowley asked Gates to talk outside, to which he responded “Yeah, I’ll speak with your mama outside.”
Obama was asked about the arrest of Gates, who is his friend, at the end of a nationally televised news conference on health care Wednesday night.
“I think it’s fair to say, number one, any of us would be pretty angry,” Obama said. “Number two, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home. And number three — what I think we know separate and apart from this incident — is that there is a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately, and that’s just a fact.”
Crowley maintained he had done nothing wrong in arresting Gates.
“I think he’s way off base wading into a local issue without knowing all the facts, as he himself stated before he made that comment. I don’t know what to say about that. I guess a friend of mine would support my position, too.”
Crowley has taught a class on racial profiling for five years at Lowell Police Academy. In the class, he teaches officers about different situations and how officers should handle them.
Gates has said he was “outraged” by the arrest.
He said the white officer walked into his home without his permission and only arrested him as the professor followed him to the porch, repeatedly demanding the sergeant’s name and badge number because he was unhappy over his treatment.
“This isn’t about me; this is about the vulnerability of black men in America,” Gates said.
He said the incident made him realize how vulnerable poor people and minorities are “to capricious forces like a rogue policeman, and this man clearly was a rogue policeman.”
So what does Crowley think about Gates’ claim that he’s a racist?
“It almost doesn’t even warrant a comment it’s so ridiculous. My friends, my family, my colleagues, those people (whose) opinions mean the most to me, they know who I am. They know what I am and what I am not.”
“It’s an unfortunate thing that the professor or other people have even mentioned that.”
The Cambridge cop prominent Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. claims is a racist gave a dying Reggie Lewis mouth-to-mouth resuscitation in a desperate bid to save the Celtics team stats superstar’s life 16 years ago Monday.
“I wasn’t working on Reggie Lewis the basketball star. I wasn’t working on a black man. I was working on another human being,” Sgt. James Crowley, in an exclusive interview with the Herald, said of the forward’s fatal heart attack July 27, 1993, at age 27 during an off-season practice at Brandeis University, where Crowley was a campus police officer.
Obama Remark on Black Scholar’s Arrest Angers Cops Nationwide
BOSTON
FOX News
Many police officers across the country have a message for President Barack Obama: Get all the facts before criticizing one of our own.
It could even set back the progress in race relations that helped Obama become the nation’s first African-American president, they said.
“What we don’t need is public safety officials across the country second-guessing themselves,” said David Holway, president of the International Brotherhood of Police Officers, which represents 15,000 public safety officials around the country. “The president’s alienated public safety officers across the country with his comments.”
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Wild Thing’s comment…….
Police have to die protecting Obama but he doesn’t give a hoot about them. He may have left Rev. Wright’s church but he brought it with him to the White House. Because Obama IS a what Wright teaches.
He has nothing inside of him to tell him about being a responsible person when he speaks. He just says whatever he feels like and he thinks it is ok.
“There is a class of colored people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs, and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs-partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.” ~~Booker T. Washington (1856-1915.)
Apparently, this professor is a good friend of ‘Bamas. The man did wrong by not showing his ID and by being beliggerrant toward the police. This officer in charge is also in charge of race relations at the station. How much you want to bet ‘Bama pressures his boss to remove him from the post and put one of his black brudders in that post?
This should make clear to anyone who doubted what we have been saying all along. Obama’s a racist. He proved that the other night. He knew none of the facts, but continued to call the actions of the police Stupid. He also proved he was wide awake when attending Wright’s Church and that his presidency is all about race and how he is going to level the playing field and the destruction of the country is part of his plan.
Then Gibbs was backpeddling for Damage Control.
“Let me be clear. He was not calling the officer stupid, OK? He was denoting that … at a certain point the situation got far out of hand, and I think all sides understand that.”
So as far as Gibbs is concerned being called Stupid or acting Stupidly, is a complement. To say the situation got out of hand implies the Police were part of the problem.
Neighbors have backed up the Cops statements and said Gibbs was belligerent to the Police.
Gibbs like obama, claim “its not about me…but all black men” and in obma’s case about the Health Care for the Poor Blacks. We all know what this is really about, you have two prominent Blacks who are racists, and there sole purpose is get reparations but obama says reparations don’t go far enough. So after a half a million dead when is the debt paid. It never will be as long as people like Gibbs and Obama have any power at all.
Nice work Barack… with one comment you managed to alienate 75% of America.
And anyone who has spent any amount of time in the “higher” education system knows the Professor Gates type: bitter, spiteful, bigoted racist with a position of power who felt emboldened to make a political statement.
This is the type of Professor who would change the subject on you when you attempt to engage in a debate- or would give you a poor grade because you actually have an opinion, and done research outside of marxist texts and such. You are fooling no one, Mr Gates.
And Mr President, is this “nuance” you’ve spoke of? “the police acted stupidly”? -please
Obama is out to rip this country to shreds in EVERY way- who can question that such ill-advised statements are divisive… and NOT helpful? He has no idea what happened, he admitted it- and apparently doesn’t care, either… he’s picked his side.
But back in reality, the childish and paranoid Gates completely baited the cop, who acted with admirable restraint, IMO… all he had to do is show his ID and shut up, he was treated with respect. This guy was clearly looking for a fight… and he ought to thank God he didn’t find one.
Obama is going to destroy race relations in this country with his vengeful “get even” mentality… some messiah- Americans should have chosen a fair and sensible human being instead of this embittered nut.
http://reaganiterepublicanresistance.blogspot.com
Racism will always be kept alive by the segment of society who uses it for personal gain….
My wife’s home farm is in Franklin County, Virginia, a few miles from The Booker T. Washington National Monument. Everyone should get a chance to visit it. In my opinion he was one of the greatest Americans. Born in an old slave cabin he rose by hard work straight up to greatness. His book, Up From Slavery, is surely one of America’s classics of literature. I’ll bet Hussein O. never read it.
The Jesse Jacksons and Al Sharptons have never had any use for Booker T. Of course they never worked a day in their lives and the idea of a black man working his way through college ironing the shirts of white boy surely rubs them the wrong way.
My future 3’x6′ home is a few miles from Booker T.’s birthplace, in incredibly beautiful Blue Ridge Mountain country. With a fool like Hussein in power the prospect of being planted there seems very appealing.
Since Obama has singlehandedly set back race relationships to pre 1960 levels anything I have to say would be considered racist at best. What’s He Building?!!!
Racism? Naw, pissing-off the cop. (Look how fast the charges got dropped, probably first thing in the morning because there’s no way busting someone for expressiing their opinion, however dumb, without breaking a noise ordinance, on their own property is going to hold up in court.) Race had nothing to do with it. He got busted on G.P. (essentially for not behaving like a grown adult, which unfortunately too many leftist academics aren’t) which is likely how the Cambridge police handle equally-dumbass drunk college students… the modern equivalent of the drunk tank. It’s not the Cambridge PD who should apologize.
Lynn, yes your right,
If Obama had any leadership
qualities in him at all he would stop this
insanity of race baiting all the time. He
just keeps doing it all the time and I am
sick of it.
Mark, thank you for all of that. I agree,
that is what this is about.
Reaganite Republican, thanks for that
about the professor Gates.
RG, it is so sad I think.
I never knew there was so much
hate for whites still existing in our
country until Obama ran for president.
It really shocked me.
Horace, good point, I bet Obama
never read it either. He seems to only
want things that are filled with hate.
Jack, OMG that is so scary.
Anonymous, I agree,
“It’s not the Cambridge PD who should apologize”