Fenty gives police power to deputize citizens
By: Bill Myers
Examiner Staff Writer
March 17, 2009
D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty has given Police Chief Cathy Lanier sweeping new authority to appoint ordinary citizens as “volunteer” police officers, The Examiner has learned.
Under an order signed by Fenty, Lanier and “her subordinate officials” are allowed to appoint “special privates” during an “emergency.”
The unpaid citizen-cops “shall possess all the powers and privileges and perform all the duties of the privates of the standing police force of the District,” the order states.
The mayor signed the order Jan. 16, and it took effect immediately. It wasn’t posted on the city’s Web site until earlier this month.
D.C. Attorney General Peter Nickles told The Examiner that the order was necessary to deal with the hundreds of out-of-town cops brought in for President Barack Obama’s inauguration. They were all given police powers, Nickles said.
Lanier hasn’t used her new authority since the inaugural, Nickles added.
So why hasn’t the order been rescinded?
“That’s a good question,” he said. “I’ll have to think about that.”
D.C. has the third-largest police department in the country. Lanier and Fenty have tried to expand its authority several times. Last year, the department armed itself with AR-15 assault rifles. Then Lanier set up checkpoints in the violent Trinidad neighborhood. Late last year, Fenty gave Lanier the power to issue subpoenas “in any municipal matter.”
Fenty later withdrew the subpoena power from Lanier but now wants to give it to Nickles.
Police union Chairman Kris Baumann said he was concerned that the police department, despite its expanding budget, was driving out good cops with its onerous discipline and penny-pinching management.
“People don’t want to be here,” he said. “It would take so little for us to be competitive.”
