The members of the Baltimore City Police Department?s union say they?re disturbed by Police Commissioner Leonard Hamm?s recent support of a proposed ban on Maryland?s death penalty.
In a letter sent to Hamm andother officials, homicide detective Robert Cherry criticized Hamm, saying his support of bill means he is putting “politics above leadership.”
The bill Hamm supported did not allow for a judge to sentence a convicted murderer to death, even if that murderer killed a police officer, wrote Cherry, vice president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge No. 3.
Read more on the death-penalty ban
“Our issue is with Police Commissioner Hamm is that he put politics above leadership at a time when the City of Baltimore has 58 homicides and only two months ago buried another police officer who was gunned down on these violent streets because he was doing his job,” he wrote in the March 15 letter.
Cherry also took issue with Hamm?s failure to ask union members for their opinion before supporting the bill.
“It is a sign of the tough times we face as police officers when the top cop in Baltimore City fails to contact the bargaining unit of the men and women he leads to ascertain their position on a bill that has obvious implications for every police officer who goes out on the streets of Baltimore City, day and night, and puts their lives on the line to protect the citizens of this City and State,” Cherry said.
In the letter, Cherry said city police spokesman Matt Jablow told him that Hamm supports a repeal of the death penalty but would have supported amendments to keep the death penalty on the books for criminals who kill police officers. Jablow was not immediately available for comment.
Cherry wrote that Hamm should have duplicated the actions of Baltimore City State?s Attorney Patricia Jessamy, who took no position on the ban.
The Maryland State Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee killed thedeath penalty ban with a 5-5 vote March 15, when Cherry?s letter was written.
Maryland?s highest court ruled in December that the state?s current lethal injection process must be halted temporarily because it was not adopted properly.
