Former Anne Arundel Police Chief Heads Embattled Baltimore PD

Former Anne Arundel County Police Chief Kevin Davis is now at the head of the embattled Baltimore Police Department after Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake released Police Commissioner Anthony Batts.

Davis, Baltimore’s deputy police commissioner, will serve as the city’s interim police commissioner as the department tries to quell violence that has surged in the city.

“As we have seen in recent weeks, too many continue to die on our streets, including three just last night and one lost earlier today,” Rawlings-Blake said at a press conference Wednesday afternoon. ”Families are tired of feeling this pain and so am I.”

There have been more than 150 homicides so far in 2015, compared with fewer than 100 at the end of June 2014, according to Baltimore Police data.

Related: Three Killed Near University of Maryland Baltimore

Time in Anne Arundel County

Davis – hired two years ago to reform an Anne Arundel department whose previous two chiefs departed with questions surrounding their conduct – resigned Dec. 1, 2014. He said when he announced his resignation that County Executive Steve Schuh, elected Nov. 4, wante his administration to head in a different direction

“As a resident of this county, I wish the new administration and police chief nothing but the best in the years to come,” Davis said.

Brought in to help stabilize a police department rocked by allegations its two previous chiefs had known of, but ignored, misconduct by former County Executive John Leopold, Davis was hired in July 2013, reports the Capital-Gazette.

Former Chief Larry Tolliver used a gay slur and was accused of retaliating against officers who testified against Leopold during that executive’s misconduct trial, the newspaper reports. Among other charges, Leopold directed on-duty police officers to do his campaign work like distribute signs and collect donations.

Tolliver was appointed by Leopold after former police Chief James Teare Sr. retired in July of 2012, according to the Capital-Gazette. Teare retired after the state prosecutor’s office ended a criminal probe into his actions. He was accused in Leopold’s indictment of knowing about Leopold’s misconduct and taking “no effective action.”

Baltimore PD Union Comments

Rawlings-Blake said that debating leadership of the department was taking away from efforts to battle crime, and “we cannot continue to have the level of violence” that has been plaguing the city since the April riots.

The announcement came hours after the Baltimore Fraternal Order of Police Lodge #3 released a 32-page analysis of the police department’s response to the April 27 riots, where more than 200 officers were injured.

Batts served the city for nearly three years, after the mayor brought him on board in 2012. Batts said he had been through five riots during his career and knew the riots in Baltimore were coming, according to the police union’s report released Wednesday.

“With all this ‘experience’ and beforehand knowledge at Commissioner Batts’ disposal, he still led us officers to slaughter,” one officer said during a section of the report that offered firsthand accounts from police on the ground.

“I had never in my 14-year career been as afraid as I was at that moment,” said another officer, who was at the Mondawmin Mall uprising. “I was struck with a piece of concrete that I did not see coming. The blow buckled me to my knees.”

»Photo of Kevin Davis from his tenure with the Anne Arundel County Police Department