← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · il ragno
Thread ID: 6964 | Posts: 3 | Started: 2003-05-28
2003-05-28 05:35 | User Profile
Get ready, y'all. This story might smack of Man Bites Dog but it's the first step on a short trip to Tank Crushes Girl.
Charleston Post and Courier Charlestown, South Carolina --
[SIZE=3][font=Times]Greenberg shrugs off outbursts; others still steam [/font][/SIZE]
For more than 20 years, Reuben Greenberg has drawn a bead on criminals in the city of Charleston. Now the "finest police chief in America" is the one under fire
Phillip Caston ([Charleston Post and Courier)
25 May 03
Charleston Police Chief Reuben Greenberg, shown during an interview with The Post and Courier, has drawn sharp criticism for recent confrontations in which he used insults and profanity.
Greenberg has drawn sharp criticism for two incidents in as many months: a confrontation with an antiwar protester at Marion Square and a heated, profanity-laced interview with a News 4 reporter. His supporters have rallied to his side, touting Greenberg's crime-fighting record.
Some call him a law enforcement genius. One City Council member says he's out of control.
Greenberg's first problem stemmed from a March 20 confrontation during a silent protest at Marion Square as the war with Iraq loomed. The chief approached the leader of the protest, Merrill Chapman, 36, of Mount Pleasant.
"So you're the crazy fat lady everyone's talking about," Greenberg said, according to Chapman.
Chapman attempted to introduce herself and shake his hand, but she said Greenberg refused. Chapman offered to meet with Greenberg the next day, but she said Greenberg told her he didn't meet with "people like her."
"You're proof that fat people aren't only at McDonald's," she said Greenberg told her. Greenberg also told her he had the courage to say to her face what others said behind her back, Chapman said.
The chief said he called her the fat lady because he did not know her name.
"I was wrong. She's not fat. She's obese. She's grossly obese," Greenberg said in an interview last week. "If she doesn't like that, she can do something about it, like the Atkins diet that I was on."
Told of Greenberg's elaboration on his March remarks, Chapman said: "The size of my waist is irrelevant ... It was absolutely uncalled for."
"I'm a Texan and I support fellow Texan George W. Bush 100 percent," said Greenberg, a man who holds a cigarette lighter that plays "Dixie" to the telephone when he's speaking to someone he thinks is liberal. "We have a lot of reserve officers over there, and they were not over there to kill Iraqi babies."
"It was obvious he was trying to interject a problem into a peaceful situation," said Chapman, adding that Greenberg danced around her mockingly. "What was I supposed to do, call 911 for help?"
"She was attacking the fine American boys who were going over to defend our interests in Iraq," Greenberg said. "She had no right to do that."
The second time Greenberg lost his cool came April 11 during an interview with News 4 reporter Nick Salvucci. Salvucci asked the chief about two City Council members' opposition to Greenberg's decision to allow West Ashley residents protesting an adult video store to use a police bus to drive to Anderson for a court hearing. During the interview, Greenberg swore on camera twice while referring to two City Council members, once slapping his hand on the conference table and shouting, "F--- 'em!"
He later cornered Salvucci and poked the reporter's chest 14 times with his right index finger while questioning his intelligence.
These two events outraged City Councilman Bob George.
"He was wound up as tight as a damn clock spring," George said. "He sprang on that reporter like a tiger. In all senses, he committed battery against the reporter."
"It was not a display of self-control," Salvucci said, adding that he felt Greenberg's behavior crossed the line.
Greenberg said he was angry because he didn't want to be interviewed, he was hungry and he had somewhere else to be. He did say Salvucci was not the one toward whom he should have directed his anger.
"It was probably easier to be very much upset with a surrogate like Mr. Salvucci than to be upset at the person who was really behind the whole thing," Greenberg said. "I did learn that you don't talk to reporters when you're in a hurry."
George was one of the two council members toward whom Greenberg directed his profanity; the other was not identified.
"Publicly I think he's starting to lose it," George said. "It's grounds to wonder what's going to happen next. He was totally out of control. He was sweating like a horse that has run a mile in a furlong."
Another council member came to the police chief's defense.
"Greenberg has a history of a temper. So what?" said Councilman Larry Shirley. "A lot of people have tempers. Maybe he had a bad day."
Shirley did liken Greenberg to the late Ohio State coaching legend Woody Hayes, whose career ended when he punched Clemson nose guard Charlie Bauman during the 1978 Gator Bowl after Bauman's interception sealed Clemson's victory.
"If it gets to that point again, maybe he (Greenberg) needs to take up golf or take up fishing," Shirley said. "Arrogance does not belong in a police department."
WHO IS REUBEN GREENBERG?
Standing firmly behind the chief despite his actions is the man who brought him to Charleston.
"We have, in my opinion, the finest police chief in America," said Mayor Joseph P. Riley Jr.
When Riley had to find a new police chief in 1982, he wanted to make Charleston a safe paradise for tourists and residents. He looked to Greenberg, a man with extensive law enforcement experience in San Francisco, Savannah and several Florida locales.
On April 12, 1982, Greenberg arrived in Charleston, a city with a large crime problem, Riley said. Greenberg's response was swift. Within seven years, Charleston's crime had dropped 38 percent.
"This was a typical deep South police department back then," Greenberg said. "We got rid of the old, pot-bellied cops walking the street."
Everyone who now works at the Charleston Police Department has a college degree, where before many hadn't graduated from high school, Greenberg said.
Changes Greenberg made in Charleston law enforcement included increasing foot patrols on city streets; improving police relations with the community by linking law enforcement to neighborhood watch programs; and setting higher standards for officers on the job, both in physical and professional performance. He ordered his officers to confront convicted felons on the street to ensure they weren't up to something.
Since Greenberg's arrival, the Charleston Police Department has added a K-9 bomb and drug-sniffing unit, a harbor patrol and a crime lab.
"He made the city safer, and he made people here feel safer," Riley said. "You can't put a price tag on that."
Greenberg hasn't just fought crime from the comfort of an air-conditioned office.
"Whenever there was a robbery or something else of the sort during his first few years, Chief Greenberg was oftentimes the first one to respond to the scene," Riley said.
Charleston police never allowed gangs to form in the area under Greenberg's leadership, something other cities can't boast, the chief said.
A team of officers remove graffiti the moment it appears in Charleston, sending a message that the city belongs to the police, not the vandals, he said.
The chief is known for patrolling the streets and conducting traffic stops, just as the officers he commands do. Charleston residents have lauded him for stopping to assist them when their vehicles break down, with the chief identifying himself as merely "with the police department."
"I enjoy helping people who need to be helped," Greenberg said. "I try to assist them before some bad guy comes along."
Riley recalled an incident in 1987 when the Ku Klux Klan held a march in downtown Charleston. Standing at the forefront of the march, Riley said, was Greenberg, ensuring the marchers' safety. That incident is evidence that Chapman's safety was never in danger, Greenberg said.
Greenberg became renowned for his colorful, no-nonsense, take-no-prisoners style of crime fighting. During Hurricane Hugo in 1989, he told his officers regarding looters: "Don't arrest anybody. Beat 'em. We have nowhere to put them."
"I'm not a politician. I'm not worried about getting elected to anything," Greenberg said.
Greenberg has his critics. Recently, Councilman James Lewis Jr. publicly faulted the Charleston Police Department for failing to clean up presidential areas in his district. Lewis cited three shootings in the past month in broad daylight, all within a block of each other in Lewis' district. One of the shootings was fatal.
Riley said police do patrol that area and that he, Lewis and Greenberg met recently to discuss police presence in the neighborhood.
Though praising Greenberg's achievements, Lewis said he and the rest of council sometimes are frustrated by the chief.
"I could give him suggestions, but he won't listen. He gets defensive and thinks you're trying to tell him how to do his job," Lewis said. "He doesn't listen to council members, and that upsets us sometimes."
Greenberg responded sharply. "Nobody on the council knows how to fight crime. They have no experience and no training, academic or otherwise. I don't give a damn about what they say. They're not my bosses."
Some residents have spoken out against drug dealing in neighborhoods without police presence, and some say Charleston police spend too many resources pursuing teenagers in Marion Square.
By 1999, the number of crimes was almost as high as the 1982 total, according to the FBI, down less than 1 percent from Greenberg's first year as police chief. Because of Charleston's increase in population since then, however, the actual crime rate has dropped. In 1999, there were 78 crimes per 1,000 residents; in 1982 there were 100 crimes per 1,000 residents.
Law enforcement officials across the country and outside the United States consider Greenberg an expert. He teaches once every two months at the International Law Enforcement Academy in Budapest, Hungary. According to Riley, Chicago, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles pursued Greenberg to head up their police departments.
The Mobile Ala., police department hired Greenberg temporarily for five months in 1990 as the public safety director to help clean up that Gulf Coast city.
Riley said the closest Charleston ever came to losing Greenberg was when Washington offered him the top police job. Greenberg seriously considered the job because his sense of patriotism made him want to fight crime in the nation's capital, Riley said.
Greenberg shied away from the offer because he didn't feel he would have the authority and budgetary support he had in Charleston -- and the same appreciation for the community, the mayor said.
"He's here and not in a bigger city with a bigger paycheck because of the community," Riley said.
"Charleston is a good place to live," Greenberg said. "Why leave here to go someplace not as good?"
THE AFTERMATH
Greenberg went to the News 4 station to apologize to Salvucci shortly after the incident.
"I'm not proud of the situation," Greenberg said. "It was not my finest hour. But it sure did relieve a lot of stress."
"He apologized for his actions," City Councilman Wendell Gilliard, one of Greenberg's many council supporters, said of the News 4 interview. "It takes a big man to apologize."
George, who hasn't heard an apology from the chief, said he has never exchanged more than 25 words with him.
"I don't care if he contacts me. I have no reason to contact him, nor do I want to," George said.
Chapman has not received what she says is a deserved apology from Greenberg.
Riley said he did not consider taking any action against Greenberg for either incident.
George said the mayor is turning a blind eye to Greenberg's unprofessional antics. He said Greenberg should have been given at least a public reprimand and possibly two weeks of administrative leave.
"I have been punished," Greenberg said. "By my wife. That's some of the worst punishment I could get."
Greenberg said he wouldn't have punished any of his officers had they reacted similarly, nor would he have blamed them for their behavior. He passes off both incidents as unimportant.
Crime fighting Greenberg-style may not rub everyone in Charleston the right way. But if it puts the bad guys behind bars, Greenberg just doesn't care.
"If I wanted to be nice and get everybody to like me," he said, "I would have joined the fire department."--
2003-05-28 05:42 | User Profile
I remember reading about the "finest chief in the country" in the past. Take a look:
[img]http://www.charleston-pd.org/award8.jpg[/img]
I think that his protective coloring has helped him many a time. It's like ... Whoopie Goldberg, all over again.
[url=http://www.charleston-pd.org/]http://www.charleston-pd.org/[/url]
2003-05-28 05:59 | User Profile
[SIZE=3]Good GAWDAMIGHTY!![/SIZE]
That's Reuben Greenberg?!?
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the prototype New Melting Pot American. (Forward my mail henceforth to Costa Rica.)