Minority police group seeks resignation of editor of Boston police-union newsletter

By adamg on Fri, 07/06/2012 - 10:02am

The Globe reports, adds that while the editor himself continues to refrain from public comments, the officer who wrote a column with a joke about Egyptian men having sex with their dead wives "stands behind" everything he's written.

Neighborhoods:

Boston

Free tagging:

Boston Police Department

BPPA

Ad:

Like the job UHub is doing? Consider a contribution. Thanks!

Comments

If James Carnell cannot speak

By Anonymous on Fri, 07/06/2012 - 4:42pm.

If James Carnell cannot speak with respect for BPPA members and the public he serves, or if he cannot speak in a way that sponsors find responsible, he should find a different forum to speak in. His track record pretty clearly indicates he should not be the editor of the BPPA newsletter.

Boston police Sergeant Jose Lozano, vice president of the Massachusetts Association of Minority Law Enforcement Officers, said Thursday that Officer James Carnell should resign as managing editor of Pax Centurion, the newsletter of the Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association, because of statements he and others have made in the paper that have angered many union members.

“All you have to do is go to certain [online] forums . . . and you can tell that members of the BPPA, specifically the minority members, are highly upset,” Lozano said.

Neither Carnell nor union president Thomas J. Nee responded to messages seeking comment on Thursday.

Lozano’s remarks came after several advertisers — including Simmons College, LoJack, and Harpoon Brewery — said last week that they would stop advertising in Pax Centurion following criticism the newsletter received for remarks that appeared recently in its pages.

I support Sgt Jose Lozano, VP of the Mass Assoc of Minority Law Enforcement Officers, request for James Carnell to step down from his post as editor of the BPPA union newsletter.

James Carnell and BPPA President Thomas Nee should deliberate and respond when they've chosen a course of action.

I agree with your comment 100%

By bibliotequetress on Sat, 07/07/2012 - 5:07pm.

I actually read the most recent issue cover to cover. It was painful.

These are people we ALL pay to protect the peace and enforce laws without favoritism, without prejudice. We pay them to investigate crimes using empirical observation and the unbiased search for and uncovering of evidence, and to then, by applying reasoning untainted by irrational hostility towards any part of the citizenry which they are supposed to serve, solve the crime, or determine it to be currently unsolved. No one who reads the hatred and irrational resentment and bigotry spewed from the policemen who contributed to that rag could conclude the writers are capable of carrying out their responsibilities to the Boston community in any competent way.

I have been a union member most of my working life. This is an embarrassment to all of us who unite to seek fair remuneration and treatment from our employers. I have never doubted that my brothers and sisters in the union that are diligent and worthy of every penny paid them, usually much more. The writers in Pax are not able to fulfill their work responsibilities. Furthermore, the whininess, the arrogance and resentment they express towards other working people shows such a lack of empathy or solidarity that they should never trash the name "union" by applying it to themselves again.

WBUR's afternoon talk show

By ilamont on Fri, 07/06/2012 - 6:32pm.

WBUR's afternoon talk show had a discussion about this today. Larry Brown (Boston Minority Police Association) said that when he joined the force in 1977, Pax was even worse -- he said some issues from the years before he joined depicted black people as apes.

He added that even if the editor resigns, it won't change the culture that encouraged and perpetuated these types of views in the official union newspaper for so long.

Time to demand

By anon² on Sun, 07/08/2012 - 2:34pm.

a culture change then.

Boston is considered a very racist city still, and seeing BPD-Pax in this light isn't helping.

People know better than to mix politics with work in the private sector.