Chattin’ with the chief

Editor’s Note: The Times recently met with Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey for his insights on crime issues, revamping the police department, and the challenges of his five months on the job. The two-part series will conclude next week.

By William Kenny
Times Staff Writer

Charles H. Ramsey has a dead drug dealer to thank for becoming Philadelphia’s 31st police commissioner.
It’s a far-removed connection, to be fair. But as Ramsey tells it, his long journey from being a young Chicago beat cop to commander-in-chief of the nation’s fourth-largest municipal police force began on a bitterly cold night in January 1973.
As Ramsey sat with his partner outside a West Side apartment building, guarding a murder scene there, the meat wagon showed up.
Ramsey watched as a couple of fellow cops, particularly one 60-something officer, lugged the lifeless 400-pound body down three flights of stairs and across a snow-encrusted street.
Steam billowed from the nostrils, the mouth and the scalp of the veteran cop as he struggled with the load.
"It was like every step, he was just counting the steps to get to that wagon," Ramsey recalled. "And I looked at him and suddenly it just flashed. I said, ‘Man, that can’t be me at sixty.’ That was a reality check. I couldn’t have been more than twenty-two years old, but it just struck me that a day will come when you’re sixty years old and struggling to get a guy off the third floor, you know, carrying a stretcher. I said, ‘No, no, no.’
"They had a sergeant’s exam coming up the next year. So I cracked the books and started studying right away."
Now, with Ramsey two birthdays shy of 60, lugging dead bodies is the least of his worries these days. Rather, stemming Philadelphia’s surge of street violence while revamping a department under fire from both criminals and civil-rights activists is the burden that the former Washington, D.C., police chief must bear.
Perhaps no other period best exemplifies this juggling act than a nine-day stretch starting on May 1.
That day, Ramsey joined Mayor Michael Nutter at a City Hall news conference to announce the appointment of four new deputy police commissioners and the reassignment of dozens of other high-ranking cops, along with major modifications to the department’s command structure.
The event took on a largely positive tone as Ramsey reported that, in less than four months on the job, he had put 248 additional officers on the streets in uniformed patrol and reduced the year-to-date rates of murder and other violent crimes significantly.
Two days later, the slaying of Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski on a Port Richmond street corner by suspected bank robbers dealt the police department and the communities it serves a devastating dose of harsh reality.
On May 5, as authorities continued the multi-state hunt for one of the suspects in Liczbinski’s slaying, a local television news helicopter videotaped the violent arrests of three drive-by shooting suspects by more than a dozen officers on a North Philadelphia street.
In the days that followed, news organizations around the world broadcast the video, which showed the officers apparently kicking, punching and clubbing the suspects, touching off international controversy.
Police captured the final at-large suspect in the Liczbinski killing on May 7. Two days later Ramsey and his department memorialized the slain officer in a Center City funeral Mass and laid him to rest in a Bucks County cemetery.
On May 2, some 20 hours before the Liczbinski shooting, the Northeast Times spent an hour with Ramsey discussing the many challenges facing him as commissioner and his vision for the police department.
The Times will publish a condensed version of the interview in two parts, one today and the other in our June 12 editions. In this week’s segment, Ramsey discusses his reason for taking the job, murders and other problems facing Philadelphia, gun control, reorganizing his department and the "stop-and-frisk" debate.

• • •

Northeast Times: Why did you choose to come to Philadelphia as police commissioner?
Charles Ramsey: I was anxious to get back into policing. I had been out of it for a year. I didn’t realize I would miss it as much as I did, but I did miss it. I had a chance to meet Mayor Nutter. I was very impressed with him. We hit it off right away. I knew that it would be a city that would undergo a transformation and I wanted to be a part of it.
NT: What differences do you see between the job in Philadelphia and your previous assignments?
CR: The biggest difference is the degree of federal presence in D.C. and the complexity of running (the police department) when you have to deal with so many issues, especially post 9/11. Crimefighting-wise, I don’t think there is a unique challenge posed by Philadelphia. I think the challenge is pretty much getting a handle on the violent crime, getting the violent criminals off the street. If there’s anything unique, it’s the amount of guns that you see here and lax gun laws, which is unusual at least with respect to the two jurisdictions where I worked previously. That part of it is different.
NT: What gun laws would you like to see enacted and enforced?
CR: I just think we need reasonable gun laws. We need to have registration of handguns. We need to have a requirement for people to report guns lost or stolen. I think there should be a limit on the amount of guns a person can buy in a month’s period of time. I’m talking about handguns. I think there ought to be a ban on assault-type weapons. Those I don’t think serve any useful purpose if you’re not in the military.
NT: What pressure are you under to lower the murder rate and reduce violent crime quickly?
CR: I don’t know if I’d describe it as pressure. I certainly have a desire to do all I can and I don’t think people should have to wait a year or two years or whatever. But it’s not going to be an overnight solution to the problems. The problems are pretty complex. But I also believe that we can make a significant impact and we’re going to work as hard as we can and let the results speak for themselves at the end of the year. . . . If we could drive the numbers down this year, the question becomes how far we can drive them down next year. We want to keep moving forward.
NT: What do you hope to accomplish with your recent reorganization of the police department’s command structure?
CR: Better workflow. Over a period of time, it seems like the department pretty much just stuck units in different places that made no sense. For an example, one of my deputy commissioners was in charge of internal affairs and gun-control strategies. I had to figure out how those two mixed together, and they don’t. . . . You also want to have a semblance of accountability. Who do you go to if there’s an issue? You want to have a structure where the person has the responsibility and the accountability for results.
NT: How did you decide what people to put in which jobs?
CR: I think that’s probably the most difficult thing, getting a round peg in a round hole. Fortunately, we’ve got talent in the department, so I didn’t feel the need to bring in hordes of people from the outside. But it is a challenge to find people that are suited for certain positions: investigations for example vs. patrol. Some people are good at investigations, maybe not so good in patrol. Some people are good in patrol, maybe not so good in investigations.
NT: What can we infer about the commanders who were moved from one area of the department to another?
CR: I really do believe that if you want to demonstrate your abilities, then you need to be in a district somewhere where I can see what you can do. I think the patrol function is the core function. (That’s) just the opposite of some who think the way to go up in the department is through specialized units. For me, the way to move up is patrol, and I think I showed that with the reorganization in who was chosen to head up a lot of these different positions.
NT: Mayor Nutter has proposed giving police "stop-and-frisk" power in high-crime areas as a method to weed out illegal guns. Critics of stop-and-frisk say it violates civil rights and could lead to a litany of lawsuits against the city. What do you think?
CR: I think it’s a very useful tool. I think the challenge is stopping the right people. You’ve got to know who the thugs are, who the people are who illegally carry guns, who are out there committing robberies, doing shootings and so forth. Those are the ones you want to stop. You don’t want to alienate the decent law-abiding citizens, but you do need to get out there and get those guns. I believe in going after criminals. That’s what you have to do. They cause too much harm to the public. I’m all for programs to try to save folks, but that’s not my primary mission. You know, by the time the 911 call is made, it’s a little late for salvation. ••
Next week, Commissioner Ramsey will offer his views on redrawing police districts, funding the department, combating the "stop snitching" mentality, violence against officers, proposed waterfront casinos and how his anti-crime plan will affect Northeast Philly.
Reporter William Kenny can be reached at 215-354-3031 or bkenny@phillynews.com