Metro Nashville police regularly interfered with internal investigations, selectively followed policy and ran a department on double standards, alleges a 61-page complaint filed with MNPD’s Office of Professional Accountability last week by a retired police lieutenant. Metro released a redacted version of the complaint on Thursday evening.
Complainant Garet Davidson, who ended his career within MNPD’s OPA, describes systemic malfeasance from top MNPD officials, including Chief John Drake and Deputy Chiefs Mike Hagar and Chris Gilder. Davidson’s allegations read like a retrospective from more than a decade within the department. Specific incidents span mistreatment and physical harm toward female employees, rank bias in internal investigations, and Gilder receiving an award for helping pass legislation that gutted the Metro Nashville Community Oversight Board (COB).
The 61-page complaint, so far unavailable to the public, corroborates CRB suspicions of systemic malfeasance within the Metro Nashville Police Department
Davidson further alleges that the police department has repeatedly lied about reform, specifically in response to recommendations from a 2020 Policing Policy Commission under then-Mayor John Cooper.Â
“The department’s effort and DC Gilder’s work to change COB law undoes efforts made to create transparency and build trust with Nashvillians,” Davidson’s complaint reads. “It upends progress in creating a culture of accountability with the public, eliminates a specific mechanism of this, and further enables the department to insulate its own culture of how accountability is performed or not performed.”
The breadth of Davidson’s complaint presents conflicts of interest with respect to a follow-up investigation by MNPD, OPA, the Community Review Board (formerly COB) or the mayor’s office. Mayor Freddie O’Connell released a statement Friday morning indicating that the city will enlist former U.S. Attorney Edward Stanton III to look into Davidson’s allegations.
“Recognizing that these are allegations, which are unproven at this time, I, Chief of Police John Drake, Civilian Review Board director Jill Fitcheard, and the Department of Law Director Wally Dietz all have a strong interest in ensuring the integrity of the investigation,” O’Connell’s statement reads, in part. “I have insisted that our process be above reproach. Mr. Stanton will have access to resources from Metro Legal, MNPD, Human Resources, the CRB, and anything else needed to conduct a thorough investigation.”
To comply with new state law, current COB staff will all be laid off — but Mayor O’Connell says city is working to transition all to new review committee
The CRB held a special meeting Tuesday to discuss the complaint. At the meeting, the body endorsed an independent investigation vetting Davidson’s claims. Gov. Bill Lee previously hired Stanton to look into Tennessee’s lethal injection protocol after the state repeatedly botched executions.
Much of the complaint focuses on efforts by MNPD to avoid, diminish or otherwise control external accountability for police officers. Internal investigations inconsistently applied department policy, Davidson writes, and exhibited bias for higher-ranking officers facing disciplinary matters, which he terms “cherry-picking winners and losers” among police ranks. Davidson names several officers whose cases support this pattern.Â
“The department continues to cherry pick cases and delay them from going to a departmental hearing for reasons outside of policy and procedure,” Davidson writes. “In my estimation, these are violations of employees’ due process rights.”
Following the allegations, Chief Drake released a statement reading, in part:
The police department has been reviewing and will investigate the complaint submitted by Mr. Davidson on May 22. As this occurs, we will look at whether our administrative processes for internal investigation and discipline need any refinement. A periodic review of practices and procedures in a large police department such as ours is healthy for the organization.
Mr. Davidson did not bring any complaint to me, or, I am told, the Director of the Office of Professional Accountability, prior to his resignation becoming effective on January 5, 2024.
