OAKLAND, Calif. (KRON) — Anne Kirkpatrick is no longer the Oakland Police Department’s police chief, according to a KRON4 source.
Oakland city leaders made the announcement late Thursday evening. They said the decision was voted unanimously between Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf and members of the police commission.
“The Oakland Police Commission voted unanimously to join Mayor Schaaf in terminating the chief of police without cause,” Oakland’s Police Commission Chair Regina Jackson said.
Details as to what led to Kirckpatrick’s firing were not disclosed, other than this was a “no cause” termination and a personnel matter.
“There wasn’t enough leadership,” Jackson said. “We need new leadership for Oakland.”
Kirkpatrick joined the force in 2017 becoming the first female police chief in Oakland’s history.
She was selected and appointed by Mayor Libby Schaaf, who said she chose to hire the 34-year law enforcement veteran because she was “the reform-minded leader Oakland is looking for.”
Schaaf said she doesn’t regret hiring Kirkpatrick.
“I do not regret choosing Chief Kirkpatrick,” Schaaf said. “And I believe there are many examples of ways that she served our city extremely well.”
We’re told an assistant police chief will be the interim until they move forward with a new search.
According to Schaaf, the terms of the chief’s contract says under a no fault separation the chief is entitled to a one year salary as severance but that is conditioned on her signing a release of claims.
Jackson said the one year salary is at least $270,000.
When Kirkpatrick was hired, she was tasked with restoring confidence in the agency that was reeling from a sex scandal involving officers and an underage girl and had cycled through three chiefs in the span of nine days.
Before joining the Oakland Police Department, she was leading organizational development inside the Chicago Police Department and was the former police chief in the city of Spokane, Washington.
Kirkpatrick was only in Chicago for six month before taking the job in Oakland.
Oakland had been without a permanent police chief for six months before Schaaf selected Kirkpatrick.
When she was sworn in, Kirkpatrick said she wanted to “transform” the police department so that it develops “a model policing culture for America in every way.”
“I want to see the Oakland Police Department be the Super Bowl of American policing,” she said.
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