In Baltimore’s Northeastern District, relationship was forged between then-Councilman Brandon Scott and police commissioner pick

BALTIMORE -- For several years, Brandon Scott and Richard Worley seemed like a package deal.

Worley, a Baltimore Police major overseeing the Northeastern District, and Scott, then a Democratic city councilman representing the 2nd District, appeared everywhere together during the four years when they overlapped in the area.

When Worley volunteered as a coach for the BmoreKids Flag Football program at Herring Run Park in 2015, Scott was on the sidelines to document the moment for Facebook. And when Scott played in a basketball game between district police and Vanguard Collegiate Middle School students in 2016, Worley donned gym shorts and hit the court.

The men’s styles, too, were in sync, residents and community leaders recalled. While the jobs of councilmen and police district major differ, Scott and Worley had a similar approach: being present in the community, constantly engaging with residents, and cutting through red tape to get things done.

And so earlier this summer when Scott, mayor since 2020, tapped Worley to head the city’s police department, it came as little surprise to Northeast Baltimore residents and community leaders.

“Seeing how they worked together in the Northeast, I’m confident they’ll continue to do things together as a duo,” said Rita Crews, president of the Bel Air Edison Community Association. “They’re like Batman and Robin.”

Asked who was which, she laughed and didn’t answer.

The selection has had some detractors. The June announcement of Worley’s nomination caught many off guard, coming days after Baltimore City Council members questioned whether then-Commissioner Michael Harrison would finish his contract with the city. And, despite Scott’s past support for transparent police commissioner searches with community input, there was no national search for Harrison’s replacement or solicitation of feedback from community leaders before Scott tapped Worley.

Others question whether Worley is the best person for the position. Adiena Britt, who sued the city over a 2015 raid on her home, is one of a group of activists who point to police misconduct or brutality allegations regarding officers overseen by Worley during his stay commanding the Northeastern District from 2012 to 2016.

“My thing is: If he didn’t have any kind of commander control over Northeastern officers, how is he going to handle the whole entire police department?” asked Britt.

But for many in Northeast Baltimore, Worley was a natural pick. During his time in the Northeastern District, Worley left an indelible mark.

“They broke the mold when they created Rich Worley,” said Mike Hilliard, a former Baltimore Police officer who got to know Worley after his time on the force.

Hilliard was a community services director for the Harbel Community Organization in Northeast Baltimore during Worley’s tenure there.

“When he left,” Hilliard said, “future commanders were judged by his performance.”

The City Council has scheduled a confirmation hearing for Worley for Sept. 21. The council has until early October to vote on his nomination.

In recent town hall meetings with residents ahead of that vote, Worley has cast himself as a proponent of community policing and relationships, even as he’s faced sharp questions from Britt and other activists.

Neighborhood leaders like Crews and Hilliard reported Worley was immediately responsive to their calls and emails, something they hadn’t always experienced with previous majors. They also were pleasantly surprised that Worley would call them to seek input or bring up a problem in the neighborhood before they could make contact with him.

“Sometimes he calls you before you finish dialing his number,” said former Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke, a Democrat who served the city’s 14th District and worked with Worley for many years in that role. “That’s a sense of knowing what’s going on in your bones and knowing what has to take priority and how to handle it.”

When they spoke, Worley was always prepared with the latest data, Crews said, and he never shied away from sharing it. Worley talked openly about hot spots for crime, his strategies to tackle them and the deployment of his officers, she said. Worley began sending a weekly email to neighborhood leaders providing updates that many still talk about.

“He didn’t try to hide anything,” Crews said. “He was open with us about, ‘This is what is going on.’”

Worley also made his mark by being present. Whether it was a community cleanup, planting trees or a neighborhood fun day, the major was almost always on hand, Crews said. Worley brought residents into the fold, inviting them to cookouts at the district station as though they were family, she said. And he encouraged his officers to get more involved, clearing the way for them to coach neighborhood sports teams. Worley, a standout high school and college baseball player who briefly had a minor league career, also stepped in to coach.

“The kids would see the officers in a different light,” Crews said. “They didn’t always see them with guns drawn.”

The Baltimore Police Department has pushed Worley’s brand of community policing in recent years as it seeks to comply with a federal consent decree implemented because of the department’s history of unconstitutional policing. The approach requires officers to spend more time in the neighborhoods they patrol, getting to know residents and the goings-on there.

One of Worley’s earliest tests as acting chief — he took the reins of the department in June — has come due to an apparent breakdown of the community policing model. On July 2, the annual Brooklyn Day festival devolved into a melee of gunfire that left two dead and 28 injured.

In the aftermath of one of the largest shootings in the city’s history, police admitted they were unaware of this year’s festival in advance, despite the event’s nearly three-decade history.

Policing experts and city officials have argued a better relationship with community members could have helped the department prepare and offered an opportunity to strengthen ties between residents and police.

Appearing before the City Council in July, Worley acknowledged police failed not only in their efforts to learn of the festival plans, but also by not deploying additional resources once officers learned the event was underway.

“We could have and should have done more,” he told the council.

State Sen. Cory McCray, a representative of the 45th District in Northeast Baltimore and an ally of Worley’s, said the acting chief’s response to the Brooklyn Day shooting displayed leadership.

“Real leaders own up to it when they make a mistake and figure out a path forward,” the Democrat said. “He didn’t throw his men under the bus. He said: ‘Hey, we didn’t know about it. It’s on us. It’s on me.’ When people see that, they start to take ownership also.”

An internal review of the police department’s actions surrounding the Brooklyn Day shooting was released Wednesday. It reveals community policing lapses, including a lack of officer engagement in neighborhoods, insufficient relationships and “indifference” that could have “compromised” the department’s efforts.

Implementing recommended changes will be a test of Worley’s reputation for community policing and whether he can improve its implementation from the commissioner position, which is inherently less hands-on.

Asked at a news conference Wednesday why the Brooklyn Day situation was not “disqualifying” for Worley, Scott argued Worley was not to blame, being only “a few days in.” Scott also pointed to Worley’s record, saying there are “no misconduct allegations, there is no inability for him to lead this department. There is none of that.”

Leaders who worked with Worley in the Northeastern District were confident his skillset could be translated to the rank and file.

“He lives this stuff and loves it,” Clarke said. “It’s not just a ride through ... it’s really getting to know people enough that you have a sense of that community and what’s urgent and what’s going on. You’re already working on the biggest problems and know their status. That’s what needs to happen.”

Others, however, have used their personal experiences to raise questions about how Worley would weed out “bad” police officers, given incidents he oversaw in the Northeastern.

In town halls, Worley has emphasized the police department’s Internal Affairs unit handles investigations and that he couldn’t act unilaterally as commander. Britt and others call that “deflection.”

In her 2016 lawsuit against Baltimore, Britt said she emailed Worley about potential criminal behavior at a neighbor’s home in May 2015, but officers raided her home instead. The lawsuit accused Worley of providing misinformation or failing to accurately provide information to a detective who swore out a search warrant for Britt’s home.

Worley was later dismissed as a defendant, prior to the suit’s settlement in 2018 for $15,000.

That experience pushed Britt into activism, and ultimately connected her to Tawanda Jones, whose brother, Tyrone West, died in 2013 following a traffic stop and ensuing struggle with police who were part of Worley’s command. West’s family has said officers beat him to death; police say West fought. The medical examiner’s office ruled he died of a heart condition.

Jones rallied weekly for justice for her brother and against police brutality in the years since. She argues that Worley, who responded to the scene of her brother’s death, “regurgitates” the police narrative of the event and, she believes, didn’t properly discipline the officers responsible for her brother’s death.

“If you’re a commander, you’re in charge,” Jones said. “You can’t handle that, do you deserve to be top cop and handle everything? You couldn’t even handle a small test.”

Worley’s supporters in Northeast Baltimore, however, are numerous and vocal. They argue his reputation earned during his lengthy stay as district major will translate to the more powerful commissioner platform and the relationship he fostered with Scott will be an asset.

“If anyone can turn that agency around, it’s him,” Hilliard said of Worley. “He knows how to build relationship with communities. Now you’ll see him do it at a higher level.”

“The stage is bigger, but the motivation hasn’t changed,” Hilliard said of Scott and Worley. “Both of them want to make Baltimore a better place to live. They have that mutual goal together.”