Racist Texts Shake Charlotte Police, Arrests Face Review
The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department (CMPD) is facing a racism scandal after an investigation into misuse of its Flock license-plate-reader camera system uncovered racist text messages exchanged among officers, The Guardian, Fox television stations and other outlets reported. Police Chief Estella Patterson called the messages "deeply troubling" at a news conference on Thursday, Oct. 15, and announced a sweeping review of the officers' work.
According to Charlotte outlets WBTV and WSOC, the messages included use of the N-word and officers competing over who could pull over the most Black drivers. One message likened the officers to a "clan rally," an apparent reference to Ku Klux Klan gatherings. Patterson said she had not read every message but confirmed the texts, stretching back several years, showed racial, sexual and religious bias. The exact messages have not been released publicly.
CMPD released the officers' names on Monday, Oct. 19, three days after the local NAACP demanded their identities, QCity Metro, Axios and WSOC reported. The seven are Seth Elliott, Mateo Juarez, Joseph Kelly, Alexander Larsen, Tredan Maronic, Matthew Osborn and Jeremiah Todman. Elliott had resigned on Aug. 4; five others resigned between Oct. 11 and Oct. 19. Todman, hired in 2022, remains suspended without pay pending Civil Service Board review.
Patterson said the department immediately audited the officers' body-worn camera footage, traffic stops and stop data, arrest records, and checked for external complaints. As of mid-October, she said, no evidence had been found that the bias expressed in the texts had affected stops or arrests, QCity Metro and the Chicago Defender reported. An independent chain-of-command board unanimously recommended on Oct. 9 that six officers — Juarez, Kelly, Maronic, Osborn, Larsen and Todman — be terminated; Patterson said she concurred, but noted only the Civil Service Board has authority to fire sworn officers.
Mecklenburg County District Attorney Spencer Merriweather is reviewing criminal cases in which any of the officers was involved, even as a witness, to look for signs of improper bias, WSOC and Yahoo reported. Cases that cannot proceed without the officers could be dismissed, he said. The department has also asked the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's Office to review the matter for possible civil rights violations. U.S. Attorney Russ Ferguson cautioned that the burden of proof in civil rights cases is very high, and investigators must determine whether the messages were merely offensive speech or drove official action.
The Rev. Corine Mack, president of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg NAACP, demanded the names be released and is pushing for the officers' North Carolina law enforcement certifications to be revoked so they cannot join another department, Spectrum News reported. CMPD, which polices the country's 14th-largest city, where about a third of residents are Black, says it will pursue decertification. Patterson, a Black woman who began her career in the department, said: "It is especially painful and disheartening to hear concerns from our community about racism coming from within the ranks."