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Boston Police learned of Patrick Rose's alleged child molesting in 1995, but he stayed on the force - and worked on child sexual-abuse cases

The Globe updates the story of the former patrolmen's union president now facing child-rape charges.

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We probably don't pay them enough to go after pedo crime. We should pay them more.

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Cops get paid more than enough. The purpose of the job is to serve and protect, therefore they should be going after pedos in the first place. People were aware of what he was doing and they ignored it, they do not deserve any more money because clearly the money they receive isn’t going to anything beneficial. Did you also know that cops in Mass have actually been lying about the hours they’ve been working in order to receive money? They allow themselves to earn money for doing nothing.

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The thin blue line even stretches into a cover up of a rapist cop?? Despicable!!!

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What a world you live in.
A world where the only way a decent human being will intervene to stop a grown man from raping children is if they get paid more.

If that is your idea of humor - a joke at the expense of children whose lives are destroyed, you are sad

If that is your idea of a real excuse, you are a monster.

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[E]ven after the complaint was dropped, [BPD] proceeded with an internal investigation that concluded that he likely committed a crime. Despite that finding, Rose kept his badge, remained on patrol for another 21 years, and rose to power in the union that represents patrol officers.

Cover up.

Boston’s police department has a long history of protecting its own from accountability, particularly if the officer, like Rose, is white, said retired deputy superintendent Willie Bradley, who is Black.

“The police department’s refusal to actually deal with this issue is a direct contributor to what (later) happened,” said Bradley. “It would have been out there and people would have been aware of it, but they hid it.”

How many “unsolved” sexual assaults, on children or adults, have been swept under the rug because of the “thin blue line”? If BPD covered up raping kids, what else are they covering up?

We’ve seen this before—in the Catholic Church, in Scouting, in college athletics—if an organization is hiding one sexual abuser, then chances are they are harboring more than one abuser.

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Are more equal than others

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I'm sure that good cops are disgusted but if I remember back in the day no cops were punished for the Boom Boom room or for shaking down prostitutes in exchange for sex in the city.

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I'm sure that good cops are disgusted

Not disgusted enough to do anything about it. What was that saying about bad apples again?

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good cops

I mean, yeah, in theory they exist.

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Good cops who remained on the force and didn't find another line of work after all the revelations between Mike Brown and George Floyd... are not good cops.

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Was it all a dream when commenters on here posited that BPD would very much not allow a pedophile to hide on the force? I swear pro-cop posters were rolling out some silly idea that the thin blue line would stop at pedophilia. Police leadership views the world very much as a zero sum game and the risk of outside oversight trumps even protecting the public from a potential pedophile.

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If Bradley (like Rose before my time) knew about it. Why the hell didn’t he do something about it? I heard he was forced out (union positions are not active police positions) but the department must known that they didn’t have enough to fire him. Plenty of cops have been fired (even in the 1980s and 90s). Why they hell would they cover for this guy? Especially a union guy?

Still doesn’t add up but the Globe isn’t great at getting people to talk to them either. You won’t get a good in-depth story out of that paper

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but I imagine that the guys who don't get beyond being a patrolman might have some group dislike of the upper levels of the police department and probably have a thicker blue line. More Bud Whites, fewer Edmond Exleys (LA Confidential)

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At least they're trying to figure this out vs. just acting like it was something that didn't happen like BPD is. I'd think it would merit some very deep investigation about the dept. to ensure that other serial criminals aren't in the force.

Globe: What the fuck?
BPD:
Globe: No seriously, how did this happen?
BPD: [Lawyers up]

Pete Nice: Guess the Globe didn't want to write an in-depth story!

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I mean its clear the Globe has gone woke, but you don’t have to be lazy or incompetent while doing it. You couldn’t fine one retired DA, defense attorney, neighbor, cop framed by other cops, etc for this story? There are dozens of cops fired for lesser stuff, find them and ask. Hell they had two comment in the story but didn’t ask what they knew and when? Now it’s easy because the guy has zero power to find some one to rat him out (see Henry Hill etc).

In the end of the BPD has fired and charged dozens of white cops for lesser stuff, why would they cover for this guy? Just dig deeper is what I’m asking. They did pretty deep in the cop down in Rockland who drive drunk, why wouldn’t they get what I would presume to be easy witnesses for this one?

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I’m sure there a ton of ex-cops and ex-prosecutors who are clamoring to go on record and say “I totally knew Rose raped a kid, but I kept it quiet until now”.

I wonder if there is some sort of publicaly funded organization that could do some further “detective” work on this new lead from the Globe and work their own sources?

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They wanted him in jail and fired. Why wouldn’t you go on record and say that?

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Fire him and let him sue for wrongful termination. Let him explain to the court and the press as to why his department is wrong in thinking he raped a kid. I get the “but the powerful union” argument, but that is weakness. Lawsuits exist for a reason.

Furthermore, the fact that it took 25 years to come out and 8 months after his highly publicized arrest indicates that people aren’t rushing talk to the press.

I don’t believe the Globe is above criticism, but between the child molester cop, the bosses from 1995/96 who failed, and all the people who have kept quiet for 25 years, I hardly think “lazy” reporting is one of the top 10 problems with this whole ordeal.

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There would be no court, only a private civil service arbitrator that probably already told the city they couldn’t discipline him in the first place.

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People get false accused and innocent people get perp walked. It’s unfortunate, but it’s part of the justice system as you are aware.

To say that “the bosses did all that they could, oppressive civil service laws and powerful unions prevented the service of justice” betrays a lack of imagination and critical problem solving skills.

There is an observable pattern of powerful institutions and organizations covering up sex abuse—maybe to protect “one of their own”, maybe because the bosses are cowards and they want to punt the problem to the next generation of managers. And if there is one thing that the Catholic abuse scandal and others have taught us, it’s that those in charge certainly did not do everything they could have to punish the rapists and stop further abuse.

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But they’ve fired and charged others for the same thing when they could going back to the 1980s. That’s the difference here. Is there something about this guy that they were trying to cover up? Why charge others and not him (they did charge him)

I mean they could leak lots of stuff to the press. Not sure whistleblower statutes would protect them. What if this guy never raped anyone ever again? What would you say then? It would look like they personally went after the guy.

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What if this guy never raped anyone ever again?

In your presumably educated, professional opinion, in all that you have been thought and know about people who rape children, a.) what are the odds of that being the case? and b.) are you willing to bet your children’s safety on the off chance a known child molester isn’t going to do it again?

Also, he totally did it. What difference does it make if he never rapes another kid? Even people who are for second chances recognize he doesn’t need a second chance at being a cop.

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And I have no idea what happened originally or if the victim was SAINd etc. When a kid alleges a rape, there are tons of agencies involved and DCF and the DAs office get these reports first, not the police. Did they cover this up too? This is my whole argument. There are many child interviews every year which go different ways, teens can be especially difficult.

I’m not saying “what if he didn’t do it” in terms of this guy, but there have been false accusations that have resulted in lawsuits different ways. At the time maybe the BPD didn’t care if he did it or not they wanted to discipline him and fire him anyway and an arbitrator said no. Surely someone at the DAs office can answer this one, even Rollins. My only talking point here is in response to the “cover up” that the Globe reported on.

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Another word used by intellectually lazy people to put down others.

Globe can't get people to talk to it? Ah, when there is a police form of omerta the statement is absurd. The so-called thin blue line includes a legal omerta, just as it includes a legal for of graft (aka, Details).

Attacking the messenger, trying to divert attention from the message and what the message represents.

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To me, the explosive and damning nature of the story is exactly why no-one will talk. This isn't covering up for a DUI but so much worse. So anything other than complete denial of knowledge of this is risky given the terrible consequences of this guy not getting nailed the first time around.

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why would they cover for this guy?

Gee I don't know Pete, maybe because there's a culture in police departments across America where cops are more interested in defending the police department and its reputation over actually preventing crimes and finding justice?

You know, kind of like you're doing right now by trying to make this about the Globe rather than the whole department of paid investigators who were ok with letting this guy get off with a slap on the wrist?

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Arresting and firing other cops who did the same thing.

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  • I'd be furious that my employer (or brother agency) allowed a child molester to continue to work with kids without appropriate protections.
  • I'd be wondering if this sort of coverup is just the tip of the iceberg, as seems to be the case in so many organizations where people in authority have power over children.

But Pete Nice's reaction is to cast aspersions on the Globe for being too "woke"

I guess that's one of the reasons why I'm not a cop.

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is that they couldn't avoid doing it, because of one reason or another (story was already out, impossible to cover up, etc).

And honestly, given the amount you're willing to bend over backwards to keep defending the BPD even in this case where they were clearly in the wrong, I'm starting to lean more and more towards the cynical answer here.

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gone woke

Warning! Douchebag alert!

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You are woke and ashamed of it. It’s a great term for you. Only about 3 or so people who comment here that I would call woke, you are one of them.

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I do not think it means what you think it means.

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You are woke and ashamed of it.

I didn't realize you were a mind reader. Why are you wasting your time on UHub instead of helping to solve cold cases?

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You are woke and ashamed of it. It’s a great term for you. Only about 3 or so people who comment here that I would call woke, you are one of them.

Please stop making such a public fool of yourself. It's really painfully embarrassing to watch.

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They sought a criminal complaint against him. Then the DA dropped the charges after the witness recanted. Not refused to cooperate, but actually recanted.

In order to establish just cause for a termination, BPD needed to prove to an arbitrator that Rose violated the law. How exactly could it meet its burden of proof when Rose denied it, there was no physical evidence, and the victim recanted their story? If we are blaming people here, the DA’s office is just as culpable. Forget reasonable doubt v preponderance of the evidence - it’s a distinction without a difference in this case. Neither BPD nor the DA believed they could make a case with the evidence they had.

Once that determination was made, BPD couldn’t discipline Rose. This is a horrible tragedy and it is fair to ask if BPD should have just fired him anyway and forced an arbitrator or the civil service commission to give his job back.

Also, BPD never promoted Rose. He remained a patrolman his entire career, Blame the union members for electing him for his rise there.

If we are going to insist on due process to protect the rights of employees, we need to understand that guilty people will avoid discipline and keep their jobs.

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My thing is I just don't believe that the BPD leadership was powerless to stop this guy from being a public figure like he was. If you have a non-zero fear that he's a pedophile, then you do some backroom bullshit to block him from getting elected. The reputational damage to the force is way too serious, even if you can't arrest him on charges that will stick.

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BPD concluded in 1996 that Rose likely committed the crime, but we didn't hear about until 25 years later.

So you are saying that members of the BPD and its leadership knew and documented that this guy was a likely child molester, the public did not hear a peep about it for 25 years, and it is not a cover up? That's a lot of mental gymnastics you're asking us to accept in order to excuse the protection of a serial rapist of children.

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He was charged criminally - there was a public court case. I supposed BPD could have issued a press release.

I’m responding to the employment issue. I’m not doing gymnastics. Just explaining how it works and offering a theory to explain why BPD didn’t terminate Rose.

I get it - objective analysis isn’t your thing. Carry on.

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That didn’t happen. Read the article closer.

If there was no cover up, then there would be relevant news articles/press accounts of the fact that BPD believed that they were employing a sex predator, but we did not know about this until 2020.

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I’m curious.

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In a perfect world there would be total transparency and the local news media would have informed the public that BPD believed that they were employing an officer who molested children but believed that he could not be fired.

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That’s why they can’t release that stuff

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Cops and police departments do illegal shit all the time. The city of Boston paid $15 million to settle law suits over the last decade.

BPD chose to keep employing, for +20 years, someone the knew to being child molester. It would have been worth the lawsuit to fire and publicly out Rose as a child molester.

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Then the DA dropped the charges after the witness recanted. Not refused to cooperate, but actually recanted.

The witness was a 12-year-old boy, who was coerced into recanting by Rose. Why was Rose allowed any contact with the boy? He was apparently the one investigating the crime. It gets worse.

The father who brought his daughter in last summer to report abuse by Rose was the boy allegedly abused at age 12 in the 1995 case. ... Though the criminal case against Rose was dropped as a result, a separate police internal affairs investigation went forward and concluded Rose broke the law."
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I could have sworn if you were some random bad guy and you pressured a victim into recanting their allegations against you, that was some sort of crime in itself. Maybe I've got that wrong, but if I'm right, then imagine a cop being allowed to do such a thing to someone he has victimized.

Pretty fucked up, huh?

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Good to see the city hall not being implicated in the cover up.

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We were assured (by the people here who claim to know everything about cops) that if the BPD rank and file ever knew he was a pedo, ho boy, he would be in deep do-do then. Guess that wasn't true.

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From the article:

"For security reasons, he is being held in the Berkshire County Jail on $200,000 cash bail."

Security against whom? Are there torch bearing, rope carrying civilians ready to storm the Boston Bastille to hang and burn this fellow? Or is there fear that the local BPD is unable to police itself in holding captive a former cop accused of a heinous crime (accused, not yet convicted)?

Or is there fear that Rose might spill the beans concerning other matters he knows about in Boston? Therefore to protect him from going the way of Jeffrey Epstein he was moved a couple hundred miles from Boston?

Seems to me that the Globe went quite deep in providing that bit of information. While that raises other questions the fact that this was reported is important by itself.

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He's not been convicted of anything so putting him at serious risk of harm (though deserving) by putting him in jail with people he probably had a hand in putting there is probably not justice. Jail is jail within the state I think, so I don't care where he's locked up.

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I hear people in prison have a particular distaste for punks like Rose. There is likely no population in the country where he'd be safe outside solitary.

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The office responsible for police accountability that Walsh created from his task force is OPAT.

I feel like they said that a lot at HQ lately.

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This guy is going to be the Belle of the Ball in the slammah, that's for sure!

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Prison rape jokes always raise the level of a discussion.
/s

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Rape isn't a joke.

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Okay, kids, if you see a policeman handing out free candy, run like hell!

I'm sure there are a million little technicalities why the BPD and the BPPA just couldn't do anything about Pedo Rose. I hope that's reassuring for them, because it isn't for anyone else.

Every cop on the street, every member of the union, has an additional burden put on them by Pedo Rose.

-"Why were you running from me, kid?"

-"I thought you were a kiddy-diddler like your boss."

-"I think we have to let him go, Pat."

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"Why were you running from me, kid?"

If the kid runs, they'll just shoot 'em.

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Will they?

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We're going to find out Operation Hoodsie Cup using a BPD-marked ice cream truck was an idea that came from Patrick Rose, aren't we?

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IMAGE(https://i.pinimg.com/originals/55/2e/72/552e72f5c6ad02defbc6b25ba5394142.jpg)

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It's been years since I've seen Pedo Bear.

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