High school officer in accidental gunfire incident placed on leave after finding he left gun on hook
Cambridge police officer Frank Greenidge, left, seen at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School on 2019. (Photo: Cambridge Police Department via Facebook)
The Cambridge police officer named in an April 2 accidental gunfire incident has been placed on administrative leave pending a full review of the incident, police and Cambridge Public Schools said Friday in a press release.
Officer Frank Greenidge has been on the department since 1987 “and is highly regarded in the school district,” with no previous accidental discharges on his record, police spokesperson Robert Goulston said. He has been placed at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School as a high school resource officer – a sworn law enforcement officer selected and trained to promote safety within schools, according to the police department.
Based on information from a preliminary investigation, Greenidge went alone into a single-person, first-floor restroom at the school and took his department-issued firearm from its holster.
He placed the gun on a bathroom stall hook, hanging it by its trigger guard, police commissioner Christine Elow said.
The gun reportedly discharged unintentionally as it was taken off the hook, Elow said.
There were no injuries, and the school day continued uninterrupted. It wasn’t clear that any students heard the gun go off. Greenidge told his department supervisors and school administration immediately, and police officials responded to the scene to investigate.
The district attorney and State Police were told of the incident, but the “agencies have deferred the case back to CPD for internal investigation,”
Goulston said.
“The Cambridge Police Department has strict policies and standards regarding the use, maintenance and storage of all department-issued firearms. Conduct by a member of the [department] that is found to be nonconforming with department policies and standards will be thoroughly and objectively investigated to assure that there is accountability,” according to the press release.
Unbelievable stupidity.
Get the cops out of the schools.
Paid or unpaid leave?
Also I’m for fewer cops in schools but at Rindge right now they’ve got no more teachers monitoring the halls, more fights daily, and no more home room and this losing sense of community.
It’s really sad and we need something to keep the kids safer I’m
Not sure what.
Take the money spent on policing and dedicate it to councilors, after school programs, and better salaries for paras.
There should be clear, transparent, consequences here, both for the police department and the officer.
The consequences should also not be draconian. Humans make mistakes. The officer did the right thing, and was honest about what happened (how many people would admit to this sort of firearm handling?).
Consequences should be corrective and lead to improvement.
A good set of consequences:
1) The police officer pays or is docked the costs of actual repairs.
2) Police officers in schools no longer carry guns. Guns are kept safely in gun safes.
Cambridge has two modes of operation: (1) No consequences (2) Career-ending consequences. Very little happens in between. This is very much a place for the in-between. The community does need to know what the consequences were, however. The normal b***shit about “we don’t talk about employee actions” shouldn’t fly here.