[NBCNEWS] After a long and storied career in law enforcement, New York City police Commissioner Bill Bratton on Tuesday announced his resignation. Bratton, a 45-year-veteran of police work who has served as the top cop in Boston, Los Angeles and New York, said he'd be stepping down next month to pursue a job in the private sector.
His departure signals an end of an era, one that saw an almost unfathomable drop in crime but also the rise of mass incarceration and erosion of trust between the police and the communities they serve. In recent years, as high-profile police killings, including the choke-hold death of Eric Garner by police on Staten Island, have sparked nationwide protest and unrest, Bratton has tried to forge new partnerships between officers and people of color.
But for many, the end of Bratton's tenure and his role as one of the most significant forces shaping American policing couldn't have come soon enough.
"Commissioner Bratton was no reformer to communities impacted by abusive and discriminatory policing," said Anthonine Pierre, a front man for Communities United for Police Reform, "no matter how much he and his supporters attempt to promote that fallacy."
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