Mayor Picks Former Dallas Police Chief David Brown As Top Cop

CHICAGO - Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Thursday tapped former Dallas police Chief David Brown as her pick to become the city’s next top cop.

She called Brown the "humble leader" that her gun-violence plagued city needs, describing him as a "man of integrity whose mettle was forged in tragedy."

Brown, a Dallas native who joined his hometown police department the 1983, has experienced plenty of tragedy. In 1988, his former partner was shot and killed in the line of duty. Three years later his brother was killed. Brown rose through the ranks to become Dallas police chief in 2010. That same year, on Father's Day, Brown's namesake son shot and killed a police officer and another man while high on PCP in a Dallas suburb before being fatally shot.

On July 7, 2016, Brown garnered national attention for his controversial decision to a use a robot carrying explosives to kill a lone gunman who shot and killed five police officers, and injured seven more officers and two civilians during what was supposed to be a peaceful protest march in downtown Dallas.

Brown wrote in his biography, "Called To Rise" that detonating the explosives to kill a shooter who showed no sign of surrender was the right move, and one he would make again, without question, if presented with the same circumstances.

On Thursday, Brown said he was "deeply honored" by Lightfoot's nomination, which is set to be considered by the City Council later this month.

He emerged from a pool of 25 candidates including Chicago police deputy chief Ernest Cato and Aurora police chief Kristen Ziman as Lightfoot’s pick for a permanent replacement for ousted police Supt. Eddie Johnson. Lightfoot abruptly fired Johnson last year, saying the former top cop lied to her about the night he was found slumped behind the wheel of his police vehicle.

If Brown's appointment wins aldermanic approval, Brown will take the reigns of a police department under a federal consent decree with a long corrupt history that many people living in a city with a serious shooting problem don't trust.

Why would he take a job like that?

“Are you kidding me?" Brown said. "The city that produced Michelle Obama and elected Mayor Lightfoot? Sign me up." Besides, he said, Chicago and his Texas home town of Dallas have plenty in common: Both are “strong, proud and tough — not to mention the great barbecue.”

Brown is set to take over for interim Supt. Charlie Beck, the plain-spoken former Los Angeles top cop who came out of retirement to lead the police department at a tumultuous time.

Lightfoot gave Beck an emotional send off calling him a "cop's cop, a unique and gifted leader who by his mere presence makes us feel safer."

Beck will continue to serve as interim superintendent until the City Council considers Brown's appointment this month.