Q & A with NOBLE’s President Gregory A. Thomas

Evan F. Moore | As of Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Gregory A. Thomas is the current president of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE). NOBLE has nearly 60 chapters and over 3,000 members worldwide.

Thomas, who was in Chicago at the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) conference, is the Senior Executive for Law Enforcement Operations in the Office of the Kings County (Brooklyn, N.Y.) District Attorney.

The Chicago Citizen Newspaper caught up with Thomas and gathered his thoughts about Black Lives Matter, the public perception of police, the evolution of the relationship between law enforcement and the Black community, along with his thoughts on President Obama’s alleged anti-police rhetoric.

What is it about police work that the general public does not understand?

They are misinformed or ill-informed based on TV. TV is a great mystifier for people. People think that police work is a lot of radio calls and shootouts. That’s not the case whatsoever. It’s really about responding to the calls made by citizens. Most of these calls are from people who’ve been victimized or see a crime in progress. It’s not really us identifying people based on race and ethnicity.

What are NOBLE members in the Chicago area telling you about what they experience on their beats?

It can never be at a point where everybody’s is happy, but things are getting better. The bottom line is that people in communities feel like they are under siege. They see police in their community more often than not. But I would also ask why they are there. They are there because crime is up. What if crime magically stopped? What if you stopped engaging cops in a disrespectful way? Things would change. We’re changing our relationship with the community. How about changing yours along with ours?

In the day and age of social media, where videos of alleged police brutality often go viral, how can the police mend relationships with the communities they are sworn to serve and protect?

I don’t want to paint a picture that says all police are wrong. We’ve been victims of stereotypes over the years. I would say anyone in the community would be wrong if someone stereotypes all police officers.

Many conservative websites, along with a large contingent of police officers, believe that the Black Lives Matter movement encourages violence against police officers. What is your take?

What has happened that certain folks in organizations have their own agenda and use the current state of things and exposure to the media to their advantage. I think that the genesis of their group is to say per se that only Black lives matter, that they are referring to, from my understanding, is fact that in certain circumstances, there are clearly more interactions with police and more Black men being shot and killed. For the moment, in this situation, in this conversation about police engagement, Black lives matter. They aren’t saying Black lives matter more than others, for the conversation about police engagement, there are saying Black lives matter.

How do you feel president Barack Obama is handling police issues?

I spent some time with him [Obama] in the White House with superintendent [Garry] McCarthy where he invited us to talk about reforming the system and criminal justice. He is doing the best he can. The bottom line is that he can’t do much as president. This stuff falls to the house [of representatives] and the Senate. They need to make sure laws are passed.

What would you tell a young person how to handle an interaction with the police?

Be the best example of “right.” When you’re engaging a police officer, that person is an adult. I go back to my days growing up. The best thing to do is cooperate. If you’re right, and he or she was wrong, we can handle it. But to engage a police officer in a fight, or a tussle, it raises our level of response.

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