Boston Mayor Michelle Wu is all for police accountability – except when she’s sitting in the passenger seat of a police cruiser that runs a red light and crashes into another vehicle.
Wu repeatedly declined to say why the blue police lights and siren were on in her city police SUV as she was bombarded with questions about Tuesday’s accident which shook her up and injured the driver and child who were in the other SUV.
“As with any kind of departmental or city vehicle that is involved in a crash there is a review that happens,” Wu said as she entered an event in Charlestown.
Wu did add one tidbit – that “it was not an emergency yesterday where we were headed. It’s an incident that is under review and I have full faith in the team and their professionalism.”
But the incident report released on Wednesday morning didn’t even name Wu, listing her instead as a “passenger who is known to the Commonwealth.”
It was a case study in non-accountability and evasion – something you’d expect from an old boys network pol but hypocritical from a progressive who promised to hold police accountable as one of the cornerstones of her administration.
She’s supposed to be about transparency and open government.
And there are important questions still not answered. Will the police officer driving Wu be disciplined? Will the driver of the other vehicle be cited?
In fact, it took hours to even disclose she was in an accident on Hyde Park Ave. in Roslindale, and nearly a full day for police to provide the accident report. Wu showed up at a press conference hours after the accident and didn’t say a peep about it.
The next day, she still couldn’t provide basic answers like who ordered the blue lights on, and what’s the policy for her police vehicle as it navigates crowded Boston traffic.
“I’m not totally familiar with all the policies and procedures,” she said when asked about the blue lights. “I was on my phone and not really seeing what was happening as the lights were turned on at that intersection.”
Wu was also careful not to throw her female driver under the bus, repeatedly praising police and first responders who were at the scene of the crash within minutes.
Wu was also pretty dismissive of the injuries that did occur to the other occupants, Nothing to see here folks, move along.
We’ll see about that. This is the kind of accident ripe for a personal injury lawsuit.
It comes on the heels of other highly publicized cases of public officials getting caught using blue lights in their official vehicles, including former U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins, who put her emergency lights on in a shopping center parking lot to intimidate another driver.
Rollins never paid a price for that incident, but she eventually was forced out last month for violating ethics laws.