United States: The police chief used police force to help his son find a cell phone, causing public outrage

United States: The police chief used police force to help his son find a cell phone and caused public outrage. Michael Meehan, the chief of the police department in the western California city of Berkeley, has recently become a public figure...

United States: The police chief used police force to help his son find a cell phone and caused public outrage. Michael Meehan, the chief of the police department in the western California city of Berkeley, has recently become a popular figure in public discussion. His son's cell phone was lost, and he mobilized eight anti-drug police officers to participate in the search. The phone was not found, and he himself became the target of public criticism. According to local media reports on the 23rd, in January this year, an iPhone with signal tracking software installed on it was accidentally lost in a cabinet in the school locker room. After the incident, the police chief ordered sergeants investigating property crimes to search the phones. The sergeant immediately led eight people from his anti-narcotics task force to work overtime and launch a search operation for the lost mobile phone. Counting the director himself and the police sergeant, a total of 10 people were involved in the investigation of this case. Moreover, they did not register the whole process with the police station, which is irregular. However, a spokesman for the police department said that it is common for street patrol officers to receive signals from stolen mobile phones and search for them. In a statement to local media, the Berkeley Police Department also stated that in fact Meehan did not order the drug task force officers to investigate the case and that their actions were voluntary. Four detectives were also paid two hours of overtime each. So far, many people are dissatisfied with this matter. They believed that Meehan was not only involved in the investigation of the case himself, but that as many as nine police officers were involved, which made the matter appear high-profile. However, the director himself has not yet made any comment on the incident. According to reports, Meehan was also revealed to have sent a police officer to the home of a reporter in the middle of the night in March this year to ask the reporter to change a report that had been posted online about a Berkeley Hills resident who was beaten to death with a stick in February. Meehan is currently under investigation by a San Francisco law firm.