Ferguson, Missouri, Police Chief Thomas Jackson will resign as of March 19, reports say. On March 3 the Department of Justice released a highly critical report that documented a number of abusive and racially biased practices perpetrated by the town’s police officers and other municipal employees. Ferguson’s city manager, John Shaw, resigned on Tuesday; two police officers and a city clerk who were connected to the racist email jokes described by the DOJ have also resigned or been fired, while a municipal court judge named Ronald Brockmeyer who helped oversee the city’s reportedly extortionist system of tickets and fines has also stepped down.
“I believe this is the appropriate thing to do at this time,” Jackson told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “This city needs to move forward without any distractions.”
