PHILADELPHIA _ A 43-year-old black woman who heads a police department on the West Coast was named Monday to take over Philadelphia's police force.
Danielle Outlaw, chief of the Portland Police Bureau, will be the first black woman to lead the Philadelphia Police Department. She will be the city's first female commissioner aside from Christine Coulter, who has served as the interim commissioner since August, when former Police Commissioner Richard Ross resigned abruptly. She'll be one of three women who lead police departments of the 10 largest cities in America.
Here's what to know about Outlaw:
_ She comes from a much smaller force
In taking over in Philadelphia, Outlaw would lead the nation's fourth-largest municipal police department, which has about 6,600 sworn officers and 800 civilian employees. By comparison, the Portland Police Bureau has 877 sworn officers and 300 civilian employees, according to city data.
In Philly, Outlaw is inheriting a department that's faced tumult and scandal over the last year, including the disciplining of dozens of officers who posted offensive material on Facebook, as well as allegations that the department has a culture of sexual harassment and discrimination. This comes amid ongoing gun violence _ more people were shot this year than in any year since 2010.
But she's not a stranger to controversy.
_ She's been criticized by protesters on both sides
Outlaw's Portland department was criticized last year for its use of chemical irritants and flash-bang devices during a right-wing rally and anti-fascist counterprotest. She addressed the protesters further, appearing on a conservative talk radio program and comparing the police's engagement in the matter to a schoolyard brawl.
"I tell you, 'Meet me after school at 3:00. Right? We're gonna fight,' " Outlaw told Portland radio host Lars Larson. "And I come with the intention to fight. And then you get mad because I kicked your butt. And then you go back and you wail off and whine and complain."
The same summer, Outlaw said she told Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler police planned to sweep an encampment of Occupy ICE protesters who parked themselves outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Portland for five weeks. (A similar sweep took place last summer in Philadelphia.)
"I wasn't asking for permission to go out and clear this camp. I said, 'This is what's going to happen and here's how it's going to happen,'" Outlaw said in the interview, noting that Wheeler was supportive.
Then this year, her department faced criticism from the right, including from Donald Trump Jr. and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, after a right-wing rally resulted in a viral video of activist Andy Ngo being punched by demonstrators. Cruz tweeted that Wheeler "for political reasons, ordered his police officers to let citizens be attacked by domestic terrorists."
Wheeler responded "get your facts straight" and Outlaw defended her officers in a news conference, saying "there's a perception that they 'ran away' from confrontation, and that couldn't be the furthest from the truth."
_ She doesn't fit neatly into a political category
After having spent 20 years on the force in her hometown of Oakland, Calif., Outlaw was sworn in to lead the Portland Police Bureau in October 2017, becoming the first black woman to head the force in one of America's most liberal and whitest big cities. Her hire in Portland in 2017 was met with optimism from police reform advocates, who characterized her as progressive.
Outlaw made a name for herself in law enforcement, speaking on topics related to race and policing, women representation and use of force investigations. Last year, she delivered a Ted Talk about 21st-century policing and restoring "the humanity in authority."
But a 2018 story by the Portland weekly newspaper Willamette Week indicated she was a "cops' cop" less interested in the reforms the mayor who hired her campaigned on than in "taking back control of the city's streets."
_ She's got two degrees and some tattoos
Outlaw, who joined the Oakland Police Department just out of college, has a sociology degree from the University of San Francisco and a master of business administration from Pepperdine University.
According to the Willamette Week, she's 5-foot-4, and was described as "tough-talking, frank, almost schoolyard in her bluntness." She's also got a number of tattoos, including a quote from Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream." It reads: "Though she be but little, she is fierce."
