BERKELEY, Calif. (AP) — The previous acting head of the U.S. Capitol Police following the Jan. 6, 2021, riot can be the following chief of campus police on the University of California, Berkeley, officials announced Monday.
Yogananda Pittman will begin leading the campus force in February, replacing retiring Chief Margo Bennett.
Pittman takes the role after 21 years with the U.S. Capitol Police, a profession capped by six months of service leading the force following the rebel.
“Chief Pittman’s remarkable record of accomplishment and her steadfast commitment to reform and social justice make her perfectly fitted to this essential leadership role on the Berkeley campus,” Chancellor Carol Christ said in a press release.
Pittman was named acting U.S. Capitol Police chief after Steven Sund, who was leading the force through the riot, was forced to resign. Pittman had previously led intelligence operations for the force, including leading as much as Jan. 6, a job she returned to after she lost out on the chief’s job.
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She was the topic of a vote of no confidence from the officers union and faced questions from members of Congress about why the force hadn’t been higher prepared for supporters of former President Donald Trump to storm the Capitol.
Pittman announced last week she was retiring from the Capitol police.
The Berkeley campus has long been referred to as a hotbed of counterculture, political activism and protest. There, Pittman will lead a team of about 140 officers, in response to the university.
Campus leaders acknowledged the tensions that exist around policing on campus and locally, including the recent demonstrations over the long run of People’s Park.
Pittman, in a press release, said she’s going to spend her first 100 days have meetings with “all the entities which have a vested interest in safety and security on campus” to higher understand people’s concerns.
“To attain change, it helps to have leaders who’ve deep skilled experience, but who also know the angle of people that have been on the receiving end of unlucky encounters with law enforcement,” she said.
She can even work on a campus security reform program that began in 2020, which is partly aimed toward improving how the university responds to people in mental health crises, in response to the discharge.
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