The mother of Baltimore city state’s attorney Marilyn Mosby faced numerous disciplinary actions during her 20-year career as a Boston police officer, though the public wouldn’t know it based on the Freddie Gray case prosecutor’s public statements touting her family’s strong policing history.
The 35-year-old Mosby has used her family’s police ties to rebut critics who say she rushed to judgement and overcharged the six cops involved in Gray’s April 12 arrest. The 25-year-old Gray died a week later, touching off rioting in Baltimore and nationwide protests.
“Law enforcement is pretty much instilled within my being,” Mosby told MSNBC’s Chris Hayes on May 1, the day she publicly announced charges against the officers. “I come from five generations of police officers,” she added, pointing out that her mother, father, grandfather and uncles have all served as cops.
But there’s more to the story than Mosby has let on.
Personnel records obtained by The Daily Caller show that Mosby’s mother, Linda Thompson, first violated the Boston police department’s substance abuse policy in 2006. After serving a 45-day rehab stint, Thompson violated the drug code again and voluntarily resigned on Feb. 1, 2008, rather than be fired.
The early retirement allowed Thompson, now 52, to draw a $1,810.69 monthly pension.
Thompson is not the only member of Mosby’s family to have had a rocky policing career. Mosby’s father was fired from the Boston police department in 1991 following accusations that he and his partner robbed drug dealers at gun point. Mosby’s uncle was fired from Boston PD in 2001 after testing positive for cocaine. Her grandfather was a well-respected Boston cop, but he ultimately and unsuccessfully sued the department for racial discrimination in the 1980s.
Mosby has not publicly mentioned any of that during her speeches when running for Baltimore state’s attorney or since taking on the Gray case.
“A majority of police officers are risking their lives day-in and day-out,” Mosby told Hayes during her interview. “Recognizing that, because that’s what my family did, I also recognize that there are those individuals that usurp their authority who will…go past the public trust.”
“When they do that, you have to hold those individuals accountable,” Mosby added.
