The St. Paul City Council voted Wednesday night to have the Minnesota’s Peace Officers Standards and Training Board review the livestreams of Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher.
The 5-2 vote asked the POST Board to determine whether or not actions witnessed in the livestreams violate Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office policies, City policies, and the Minnesota Police Code of Conduct.
"The reasons the city council has an interest in this is because Sheriff Fletcher made the decision that the neighborhoods of St. Paul will be where he mainly puts on this show," said Ward 3 Councilmember Chris Tolbert.
Tolbert then criticized a November 2020 police chase where Fletcher went down the wrong way on a residential street and requesting that it not be caught on the stream.
"This is particularly concerning because Sheriff Fletcher refuses to wear a body camera," Tolbert said. "Then he can decide what the public sees and doesn't see. When we talk about transparency, we should talk about that."
Live on Patrol began in late 2020 according Fletcher as a way to build trust with the community in the wake of George Floyd's murder.
Fletcher told WCCO Radio's Adam Carter that he thought the livestreams and the transparency would be a hit with the St. Paul City Council.
"In the course of showing what's happening, the crime increases that are out there in St. Paul like carjacking's, shootings, and homicides are all shown," Fletcher said. "We talk about the crime trends and apparently the transparency regarding what crime is occurring wasn't too favorable by the City Council."
Fletcher also defended the Ramsey County Sheriff's Office policy on police chases, saying the policy differs from the Saint Paul Police Department's policy.
"Our policy is a little more liberal," Fletcher said. "We do allow officers to chase in cases that St. Paul may not. Our philosophy is that we need to put serious felons and criminals in jail if we want to reduce crime. If we continue to let them run and not pursue, they're going to keep running. That was the trend up until this time."
This past weekend more than 150 shots were fired as seven people were injured in three separate shootings Saturday night and Sunday morning. Multiple gunshot victims were found at the Holiday gas station on the 600 block of Rice Street early Sunday morning.
"I wasn't live that night, but when we are live, we frequent the hotspots to make sure people don't do that. We think we're a great crime prevention tool as well."
Councilmembers Jane Prince and Dai Thao voted against the request.
