New Orleans Police Superintendent Ann Kirkpatrick says there will be an investigation after the Metropolitan Crime Commission raised questions about the apparent personal relationship between New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell and Officer Jeffrey Vappie, part of the mayor's bodyguard unit.
Chief Kirkpatrick told WWL's Newell Normand that because of the high-profile nature of it, the investigation will not be done by NOPD.
"It is going to be investigated. It should be an outside entity," said Kirkpatrick. "We have said that it should be an outside law firm that has experience in employment law."
The MCC filed the complaint after a tipster sent them images of the mayor and Officer Vappie dining together on the balcony of a French Quarter restaurant.
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MCC President Rafael Goyeneche said the request is not about salacious speculation about a relationship between two consenting adults, but about NOPD procedures when it comes to matters between a city leader and a subordinate, and between a police officer and someone he is supposed to be providing a professional service for, specifically, personal security.
"Nobody really cares -- they're two consenting adults -- if they're involved socially," Goyeneche said. "If an officer is socially involved with one of his subordinates or someone that he's involved in -- in this particular case, in providing protection for -- that's an employment conflict."
Vappie has been investigated before, by the NOPD Public Integrity Bureau, about how he was paid while working as part of the mayor's executive protection team. Mayor Cantrell called that investigation a "witch hunt." The federal police monitor criticized the PIB for seemingly ignoring "a wealth of circumstantial evidence" about Vappie's off-duty time with the mayor at the Pontalba apartment owned by the city, and failing to pursue interviews of many witnesses, including Cantrell herself and then-NOPD Superintendent Shaun Ferguson.
Chief Kirkpatrick said any formal complaints will get their due, no matter who is involved.
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