Conn. Police Chief Quits in Profiling Scandal

The police chief of a Connecticut town has resigned after four officers were indicted by the FBI in a racial-profiling case. East Haven chief Leonard Gallo was an unnamed co-conspirator in the indictment, the Hartford Courant reports. Last week, the governor's criminal policy head condemned Gallo's department for failing to follow civil-rights guidelines in targeting Latinos. "These are best practices nationally," the official said. "What is very clear is that Chief Gallo did not follow these recommendations."

The town's ex-mayor put Gallo on administrative leave in 2010 amid the federal probe. A few months later, the East Haven police board filed 15 administrative charges against him. But current mayor Joseph Maturo, a friend of Gallo who himself is facing calls to step down after a bad taco joke, reinstated Gallo last year. "It's been a general breakdown in control in that department for quite a while," the town's police commission chairman said earlier, calling for Gallo's firing. A petition with some 15,000 signatures also urged his termination, the AP notes. (More East Haven stories.)