Former NYPD detective says Dermot Shea should resign after disbanding NYPD's plainclothes anti-crime unit
Commissioner Dermot Shea announced the NYPD is eliminating its anti-crime units; reaction from retired NYPD 1st Grade Detective Harry Houck.
Former NYPD detective Harry Houck called on New York City Police Commissioner Dermot Shea to resign Monday, hours after Shea announced that he was scrapping the department's plainclothes anti-crime unit.
"I tell you, the plainclothes officers that are out there, the anti-crime units, are out there in plain clothes trying to watch criminals and catch them in the act," Houck said on "The Story with Martha MacCallum."
"Now, you [have] the perpetrators out there in the street saying, 'Hey, listen, we don't have to worry about undercover officers any more. We only have to worry about uniforms. So we see no uniforms. There's no cops around.' And believe me, they will take advantage of that."
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Earlier Wednesday, Shea described the move to disband the unit as "a seismic shift in the culture of how the NYPD polices this great city.
"It can be felt immediately throughout the five district attorney's offices," Shea said. "It will be felt immediately in the communities that we protect."
Shea added that the unit's roughly 600 officers will be reassigned to other teams.
"It's a crazy move," Houck told MacCallum. "He [Shea] should resign from his post for making a comment like that."
Houck also weighed on the fatal shooting of Rashard Brooks, 27, by Atlanta police officers, which sparked a weekend of protests in the city.
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"Once he [Brooks] did get away from the officers, he did have the Taser," Houck said. "Now that Taser, if he had that Taser, one of those officers could have easily went down and [he could have] grabbed one of the officers' guns and then shot both officers.
"So all this is going through your mind when you're having a fight with a perpetrator like this."Video footage captured from police body cameras shows the officers talking with Brooks moments before a scuffle ensued and he was shot while trying to flee.
Fox News' Bradford Betz contributed to this report.