A retired Metro Nashville Police lieutenant has filed a 61-page complaint against the department containing dozens of allegations related to what he describes as MNPD’s lack of transparency and resistance to accountability.
The complaint alleges leadership overreach in internal investigations and details efforts to get the Community Oversight Board abolished. The document lays out a pattern of misconduct at the highest levels of Nashville’s police department.
More: Listen to WPLN’s past series on MNPD, “Behind the Blue Wall”
On Thursday morning, WPLN News obtained a complete copy of the complaint and sat down with the former officer to learn more. MNPD later released a redacted copy.
Garet Davidson began his career with MNPD in 2011. From 2021 to 2024, he served as the lieutenant of the Office of Professional Accountability, better known as internal affairs. Earlier this year, he took early retirement, published a fantasy novel and now hosts a podcast.
“There were a series of things that occurred while I was working in the Office of Professional Accountability that didn’t sit well with me,” he said. “My first year in OPA, I really thought I’d be with the department the rest of my career. By year two, I was second guessing that, and by the end of year two, I’d made my plan.”
On May 22, 2024, Davidson filed his detailed, 61-page complaint.
In a statement, Police Chief John Drake said that the department is reviewing Davidson’s complaint and will investigate.
“We will look at whether our administrative processes for internal investigation and discipline need any refinement,” he said. “A periodic review of practices and procedures in a large police department such as ours is healthy for the organization.”
Drake noted that Davidson did not file a complaint with him or with the Director of the Office of Professional Accountability before he left the department.
The document is divided into nine main areas of concern — each of which include references to specific, numbered OPA investigations as well as policy recommendations Davidson believes would help fix the problem.
‘Doing things in the dark’
“One of the straws that broke the camel’s back was the department’s involvement with overturning the Community Oversight Board here in Nashville,” said Davidson.
He claims that at least two high-ranking MNPD officials worked with state legislators to help pass a 2023 state law that abolished community oversight boards in Tennessee, and that the department’s top leadership was aware of their efforts.
In his complaint, Davidson describes attending an OPA Division meeting where an MNPD deputy chief was presented with a “small, laser-engraved crystal-style award” for his work on advancing the state law.
That law primarily affected Nashville, which got its COB after a 2018 referendum. More than 130,000 Nashvillians voted to establish a community oversight board as a way to increase police accountability following the police killings of Jocques Clemmons in 2017 and Daniel Hambrick earlier that year. The measure won by a 20% margin citywide, and it won a majority in 29 of 35 Metro Council districts. After the new law went into effect, it was replaced by a less-powerful review board.
Listen: WPLN’s podcast examining the first time a Nashville officer was charged with murder
“Even though I didn’t always agree with everything the COB was doing and their perspective on things, they were forcing transparency. They were forcing the department to come to the table and explain things,” Davidson said. “Why are we doing things in the dark that can’t be shown in the light?”
‘Cherry-picking winners and losers’
In his complaint, Davidson alleges that command staff from outside the Office of Professional Accountability are overly involved in internal investigations, and they influence how those investigations are conducted. He claims that during his time with OPA, he gained direct knowledge of repeated instances of the following:
- higher-ups pushing for specific cases to be categorized under policies that carry less-serious sanctions
- an unusual lack of documentation, or documentation with “strictly tailored language” for investigations concerning favored or higher-ranking employees
- a practice of transferring personnel of captain rank and above “without formal investigations, documentation, or findings,” in lieu of more formal disciplinary measures
“This is command staff cherry-picking winners and losers through the manipulation of the internal affairs investigative process. If command staff is allowed to influence investigations in order to achieve better outcomes for certain employees, the same process can be used to achieve worse outcomes for others,” writes Davidson. “This has been done in the past.”
Davidson claims that this also contributes to a pattern of “rank bias” in MNPD’s internal disciplinary processes, with higher-ranking personnel facing lighter consequences than lower-ranking employees for similar infractions.
Workplace harassment and discrimination
In 2020, then-Mayor John Cooper’s office released the Policing Policy Commission Report, which recommended that MNPD create a “zero tolerance” policy around sexual assault and sexual harassment. However, Davidson alleges that no such policy exists in practice within the department.
In his complaint, Davidson gives an example of an MNPD lieutenant who was investigated and found to have harassed and discriminated against female employees. That lieutenant allegedly injured a female officer as well. Davidson claims that the lieutenant was not demoted and that the officer he physically harmed was not consulted when determining his sanctions.
In another example, Davidson writes that an officer was suspended 10 days for sexual harassment. He was eventually terminated after he was recorded in an OnlyFans video, in uniform, groping a woman during a simulated traffic stop, Davidson added.
“It sends a message to the rest of the department that ‘we’re not going to take this as seriously as you want us to.’ And so people, I think, shut down,” he said, “which then helps create an atmosphere or culture where more misconduct, harassment and discrimination can occur.”
Mayor Freddie O’Connell’s office released a statement on Friday saying that the allegations made in the document are serious and that Metro is recommending the appointment of Edward Stanton of the Butler Snow law firm to head up an investigation into the complaint.
“I have insisted that our process be above reproach,” O’Connell said. “Mr. Stanton will have access to resources from Metro Legal, MNPD, Human Resources, the CRB, and anything else needed to conduct a thorough investigation.”
Update: This story was updated on Friday, May 31 with information from a statement from Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell.
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