PROVINCETOWN, Mass. -- Town Manager Sharon Lynn is conducting an inquiry into an incident involving Police Chief Jeff Jaran and a rap song about police brutality playing at a restaurant he was at on May 7.
Jaran stopped at The Squealing Pig pub that night for the post-election party of Selectman-elect Thomas Donegan. After speaking with Donegan, Jaran said Friday, he and a friend sat at the bar for a drink.
A song by N.W.A. began to play. Jaran said he was not familiar with the song, but as he listened he became uncomfortable and offended. He said he told a restaurant employee to shut the song off and added that the person should be ashamed. Jaran said he and his friend regularly go to The Squealing Pig and he called the owner the next day and the issue was resolved.
The song comes from a 1988 album "Straight Outta Compton" that helped bring gangsta rap into the mainstream, with an insider's view of violence in gang-ridden South Central Los Angeles, according to rollingstone.com.
Donegan said Friday that Jaran came in for about the last 20 minutes of the post-election party and that they talked briefly about hockey. Donegan said he then left and he believed everyone involved with his campaign left before the incident with the song occurred. "It was only a coincidence that it happened there," Donegan said.
Some tension has swelled between the police department and Donegan, who raised questions during his campaign and as a member of the finance committee about the size and location of a proposed new police station. Donegan also called attention to what he says are concerns from citizens about a heavier-than-normal police presence in town.
In response to the concerns, in a May 29 public talk with citizens at a local eatery, Jaran said the police department is fully staffed for the first time in three decades as a result of a lifting of limitations of a state civil service program. He said officers are beginning to address areas of enforcement that have been neglected in the past, such as business licensing compliance.
The town has 13 police officers and four supervisors in addition to Jaran.
The matter came to Lynn's attention after she received a copy of an emailed letter of apology to Jaran from a representative of the restaurant, she said Friday.
Lynn said she expects to conclude her inquiry within a week or so and issue a statement then.
"I have been speaking to all parties involved to ascertain if there was any inappropriate behavior involving those present," Lynn said in an email to the Times on Friday.
Copyright 2013 - Cape Cod Times, Hyannis, Mass.
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
