A police chief’s journey

Cathy Lanier may be Washington, D.C.’s first female chief of police, says Judy Oppenheimer in More, but her early life was hardly a model of law and order. Lanier’s father, a fireman, left home when she was just 2. Her mother, a secretary, reared her and her two brothers by herself in a blue-collar neighborhood in Maryland. “She had one boyfriend, married the jerk, and that was it. We lived on welfare for nine years. My mother had nothing.” Lanier didn’t make it any easier for her. “My mother had a hell of a time raising me. If she said, ‘You can’t go out the door,’ I’d go out the window.” At 14, she started sleeping with a 24-year-old guy and got pregnant. Her mother sat her down and outlined the pros and cons of her choices: abortion, motherhood, or adoption. “To this day I couldn’t tell you what my mom’s preference was. Her response, in my opinion, was the best a parent could do.” Lanier had the baby, got married and divorced, and worked dead-end waitressing and clerical jobs. But in 1990 she went on a ride with her brother, a Washington, D.C., cop, and was captivated by how much he interacted with people. “Even as a patrol cop, you can make major changes in people’s lives every day.” Today, as chief, she’s an obsessive workaholic, and has even given out her cell phone number to hundreds of D.C. residents she’s met on the street. “If you separate yourself from the people impacted by crime,” she says, “you’re going to fail.”

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