An End Of An Era At The Concord Police Department As Deputy Chief Retires

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At this point in his career, while in his mid-50s, the “smart” thing to do is stay. At the same time, it is not about the money. Thomas is at the point where a job change concerns the quality of life while balancing family and personal time, especially after so many decades on the front lines of police work. Family, he said, “should always be your No. 1 priority, and if it’s not, then you need to reassess your life.” Thomas, publicly, will be remembered for all the work he did for the city, an opportunity he is grateful to have had. But he would prefer to be remembered as a good father and husband.

After attending Northeastern University and serving a year in the coop program for the U.S. Marshals Service in New Jersey, Thomas started as a patrol officer in Concord. He performed a short stint in the drug unit and became a detective in 1999 and then, in 2004, returned to patrol work. In 2007, he was promoted to sergeant in the criminal division and was promoted to lieutenant in 2012. Thomas went back to patrol again, and then, in 2015 when the chief created the community services unit, he ran it. About five years ago, Thomas became a deputy chief overseeing the criminal division.

Community services allowed the department to expand interaction with the changing city, including the resettlement of refugees and immigrants from around the world.

“We started to see that, for the first time, you’re bringing in a population that doesn’t know anything about American law enforcement,” he said, “cause a lot of these folks that are coming from these different countries are coming from war-torn countries, where a person in a uniform was the enemy. Those were the folks that were trying to do harm or kill them. So now here they are, they’re being dropped into a community where, while the police department’s got a really good position in the city and so the only way to kind of acclimate them to the community is they have to trust you.”

Thomas said building trust was a key component of the program’s success. As police agencies grow, they, too, have to acclimate to changing communities and meet their constituents.

“We’ve done a phenomenal job of that over the years,” he said. “It was a huge step forward.”

Most of his career has been spent working in the detective division, something he enjoyed. In later years, he did not perform many interviews with suspects or anything. But that suspense — “knowing when somebody’s lying to you, and you’re still sitting there interviewing them, and they’re looking you straight in the face … that’s what I love about police work is that you’re out there trying to do the better good and you’re trying to give victims some sort of sense of … some resolution to them being a victim.” He said police, the public, and anyone who is not a victim can sit and wonder what it is like, but every victim’s experience is different.

“Everyone gets into this job wanting to help,” Thomas said.

Thomas said the most important case he has worked on was probably leading the team that investigated the murders of Stephen and Djeswende Reid in 2022, bringing Logan Lavar Clegg to justice.

“That was a whodunit right from the get-go,” he said.

Thomas called the detectives’ work on the Reids’ case “unbelievable,” and the city was lucky to have such a great group of detectives.

Whether it was a murder case or a burglary, closure of cases can be an overwhelming feeling, he said, especially if a lot of time was spent solving them. The hunt is what attracted him to being an investigator.

Police work has changed in those decades, but so has the study of officers’ mental health and societal issues while working to address the health of staff and the community. Most officers know, Thomas said, whether they will last in the job after about three to five years. There is a lot of burnout and post-traumatic stress. Thomas also believes it is one of the worst times to be a police officer, especially given what has happened nationally. Concord, he said, was still one of the safest communities in New Hampshire. But horrible incidents are happening everywhere. He said the criminal justice system has taken a turn where society is more worried about the suspect than the victim.

“The suspects now are being cared to more than the victims are,” he said. “And I hope that ship comes back around that people are finally realizing that the system is bending over for the suspects.”

Thomas said departments around the state had been tracking cases, and hundreds of suspects who were a danger to the public were being released on personal recognizance instead of being held or having to put up cash bail. He said many criminals were not held accountable for their actions, even in dangerous cases.

When asked if Thomas thought he should have stayed in investigations instead of moving to the command staff, he said his heart would always remain there. At the same time, officers need to grow, and he did, too. Moving up in the command staff was never about getting a specific rank.

“I got into police work to do police work,” he said. “Could I stay and detectives forever? Probably, but at the same time, you want to grow as a person. If you sit in one place too long, (you’re) idle.”

In various parts of police work, officers learn different skills and trades — interviewing people, meticulously detailing, and other things. The knowledge the officer gains needs to be shared with the younger staffers, he said. Institutional knowledge can be lost as people leave, which is why you want to pass as much on to others.

“That’s what you want to do,” he said. “You want to keep building for the next generation.”

Thomas thanked the city, noting officials took a chance on a college kid from Boston and had given him the opportunity of a lifetime. Jobs, at the time, were scarce, he said. Thomas also thanked everyone in the department for helping him have a fulfilling career.

Concord Police Chief Bradley Osgood commended Thomas, calling his time with the department “successful” while saying he “excelled in all of the positions that he has held.” He said his passion for community policing and engagement was unmatched.

“He forged relationships with citizens and business leaders his whole career, and that has served the department and community well for the past three decades,” Osgood said. “His knowledge, experience, and leadership will be difficult to replace, and his presence at the Concord Police Department will surely be missed.”

Osgood said the department thanked Thomas for his service to other officers and the city’s residents and wished him and his family success and health in retirement.

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