Mobile city leaders name permanent police chief

MOBILE, Ala. ( WKRG ) — Interim Mobile Police Chief William Jackson was named police chief during the Mobile City Council meeting on Tuesday.

Jackson was made the MPD interim chief when former Mobile Police Chief Paul Prine was placed on administrative leave and eventually fired.

After serving as interim chief for five months, city council members decided it was time to drop interim off his name.

Chief Jackson said he already has a plan to help improve the department.

“We’ve already made some changes to the way we are looking at crime,” Chief Jackson explained. “We’re going to be more strategic with our cyber and with our intelligence units, which we’ve already implemented. So as you know, we’re down in part one crimes, double digits and so on. But we can you can push that down through continued efforts of cyber operations.

Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson said Jackson is the best suited for the role—eager for his promotion.

“There’s nothing like being the chief, and so, realizing that he had been doing this for five months, he had exhibited the leadership that we had hoped that he would,” Stimpson added. “And we would also realize that the police department—it was time to make the move and that we had nothing gained by waiting another month, another two months. It was time to go and make it happen.”

Prine was fired after an investigation into the department found that there were issues with its use of force.

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