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As recently as last month, a federal monitor appointed to oversee improvements on Rikers Island had described Ms. Townsend as \u201ccritical to the success of this reform effort moving forward,\u201d lauding her competence in pursuing discipline cases against officers who use force inappropriately, among other things.<\/p>\n
But the unions had come to loathe her for that work in particular.<\/p>\n
As deputy commissioner for intelligence, investigation and trials, she had also been responsible for reviewing certain allegations of sick leave abuse, including an incident on Columbus Day in which more than a dozen correction officers at a Queens courthouse left in ambulances to avoid being deployed to Rikers Island.<\/p>\n
She was also scrutinizing an incident in August during which dozens of transport officers claimed that more than 40 of their buses were too broken down to drive, causing detainees to miss court dates and creating further disorder on Rikers and in the court system.<\/p>\n
Frustrated, the unions launched an online petition calling for Ms. Townsend\u2019s firing, recording at least 290 signatures. A video posted by the jail officers\u2019 union over the summer attacked conditions in the jails and celebrated the resignation of the jails commissioner at the time, Mr. Schiraldi\u2019s predecessor. It ended with the words \u201cWho\u2019s next?\u201d overlaid on photos of five other administrators, including Ms. Townsend.<\/p>\n
In December, Ms. Townsend said, Mr. Molina asked her if she could get rid of the 2,000 disciplinary cases, in a meeting first reported by The New York Daily News.<\/p>\n
They agreed to meet again in January, on Mr. Molina\u2019s first Monday on the job. She was fired that day, told by human resources that the \u201ccommissioner is going in a different direction.\u201d She said she was escorted out of the department\u2019s headquarters in Queens.<\/p>\n
Ms. Townsend\u2019s firing is not the first time correction officials have ousted a top department investigator who had made enemies of the jail unions. Under the de Blasio administration, in 2014, the Correction Department forced the resignation of another official who held a position similar to Ms. Townsend\u2019s, Florence Finkle.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n