BOSTON, Feb. 6 (UPI) -- A Boston police officer who sent an e-mail calling Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. a "jungle monkey" has been fired.
Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis announced Justin Barrett's dismissal Friday, The Boston Globe reported.
"The Boston Police Department is committed to a standard of excellence,'' Davis said in a statement. "After a thorough investigation of this matter, it is evident that Officer Barrett's actions do not comply with that standard.''
The July e-mail came after Gates' arrest last year on a disorderly conduct charge after a neighbor spotted him trying to force open the front door of his Cambridge house. Barrett responded to a column in the Globe with an e-mail to the author, which he copied to colleagues in the National Guard, referring to Gates as a "banana-eating jungle monkey."
Barrett was suspended last year. He has sued the police department and the city of Boston, claiming they violated his civil and due-process rights.
