Chief of Police
Chief Daryl R. Gaines began his law enforcement career when he joined the Baltimore
Police Department in March of 2001. Upon graduation from the Police Academy he was
assigned to the Patrol Division in the Northwestern District, where he spent the majority
of his career. While assigned to the Northwestern District, he spent significant time
working in the district’s Flex Unit and Narcotics Division, and he also spent 2 years
working in the Violent Crimes Impact Division. While assigned to the Northwestern
District, Chief Gaines worked closely with both faculty and students, as well as with
campus security at Baltimore City Community College whose campus was located within
the northwestern geography. He would often speak with both students and faculty about
campus safety and conduct meetings to discuss things like crime initiatives, and crime
that was occurring both on and around campus, and often engaged in joint initiatives
with campus security. In June of 2008, he was promoted to the rank of Sergeant and
was assigned to the Southwestern District, where he spent 6 months working as a patrol
supervisor. He then returned to the Northwestern District where he spent most of his
time supervising the District’s Mountain Bike Unit, and Operations Unit. During his
time as a Sergeant in the Northwestern District, Chief Gaines also did stints supervising
the district’s Command Investigations Unit as well as the Administrative Unit.
In 2015 upon his promotion to the rank of Lieutenant, he was assigned to the Western
District where he started as a shift commander, and later would become the commanding
officer of the Western District’s Operations Unit/District Action Team. Again, understanding
the importance of establishing good relations with other police jurisdictions located
within the western district geography, Chief Gaines helped to establish regular communications
with both students as well as campus police at Coppin State University, for purposes
of information sharing pertaining to crime, as well as to help strengthen community/police
relations within the community, understanding that many of the students at the university
were local residents of Baltimore. In addition, while performing his regular day to
day duties with the department, between 2016 and 2017, Chief Gaines spent almost 2
years working as one of the department’s representatives for the education and training
program through the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), a national
law enforcement organization which partnered with the Baltimore Police Department
to offer training and best practices to security corporations and other law enforcement
entities abroad, along with assisting in policy reform. Chief Gaines has been an active
member of the International Association of Chiefs of Police since 2016, and he is
also an active member of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives.
Chief Gaines received numerous commendations over the course of his career for outstanding
and meritorious service, for his service during the civil unrest (riots) in April
of 2015, and received numerous letters of commendation throughout his 20 plus years
with the Baltimore Police Department. He was promoted to the rank of Captain in December
of 2017 and assigned to the Central District, and then promoted to the rank of Major
in May of 2018, where he served for 3 years as the Commanding Officer. During the
time he was assigned to the Central District, Chief Gaines was able to help foster
much stronger relations and communications between officers at the Central District
and college partners at both the University of Maryland (satellite campus) and the
University of Baltimore, frequently communicating with both faculty and students,
and working very closely with campus police at both colleges through joint crime initiatives
and intelligence sharing through monthly meetings.
As the climate in policing began to change, along with the demand for more police
legitimacy, procedural justice and better police/community relations, Chief Gaines
was appointed by the Police Commissioner to serve as both Co-Chair and Head Chair
on numerous administrative oversight hearings involving incidents such as police misconduct
and other violations of departmental policies, guidelines and criminal laws by members
of the department. Chief Gaines was appointed to this position by the Commissioner
largely due to his reputation for demonstrating a high level of integrity and objectivity,
and he continued to serve in that role until retiring at the rank of Major on May
1, 2021.
On June 1, 2021 Chief Gaines was hired to be the new Police Chief for The Lansing
Community College Police Department in Lansing, Michigan. During his time as the Chief
he has initiated much needed improvements within the department putting a strong focus
on such things as ensuring diversity, equity, and inclusion is present in all areas
of the department, recruitment, addressing staffing concerns, overseeing the implementation
of a newly created dashboard for data collection, implementation of the Citizen Contact
Receipt, modernizing systems, equipment upgrades, policy change, best practices and
a stronger focus on community-oriented policing, new security protocols and new access
control procedures. Chief Gaines facilitated all of these changes and upgrades because
they were needed but, also in preparation of achieving LCCPD's long-term goal of attaining
accreditation. Chief Gaines also holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Criminal Justice
from Saint Leo University.
Chief Gaines was born in Queens NY, and shortly thereafter, his family moved to a
small town in northern New Jersey. Shortly after getting married in July 2000, he
and his wife Simone moved to Baltimore, Maryland. Chief Gaines has been married to
his wife Simone for 24 years. Simone, who was born and raised in Flint, Michigan,
has a bachelor's degree in communications from Central Michigan University. They currently
reside in Michigan and have two daughters, Makayla and Marisa, who both currently
attend college at Michigan State University and The University of Cincinnati.
