Waterloo Police Chief Joel Fitzgerald was sworn in Monday, according to KWWL. Fitzgerald spent much of his first day interacting with protesters who had gathered as has been the case in so many other cities across the globe following the death of George Floyd at the hands of police in Minneapolis last week. Fitzgerald told the crowd that it is his intention to introduce a number of different trainings for his officers. The Waterloo Police Department has been accused of several instances of excessive force in the past. The scene was mostly peaceful however at one point a truck with a white supremacist flag drove by inciting the protesters. That truck was stopped by police a few blocks away. Fitzgerald is the city’s first African American police chief.
