DERBY – A school resource officer walks the grounds of the high school/middle school campus, an officer has been assigned to a DEA task force, and a dog is in training to revive the department’s canine unit.
Those are three initiatives underway under the new leadership of Derby Police Chief Brian Grogan, 43, who was officially sworn-in during a ceremony Aug. 26.
Grogan replaces Chief Scott Todd, who retired in June after 38 years in law enforcement.
Grogan graduated from West Haven High School in 2000. Four years later he graduated from Roger Williams University in Rhode Island, where he studied accounting and criminal justice.
His first jobs after graduating were in accounting, including almost two years at a firm in Shelton. He respected the work but was not cut out for it.
“Sitting at a desk all day, I just couldn’t do it. It just wasn’t for me,” he said.
Police work was always something that interested him.
“I like the idea of protecting those who can’t protect themselves. I know that sounds corny, but I never liked bullies,” Grogan said. “Sticking up for people, helping people, that’s what I wanted to do,” he said.
He started taking police exams and accepted a job with Derby police in 2006. He liked the city and the police department had a good benefits package, he said.
“When I came to Derby I didn’t know anything about the city, but I liked the fact that everybody knew everybody,” Grogan said.
Grogan and his wife, Lauren, have three children: two daughters ages 13 and 11, and a 1-year-old son.
He didn’t have kids when he started in Derby, so he was assigned nights, which he didn’t mind.
“There’s an adrenaline rush of going after the unknown. I always worked at night, so the darkness and everything added to the excitement,” Grogan said. “Granted, 30 seconds of fun usually equates to five hours of paperwork, but the intense moments can drive you.”
Grogan was a baseball player, and he said the competitive mentality helped him.
“The department was like a team. You’d see someone make a good arrest and you’d say to yourself, ‘I want to make a good arrest,’” he said.
At the same time, Grogan said it’s not a police officer’s job to gloat or to look down upon people, even if it’s someone being placed under arrest.
“You have to treat everybody like humans. You have to treat everyone fairly,” he said. “People make mistakes, but you don’t want to leave someone with the feeling they want to take revenge on you. They made a mistake, but you treat them fairly.”
Grogan said his field training officer when he started was Derby Police Officer John Dorosh, now retired. They worked nights together.
“Dorosh lived here his whole life, so he knew everybody,” Grogan said. “Riding around with him, he was able to point people out who was doing what.”
Dorosh still has ties to Derby. He owns Raro’s Automotive Center on Third Street downtown.
Dorosh said it was obvious that Grogan would be an exceptional police officer.
“He has the intelligence. He has the ability to communicate with people calmly, whether it’s his subordinates in the department or citizens in the community,” Dorosh said. “Also, people generally like him. He listens before he makes decisions.”
Grogan was promoted from patrol officer to sergeant in 2011. He became deputy chief in 2023.
He’s leading a department that is in transition. A glut of veteran officers retired from the department around the time of the COVID-19 pandemic and the Connecticut police accountability act.
Grogan said the departures have allowed officers to move up the ranks.
There are 34 officers in the department. The deputy chief position is currently vacant, but an announcement is expected in the coming weeks, Grogan said.
His command staff includes two new lieutenants – Joseph Massetti and Frank DeAngelo, along with six sergeants.
The Derby PD command staff recently received an “Agency Trilogy Award” for completing a leadership and management training program from the FBI-Law Enforcement Executive Development Association, an independent nonprofit agency.
“It’s a good group,” Grogan said of the department overall. “They’re smart, they’re educated, and they like to work together.”
Grogan said he was thankful to the city government, the Derby Police Commission, and the school district for allowing a school resource officer back into Derby High School. Tight budgets had eliminated the program for some 10 to 15 years, Grogan said.
Officer Stephanie Kowalec holds the position. She’s been a police officer for 18 years.
Grogan said getting to know the youth is critical in Derby. And the city’s small enough so that the police and young people can build a relationship.
“I’m a huge advocate of the SRO program. We finally got somebody up there,” Grogan said. “I’m a huge advocate of the program because if you build those bonds when they’re young, it goes a long way.”
Grogan said an officer has been assigned to a regional DEA Task Force. The officer will be assisting on building narcotic cases in the region.
Grogan said the experience will establish contacts the department will use when it needs help. In addition, the officer will come back with training he can pass along to the other officers.
Grogan also said the department is bringing back a canine program, with an officer currently in training in Meriden for 14 weeks. Grogan thanked The Valley Community Foundation and the Stanton K9 Foundation for awarding grants to help finance the canine program.
The dog’s training could be completed by December, Grogan said.
Grogan and the Derby Police Department are in a community where violent crime is down. In fact, overall reported crime is down, according to the official Connecticut crime database.
Reported crimes in Derby fell 23 percent between 2021 and 2025. In real numbers, that’s a drop from 852 reported crimes in 2021 to 655 in 2025.
There has not been a reported homicide in Derby since May 2020.
Reported larcenies are down 30 percent over the same period. Vandalism is down 62 percent. Aggravated assaults are down almost 79 percent.
Bucking the trend – auto thefts.
In 2025, there were 84 vehicles reported stolen. That’s a drop from 2024, when 93 vehicles were reported stolen, but it is still a 50 percent increase from 2021.
“A lot of that was the ‘Kia Boys’,” Grogan said, using a name assigned to young people who targeted an exploit in the ignition system that made certain Kia and Hyundai vehicles easy to steal.
Click here for a retrospective from Motor Trend.
Grogan said the trend stopped rising once manufacturers issued a fix.
Drug crimes have remained steady, the chief said. The data shows there were 22 cases reported in 2025, compared to 18 in 2024 and 14 in 2022.
A quirk the new chief is dealing with – getting officers back into the habit of doing traffic stops.
Connecticut data shows there were 1,127 traffic stops in Derby in 2019. During the COVID-19 era of 2020, 2021, and 2022, police in Derby averaged just 399 stops per year – or roughly one a day.
Routine traffic stops weren’t done during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic for health reasons, Grogan said. Plus the passage of the police accountability act in Connecticut, which changed some rules about traffic stops, had officers thinking twice before pulling over motorists.
“COVID hits, all of a sudden everything is shut down. Have minimal contact. Don’t stop unless it was an egregious offense,” Grogan said. “At the same time, the accountability bill hits. I think now, a lot of the older guys have retired, and the others have made adjustments. You have to evolve. Now we’re reshaping the officers to do something they were just told not to do.”
Traffic stops in Derby are now closer to pre-pandemic levels. There were 1,030 stops in 2023, and 827 stops in 2024.
The crime trends overall in Derby look good and the department is in solid hands with Grogan, Mayor Joseph DiMartino said.
The mayor said the rank-and-file like and respect Grogan, which means they are willing to work alongside him.
The mayor said that Grogan is responsive to residents’ complaints, the non-criminal of which often come through his office.
“He has always been very accessible. I call him, pass along a problem, and he’ll say ‘Let’s bring them in and we’ll talk to him’,” DiMartino said. “He’s about solving people’s problems and I’ll think he’ll go down as one of the best police chiefs we’ve ever had.”
Grogan’s annual salary is $146,607.