William G. Brooks III retired in 2024 as the Chief of the Norwood, Massachusetts Police Department following a career of 47 years. Earlier in his career he served as a patrolman with the Westwood Police Department and as the Deputy Chief of Police in Wellesley. In addition to his 12 years as the Chief in Norwood, he also served as a patrolman and sergeant, and for 14 years as a detective sergeant. From 1987 until his retirement, he served as the Director of the NORPAC Task Force, a multi-agency task force focused on drug enforcement in Norfolk County.
Chief Brooks served as a vice president of the Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association, and in 2016 as president. In 2019, he was named Chief of the Year. He served for 10 years on the Board of Directors at the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) and since 2018 has served as chair of the IACP’s Firearms Committee.
Chief Brooks was a police academy instructor for over 25 years and presented to police and criminal justice agencies across the U.S. for over ten years on eyewitness identification. He served on the SJC Working Group that produced the Report and Recommendation to the Justices on eyewitness identification, the committee at the National Academy of Sciences that issued the 2014 report “Identifying the Culprit, Assessing Eyewitness Identification” and on a task force on eyewitness identification at the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. He was the 2012 recipient of the Innocence Network’s Champion of Justice Award, and in 2015 received the IACP’s Civil Rights Award for Individual Achievement. He is a graduate of the 175th Session of the FBI National Academy.