The drug- and alcohol-related arrest of the director of A Better Tomorrow, a nonprofit connected to Chattanooga’s Violence Reduction Initiative, won’t interfere with the program to cut violent crime, city leaders said Saturday.
Richard Kevin Bennett, 48, founder and director of the nonprofit, was discovered by Chattanooga police officers in East Lake Park late Friday night. Officers had been alerted to watch for a blue or silver minivan being driven erratically.
Bennett was in a minivan with a woman and his pants were unzipped, the police report stated. Police saw two open bottles of Budweiser and an open bottle of Patron tequila in plain view, and found a baggie with less than a gram of marijuana in the glove box and a container on his key chain containing one-and-a-half 7.5mg hydrocodone pills.
The woman told officers that she was meeting Bennett because he owed her money. Bennett said he was getting information for the VRI from her, the report stated.
Lacie Stone, spokeswoman for Mayor Andy Berke, said Bennett will no longer be associated with the mayor’s high-profile plan to reduce violent crime.