NN Police Chief responds to Vick

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. - "I let myself down," said Michael Vick in an exclusive interview with CBS 60 Minutes Sunday night.  The Newport News native discussed his fall from grace, after pleading guilty to federal dogfighting charges and at least one comment Vick made about his hometown during that interview raised some eyebrows.

Briefly during the interview, Vick referenced his start in dogfighting and he said Newport News police would simply ignore a dogfight if they saw one. So WAVY.com took his comment to the Chief of Police, who is clearly disappointed in Vick's choice of words.

"I guess my reaction was, why would he put us in the middle?" says Chief Jim Fox.

Fox tells WAVY.com the City shouldn't be the focus of Michael Vick's former dogfighting issues. Yet in his interview on CBS 60 minutes, the newly signed Philadelphia Eagle partially blamed the Newport News Police Department, and their alleged lack of interest to stop the dogfighting he saw as a child, as a reason for his actions.

"When they got out of the car and seen that, you know, it was two dogs fighting, they got back in the car and they left. So that right there kind of made me feel like, 'Okay, you know, this ain't - it is not as bad as it may seem,'" Vick said to 60 Minutes.

"Number one, if the officers got out of the car, if they did, and they ignored it, that's unacceptable behavior on the part of the officers. I wouldn't tolerate that as Chief of Police," says Fox.

Fox says he can't control what may have happened in the past. It's the Newport News of today he focuses on and he says dogfighting is not a huge issue right now on the streets...nor will it become an issue under his watch.

"That's like allowing people to fight. We're not going to let that occur and we're surely not going to allow the organized fighting of animals. It's not right and it's against the law."

The Chief is also quick to say, "Michael Vick has worked in the city just recently. I'm on the board of the Boys and Girls Club. I know that we had him working in the Boys and Girls Club. I wish him luck in changing his life and moving forward."