Chitwood’s tough talk makes for a popular T-shirt in Pa.

PORTLAND – Former Portland Police Chief Michael Chitwood was known for his tough talk. Now one of his expressions is being trumpeted.

Police officers in Chitwood’s new department in Upper Darby, Pa., have taken one of his phrases – “Not In My Town, Scumbag” – and put it on a T-shirt.

The message targets drug pushers in Upper Darby, where police conducted 68 drug raids and made 132 arrests during the first 11 months of this year, Chitwood said.

The T-shirts are so popular that the police department had to set up a special Web site to handle sales. Chitwood estimated his department has sold around 700 of the shirts and raised about $3,000 for the Dennis McNamara Scholarship Foundation.

McNamara was an Upper Darby police officer who was shot and killed on duty in early 2002. His family awards a scholarship to a local high school student interested in poetry or music, two of McNamara’s hobbies, Chitwood said.

The media attention garnered by the T-shirts doesn’t surprise his former colleagues in Portland, where Chitwood earned the title “Media Mike.”

“He always threw around a lot of colorful words to get people’s attention – and it works,” said Deputy Police Chief Joseph Loughlin.

On the Net: www.scumbag

teeshirts.com