New Officer Joins Department after Completing Police Academy

Officer Angelo Ucci is the Bedford Police Department’s newest police academy graduate. Courtesy Image

The Bedford Police Department’s newest police academy graduate chose his career path after experiencing his hometown’s police outreach program as a high school student.

Officer Angelo Ucci recently completed entry-level training at the MBTA Police Academy, where he graduated first academically, more than a month ago. He is now field training with experienced Bedford colleagues, said Police Chief John Fisher.

A 2018 graduate of Reading Memorial High School, Ucci said he decided to pursue law enforcement after enrolling in that town’s Citizens Police Academy, nine weekly two-hour sessions covering many aspects of police work that usually enrolls adult residents.

Ucci received an undergraduate degree in criminal justice from Western New England University in Springfield in 2022, then worked for a year and a half in security at Massachusetts General Hospital, “kind of getting my feet wet.” There he got to know former Bedford Police Chief Robert Bongiorno, now senior manager of police and security for MGH.

Ucci is the last Bedford officer hired under the Civil Service system; Special Town Meeting approved Bedford’s separation from the Civil Service system for the Police and Fire Departments in the fall of 2023. Ucci said that after he passed the Civil Service test, when the opportunity came up to join the Bedford police force, he grabbed it.

“This is a great community. The department is full of really helpful and talented people,” he testified. “All of the historical sites, the farmland – it runs the gamut of what people do.”

“I’m happy to be at a place that focuses on learning,” he added. Ucci still resides with his parents in Reading and is pursuing a master’s degree in business administration from Bentley University.

Fisher reported that there are three other officers in the pipeline, all with local connections. Patrick Coady of Bedford is attending the police academy in Lowell along with Leslie Zayas, who was working in the town. Kathryn Brown, formerly on the staff at Kids Club, starts at the Boylston academy on July 8.