"When [Chafin] walked through the Yard, people knew him," says one senior police official. "The officers don't know Johnson."

For one thing, Johnson has no strong lies to Harvard. His social friends were more likely to include Democratic movers and shakers than Harvard police officers or administrators, and he lives in Milton, not Cambridge.

While Johnson focused on his day-to-day policing responsibilities, many of the problems that would come to divide the department festered, particularly in the security division. Periodic negotiations between management and the police and security guards unions often inflamed tensions, officers and guards say.

But equally as troublesome was outside criticism. The Harvard police department has repeatedly been accused of singling out Black students for harassment during Johnson's tenure. But even in these cases, students and administrators refrained from criticizing Johnson even as they lambasted the officers he supervised.

"I think our chief, Paul E. Johnson, has made a very great effort to sensitize his department," Director of the Harvard Foundation Dr. S. Allen Counter said after a fall 1987 meeting with Johnson to discuss alleged police harassment. "He has really worked hard at that. He shares the students' concerns."

In each public case, though, the chief has defended his officers' actions and cast doubt on student complaints.

In spring 1989, Harvard police were present as Cambridge police stopped a shuttle bus and removed two Black undergraduates who were suspected of shoplifting at Rix Pharmacy of JFK St. After the two students were searched without anything being found, police officers from both forces left without any explanation.

Johnson said Harvard police later arrested a white suspect in the incident, and insisted police had done nothing wrong. He has said he believes that Harvard police officers only stop people when they look suspicious, and that his officers never break the law.

But, in the 1989 case, Johnson received half-hearted backing from the Harvard administration. After a rally by about 250 students, administrators and faculty to protest what they called racial harassment, General Counsel Daniel Steiner '54 issued an apology to the two Black students, although he defended the conduct of the Harvard police as being within procedural guidelines.

In 1990, gay members of the Harvard community criticized the police department after a slew of arrests of several men in a Science Center bathroom for zalleged "lewdness." He met with members of the gay community and was praised for his role in increasing dialogue, but again, he defended his officers' conduct.

After security guards removed high school debaters from Sever Hall one night in the spring of 1991, Harvard debate coach Dallas G. Ferkins said University police had engaged in misconduct.

Nothing that security guards and no police officers were involved. Johnson denied the charges, but then went one step further. He accused the debate coach of a "set-up" to discredit the police, but refused to explain further.

But perhaps the strongest criticism of Johnson's officers was the most recent. Last spring, the Black Students Association distributed a flyer to undergraduates citing four cases in which Harvard officers allegedly mistreated students because of their race.

In interviews, Black students and Harvard police officers gave similar accounts of specific cases but disagreed on whether the incidents constituted racial harassment. The officers, in particular, said they were generally understanding of the students' concerns, but Johnson blasted the flier for inaccuracies.

"I felt the need to address the specific charges made by the Black Students Association," Johnson said in May. "There are glaring misstatements in the flyer--errors of fact."