Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy said Monday he’s “embarrassed” by the allegations that members of the East Haven police department were attacking and intimidating Latino residents.

Four police officers were arrested by the FBI in January and charged with assaults, false arrest and intimidation of Latino residents and business owners. The incident led to the retirement of the town’s police chief.

Delivering the keynote address at a symposium on race and crime at John Jay College in Manhattan on Monday, Malloy said there is no excuse for the kind of behavior the arrested officers allegedly carried out.

“We’re going to hold people to a much higher standard,” Malloy said. “As a Connecticut resident, I’m embarrassed. And I think most Connecticut residents are embarrassed.”

The governor said he's charged his Undersecretary for Criminal Justice, Mike Lawlor, with making sure the state is complying with its own laws and gathering information about the racial demographics of police stops.

Leonard Gallo, chief of the East Haven Police Department, has been chastised by federal civil rights investigators for creating a hostile environment for witnesses. He was suspended in April 2010 after the FBI launched a criminal investigation but was reinstated to the post in November. At the time, Governor Malloy expressed his displeasure with the reinstatement, but he has not weighed in on whether Gallo’s replacement should come from outside the East Haven Police Department.

With the Associated Press