Gov. Maura Healey defended the Massachusetts State Police Tuesday in the wake of “disgusting” comments made this month by a trooper serving as the lead investigator in the Karen Read murder case.

Remarks from Trooper Michael Proctor about Read, including that the murder suspect is a “whack job” and that she “hopefully … kills herself,” have placed the law enforcement agency squarely back into the spotlight after years of scandals have called into question its integrity.

Healey, who already condemned Proctor’s comments, pushed back on criticism leveled at the entire agency during an interview on WBUR’s “Radio Boston,” arguing Proctor is an “individual” who does not represent the rest of the state police.

“One of the things that upsets me most, both as governor and a former attorney general, is that you have an individual who does things, who says things, who engages in conduct most unbecoming of anyone who’s serving, not just in law enforcement, but in a public position, and then it impugns the integrity and the hard work of men and women,” Healey said.

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Proctor sent many of the comments on Read in text messages to friends and co-workers as he investigated Read, who is accused of killing Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe two years ago when she allegedly rammed her vehicle into him.

Read’s lawyers have denied the accusations and used Proctor’s comments as a way to characterize the murder investigation as biased.

Proctor said the text messages were “inappropriate.”

“These regrettable and unprofessional comments are not something I’m proud of and are not something I should have written in private or any other setting,” Proctor said during court proceedings earlier this month.

Renewed scrutiny on the state police comes as Healey is in the process of selecting the next superintendent and colonel of the agency. A six-person panel was in the process of interviewing finalists for the job earlier this month and the next commander could come from outside the agency.

Healey said she is looking for someone who is capable of operating with “the highest level of integrity, of competence, and ensuring that we are both recruiting and retaining and training men and women in the state police who will best serve the public.”

“That’s what I’m looking for,” she said.