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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>This story was updated on April 16, 2024 at 4:45 p.m.\u003c/strong>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San José leaders appointed a former police officer as the city’s new independent police auditor on Tuesday, less than a year after the previous auditor retired abruptly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eddie Aubrey, who currently investigates police misconduct as the civilian manager in the office of professional accountability for the Richmond Police Department, will take over as San José’s IPA on May 6, the city announced in a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey served more than a decade as a police officer in Southern California in the 1980s and 1990s, including for the Los Angeles Police Department, according to the city and his LinkedIn profile.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11983170\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11983170 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eddie Aubrey, who currently investigates police misconduct as the civilian manager for the Richmond Police Department, will take over as San José’s IPA on May 6. \u003ccite>(Joseph Geha/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>His other law enforcement and police oversight experience includes stints as the chief prosecuting attorney for Renton, Washington, the Independent Reviewer in charge of civilian oversight of police in Fresno and seven years as a pro tem judge in Washington. He has also run a law firm and headed up a college public safety department and risk management department in Tacoma, Washington.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am honored and privileged to assume the role of your next independent police auditor,” Aubrey said in the city statement. “I look forward to the opportunity to engage with the diverse communities in San José, advancing police accountability and enhancing police services.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey, during a press conference on Tuesday afternoon, addressed potential concern over a former police officer taking the lead role in police oversight in San José. He said his commitment is to fair and unbiased oversight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My demonstrated history shows that I have held officers accountable. Officers have been terminated; they have been suspended,” he said. He also noted officers in other cases he worked on were exonerated. “So they have a 15-year track record to look at.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San José Mayor Matt Mahan said in a statement that Aubrey will help maintain trust between residents and the Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re incredibly fortunate to have a new independent police auditor with extensive experience both working within and overseeing the conduct of law enforcement agencies,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey said he grew up with an African American father and a Korean mother in South Central Los Angeles and was on the police force during the violence and civil unrest taking place after the police beating of Rodney King.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m looking at my neighborhood burned down, shots being fired, in the middle of the night, cars [are being] overturned,” he said. “And I asked myself, ‘Am I doing enough in the role of police officer?’ I said, ‘I’m doing a lot, but I can do a lot more.’ And that’s what made me decide that I wanted to change and be a lawyer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey will replace interim Independent Police Auditor Karyn Sinunu-Towery, who has held the position since last summer, a time of turmoil for the office.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery, a former 30-year prosecutor in Santa Clara County, was appointed to the temporary role following former IPA Shivaun Nurre’s unexpected retirement in June after nearly five years in the role.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was later revealed that just before she retired, Nurre got into a heated verbal argument with a San José police officer at a public event while she was drunk. [aside postID=news_11983106 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SanJosePolice01-1020x680.jpg']A few months later, the assistant IPA, Eva Roa, resigned and wrote a letter lambasting city management and officials for largely ignoring the IPA’s office and criticizing Sinunu-Towery for being too trusting of police department investigators.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before Nurre’s retirement, she advocated for the city to grant expanded powers to the IPA’s office, including the right to directly conduct civilian investigations into alleged police misconduct instead of only auditing internal police investigations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Former Mayor Sam Liccardo backed the proposal but later stalled without enough support.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In November last year, the City Council voted 8–2 against expanding the IPA’s powers. Sinunu-Towery, when she first took on the role, said she supported the idea of more power for the office but later reversed course, saying the office needed to take better advantage of the powers it already has.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey said Tuesday that he thinks San José’s oversight program is a “really excellent model,” though he left open the possibility of change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Right now, what I’m looking at is what do we have, what can we use and how effectively can we use that model in the things that we’re doing there,” he said. “And then, we’re always open to entertaining other options there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>This story was updated on April 16, 2024 at 4:45 p.m.\u003c/strong>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San José leaders appointed a former police officer as the city’s new independent police auditor on Tuesday, less than a year after the previous auditor retired abruptly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eddie Aubrey, who currently investigates police misconduct as the civilian manager in the office of professional accountability for the Richmond Police Department, will take over as San José’s IPA on May 6, the city announced in a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey served more than a decade as a police officer in Southern California in the 1980s and 1990s, including for the Los Angeles Police Department, according to the city and his LinkedIn profile.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11983170\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11983170 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/04/SJ-NEW-INDEPENDENT-POLICE-AUDITOR-4-GH-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eddie Aubrey, who currently investigates police misconduct as the civilian manager for the Richmond Police Department, will take over as San José’s IPA on May 6. \u003ccite>(Joseph Geha/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>His other law enforcement and police oversight experience includes stints as the chief prosecuting attorney for Renton, Washington, the Independent Reviewer in charge of civilian oversight of police in Fresno and seven years as a pro tem judge in Washington. He has also run a law firm and headed up a college public safety department and risk management department in Tacoma, Washington.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am honored and privileged to assume the role of your next independent police auditor,” Aubrey said in the city statement. “I look forward to the opportunity to engage with the diverse communities in San José, advancing police accountability and enhancing police services.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey, during a press conference on Tuesday afternoon, addressed potential concern over a former police officer taking the lead role in police oversight in San José. He said his commitment is to fair and unbiased oversight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My demonstrated history shows that I have held officers accountable. Officers have been terminated; they have been suspended,” he said. He also noted officers in other cases he worked on were exonerated. “So they have a 15-year track record to look at.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San José Mayor Matt Mahan said in a statement that Aubrey will help maintain trust between residents and the Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re incredibly fortunate to have a new independent police auditor with extensive experience both working within and overseeing the conduct of law enforcement agencies,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey said he grew up with an African American father and a Korean mother in South Central Los Angeles and was on the police force during the violence and civil unrest taking place after the police beating of Rodney King.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m looking at my neighborhood burned down, shots being fired, in the middle of the night, cars [are being] overturned,” he said. “And I asked myself, ‘Am I doing enough in the role of police officer?’ I said, ‘I’m doing a lot, but I can do a lot more.’ And that’s what made me decide that I wanted to change and be a lawyer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey will replace interim Independent Police Auditor Karyn Sinunu-Towery, who has held the position since last summer, a time of turmoil for the office.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery, a former 30-year prosecutor in Santa Clara County, was appointed to the temporary role following former IPA Shivaun Nurre’s unexpected retirement in June after nearly five years in the role.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was later revealed that just before she retired, Nurre got into a heated verbal argument with a San José police officer at a public event while she was drunk. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>A few months later, the assistant IPA, Eva Roa, resigned and wrote a letter lambasting city management and officials for largely ignoring the IPA’s office and criticizing Sinunu-Towery for being too trusting of police department investigators.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before Nurre’s retirement, she advocated for the city to grant expanded powers to the IPA’s office, including the right to directly conduct civilian investigations into alleged police misconduct instead of only auditing internal police investigations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Former Mayor Sam Liccardo backed the proposal but later stalled without enough support.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In November last year, the City Council voted 8–2 against expanding the IPA’s powers. Sinunu-Towery, when she first took on the role, said she supported the idea of more power for the office but later reversed course, saying the office needed to take better advantage of the powers it already has.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Aubrey said Tuesday that he thinks San José’s oversight program is a “really excellent model,” though he left open the possibility of change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Right now, what I’m looking at is what do we have, what can we use and how effectively can we use that model in the things that we’re doing there,” he said. “And then, we’re always open to entertaining other options there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11963782/qa-new-investigation-finds-most-people-injured-killed-by-san-jose-police-are-mentally-ill-or-intoxicated\">San José’s Police Department\u003c/a> saw a decrease in complaints against officers in 2023, following three straight years of increases, a new watchdog report found.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In all, San José’s Police Department received 367 complaints about its officers in 2023, with 47 of those generated by the department, according to an annual oversight report from the San José Independent Police Auditor’s Office. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Sgt. Jorge Garibay, spokesperson, San José Police Department\"]‘The department has, and continues to, reinforce its commitment to officer accountability.’[/pullquote]By the end of 2023, the report said 285 officers received at least one conduct complaint, accounting for about 27% of San José’s 1,059 sworn officers. That represents a 6% reduction from 2022, when about a third of all officers received at least one conduct complaint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The report, which was set to be discussed at the San José City Council meeting on Tuesday, is the first issued by Karyn Sinunu-Towery, the interim police auditor appointed after the city’s former IPA abruptly retired last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sgt. Jorge Garibay, a spokesperson for SJPD, told KQED in an email the decrease in complaints “is a direct reflection of increased training and officer accountability.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Garibay highlighted a monthly newsletter sent to the department by Internal Affairs since June 2022 to share current trends and “remind department members of the policies and procedures governing the agency.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The department also recognizes the number of complaints received annually is based on several factors, Garibay said. “The department has, and continues to, reinforce its commitment to officer accountability.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the percentage of overall complaints received in 2023 was down 6% from the year before, the rate at which complaints lodged against officers were determined to likely be true, increased by 6% from the year prior, the report said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>About 24% of complaints from members of the public about the conduct of officers were sustained, meaning they were found more likely than not to be true. That is the highest percentage of sustained complaints recorded by the IPA’s office in the past two decades, according to a review of previous years’ data by KQED News.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In San José, the Police Department’s Internal Affairs division investigates such complaints, which are reviewed by the IPA’s office. The report shows 306 conduct complaints were reviewed in 2023, with 74 closed as sustained. [aside postID=news_11966615 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/11/231106-SAN-JOSE-POLICE-01-KQED-1020x680.jpg']Complaints reviewed and tabulated for annual reports are not necessarily tied to complaints received that same year, as the investigation and auditing process can take up to a year in some cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Police Department declined to say what might be causing the increase in sustained complaints but noted it could also depend on many factors, including the nature and types of complaints reviewed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The allegations contained within the complaints also vary and range widely from rare, major misconduct to the frequent minor transgressions,” Garibay said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery told KQED that the department is a “really young” one, which could play a role in the sustained complaints increase.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The officers that are really on the ground, in the field dealing with citizens, the majority of those officers are still pretty young,” she said. “In the first five years, an officer is on duty, he or she is more likely to make mistakes than a seasoned officer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery’s oversight report is significantly shorter and includes much less information than most prior year reports authored under other auditors. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Karyn Sinunu-Towery, interim police auditor, City of San José\"]‘In the first five years an officer is on duty, he or she is more likely to make mistakes than a seasoned officer.’[/pullquote]Sinunu-Towery’s report, for example, declined to include breakdowns of how many officers received multiple complaints — and how many complaints they each received.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And though she suggested in an interview that the level of experience of officers on the streets might play a role in the number and types of complaints a department receives, her report did not include information on the experience level of officers named in complaints in 2023.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She also did not include the ethnicities or other demographic information about the people bringing complaints against officers. She attributed her report’s differences, compared to prior-year reports, to a difference in “style.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery, a former 30-year Santa Clara County prosecutor, was appointed last summer to replace Shivaun Nurre, a longtime IPA employee who helmed the office from 2018 through June 2023.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nurre’s unexpected retirement came about without much public notice, raising questions about her departure. It was later revealed that just before she retired, Nurre got into a heated verbal argument with a San José police officer at a public event \u003ca href=\"https://sanjosespotlight.com/san-jose-police-watchdog-had-drunken-argument-with-police-ahead-of-retirement/\">while she was drunk\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A few months later, the assistant IPA, Eva Roa, resigned and wrote a letter lambasting city management and officials for largely ignoring the IPA’s office and criticizing Sinunu-Towery for being too trusting of police department investigators.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A new permanent IPA is expected to be named during Tuesday’s meeting by the City Council.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11963782/qa-new-investigation-finds-most-people-injured-killed-by-san-jose-police-are-mentally-ill-or-intoxicated\">San José’s Police Department\u003c/a> saw a decrease in complaints against officers in 2023, following three straight years of increases, a new watchdog report found.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In all, San José’s Police Department received 367 complaints about its officers in 2023, with 47 of those generated by the department, according to an annual oversight report from the San José Independent Police Auditor’s Office. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘The department has, and continues to, reinforce its commitment to officer accountability.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>By the end of 2023, the report said 285 officers received at least one conduct complaint, accounting for about 27% of San José’s 1,059 sworn officers. That represents a 6% reduction from 2022, when about a third of all officers received at least one conduct complaint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The report, which was set to be discussed at the San José City Council meeting on Tuesday, is the first issued by Karyn Sinunu-Towery, the interim police auditor appointed after the city’s former IPA abruptly retired last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sgt. Jorge Garibay, a spokesperson for SJPD, told KQED in an email the decrease in complaints “is a direct reflection of increased training and officer accountability.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Garibay highlighted a monthly newsletter sent to the department by Internal Affairs since June 2022 to share current trends and “remind department members of the policies and procedures governing the agency.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The department also recognizes the number of complaints received annually is based on several factors, Garibay said. “The department has, and continues to, reinforce its commitment to officer accountability.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the percentage of overall complaints received in 2023 was down 6% from the year before, the rate at which complaints lodged against officers were determined to likely be true, increased by 6% from the year prior, the report said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>About 24% of complaints from members of the public about the conduct of officers were sustained, meaning they were found more likely than not to be true. That is the highest percentage of sustained complaints recorded by the IPA’s office in the past two decades, according to a review of previous years’ data by KQED News.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In San José, the Police Department’s Internal Affairs division investigates such complaints, which are reviewed by the IPA’s office. The report shows 306 conduct complaints were reviewed in 2023, with 74 closed as sustained. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Complaints reviewed and tabulated for annual reports are not necessarily tied to complaints received that same year, as the investigation and auditing process can take up to a year in some cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Police Department declined to say what might be causing the increase in sustained complaints but noted it could also depend on many factors, including the nature and types of complaints reviewed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The allegations contained within the complaints also vary and range widely from rare, major misconduct to the frequent minor transgressions,” Garibay said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery told KQED that the department is a “really young” one, which could play a role in the sustained complaints increase.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The officers that are really on the ground, in the field dealing with citizens, the majority of those officers are still pretty young,” she said. “In the first five years, an officer is on duty, he or she is more likely to make mistakes than a seasoned officer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery’s oversight report is significantly shorter and includes much less information than most prior year reports authored under other auditors. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery’s report, for example, declined to include breakdowns of how many officers received multiple complaints — and how many complaints they each received.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And though she suggested in an interview that the level of experience of officers on the streets might play a role in the number and types of complaints a department receives, her report did not include information on the experience level of officers named in complaints in 2023.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She also did not include the ethnicities or other demographic information about the people bringing complaints against officers. She attributed her report’s differences, compared to prior-year reports, to a difference in “style.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sinunu-Towery, a former 30-year Santa Clara County prosecutor, was appointed last summer to replace Shivaun Nurre, a longtime IPA employee who helmed the office from 2018 through June 2023.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nurre’s unexpected retirement came about without much public notice, raising questions about her departure. It was later revealed that just before she retired, Nurre got into a heated verbal argument with a San José police officer at a public event \u003ca href=\"https://sanjosespotlight.com/san-jose-police-watchdog-had-drunken-argument-with-police-ahead-of-retirement/\">while she was drunk\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A few months later, the assistant IPA, Eva Roa, resigned and wrote a letter lambasting city management and officials for largely ignoring the IPA’s office and criticizing Sinunu-Towery for being too trusting of police department investigators.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A new permanent IPA is expected to be named during Tuesday’s meeting by the City Council.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Stockton Settles $6 Million Lawsuit Over Man's Police Restraint Death",
"headTitle": "Stockton Settles $6 Million Lawsuit Over Man’s Police Restraint Death | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>The city of Stockton has agreed to settle a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of Shayne Sutherland, a 29-year-old who died after being held face down by Stockton Police officers in 2020, for $6 million, the family’s attorneys announced Thursday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland’s mother, Karen Sutherland, said nothing could replace her son, but the settlement feels like an acknowledgment of responsibility from Stockton Police that she has been hoping for. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Karen Sutherland, mother of Shayne Sutherland\"]‘It shows that they’re taking responsibility for their police officers causing the wrongful death of my son.’[/pullquote]“It shows that they’re taking responsibility for their police officers causing the wrongful death of my son,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Stockton Police Department did not respond to requests for comment about the settlement and would not discuss the case for an earlier story reported by The California Newsroom and The California Reporting Project.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland died after an early morning run-in with Stockton Police Officers Ronald Zalunardo and John Afanasiev at an AMPM convenience store.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland had been acting strangely in the store, wandering in and out and asking to use the store phone and the clerk’s cellphone, according to police reports, surveillance footage and 911 recordings. He called 911 himself and said he needed a taxi.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The store clerk also called 911 to report that Sutherland was threatening him with the wine bottle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the officers arrived, Sutherland followed them outside, sat against a wall as instructed and answered the officers’ questions. After a while, Sutherland stood up suddenly, and officers tackled him to the ground, holding him face down for about eight minutes, according to body camera footage. [aside postID=news_11977145 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-36-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg']The Sutherland family filed the federal civil rights suit against the city of Stockton, Officers Zalunardo and Afanasiev and former Stockton Police Chief Eric Jones in 2021, citing wrongful death, negligence and excessive use of force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland left behind a son, 8, and daughter, 7. At the press conference announcing the settlement, his mother spoke of the hole his death left in their lives. His son wears a keychain with a photo of Sutherland, she said, and his daughter asks about why he died so young.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The settlement funds will go to Sutherland’s two children and his mother. The Stockton City Council has approved the settlement, but a judge still needs to sign off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Experts have warned for decades that holding people face down for prolonged periods can compress a person’s torso and restrict their ability to breathe and pump blood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles/posasph.pdf\">1995 U.S. Department of Justice bulletin\u003c/a> warned that face-down holds — known as prone restraint — can result in positional asphyxia or not being able to breathe due to the position of the body.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977047\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11977047\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karen Sutherland sits by her son Shayne’s gravesite at the Park View Cemetery in Manteca, Calif., on Feb. 24, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>New research published in 2022 also notes that prone restraint \u003ca href=\"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35869602/\">may cause cardiac arrest\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DOJ bulletin advises officers to turn people onto their sides or sit them up as soon as they’re handcuffed to allow them to breathe more easily. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Seth Stoughton, law professor and former police officer, University of South Carolina\"]‘Once someone has been handcuffed, you get them off their stomach, even if they’re still struggling.’[/pullquote]Zalunardo and Afanasiev handcuffed Sutherland within 30 seconds but didn’t turn him over until nearly eight minutes later. Afanasiev put his weight on Sutherland’s back for about half of that time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Seth Stoughton, a former police officer who now teaches law at the University of South Carolina, said that deaths following prone restraint are easy to prevent as long as officers follow this procedure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I would say any, or at least damn near any defensive-tactics use-of-force trainer, any police expert, they’re going to tell you: Once someone has been handcuffed, you get them off their stomach, even if they’re still struggling,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California passed a law, AB 490, in 2021 that \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220AB490\">banned police from using maneuvers that put people at significant risk of positional asphyxia\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Assemblymember Mike Gipson, who authored the bill, is a former police officer. He said the bill was inspired by the deaths of numerous people, including George Floyd and Angelo Quinto, who died after being held face down by police officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Antioch, California, respectively.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977052\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11977052\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karen Sutherland holds a photo collage of her son Shayne at Park View Cemetery, where he is buried, in Manteca, Calif., on Feb. 24, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Gipson said the potential deadliness of prone restraint necessitates a total ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We cannot afford these techniques to be used at all,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gipson stressed the need for more comprehensive training to prevent these deaths and accountability for those who have died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/feb/28/california-police-officers-prone-restraint-deaths\">February 2024 investigation\u003c/a> by the California Newsroom and the California Reporting Project found that between 2016 and 2022, at least 22 people died in California after being held face down by police. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Assemblymember Mike Gipson\"]‘We cannot afford these techniques to be used at all.’[/pullquote]At least two of those people died after AB 490 went into effect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the Sutherland case and decades of warnings by experts about the dangers of prone restraint, the Stockton Police Department made \u003ca href=\"https://cms3.revize.com/revize/stockton/Documents/Services/Police%20Department/Police%20News%20and%20Information/General%20Orders/300%20Use%20of%20Force.pdf\">an updated use-of-force policy effective on March 11, 2024\u003c/a>, that states that positional and restraint asphyxia “remain the subject of debate among experts and medical professionals” and “are not universally recognized medical conditions.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The department did not respond to requests for comment about the updated policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Families of people in California who have died following prone restraint have won at least $41 million in lawsuits across the state, according to court documents and press reports obtained by the California Newsroom and the California Reporting Project.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Sutherland settlement is not included in that tally, as a judge hasn’t approved the agreement. [aside postID=news_11949359 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64219_010_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1020x680.jpg']The San Joaquin County Medical Examiner attributed Sutherland’s death to a cardiac arrest and noted that meth intoxication also played a role. The death was ruled accidental.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the Sutherland family commissioned a second autopsy as part of the lawsuit. Former San Joaquin County Medical Examiner Dr. Bennet Omalu, who performed the procedure, ruled Sutherland’s death a homicide and said he died due to positional asphyxia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karen Sutherland said she hopes the hefty settlement will help deter other police departments from similar practices and encourage officers to follow their pledge to protect and serve.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Because what happened that day on Oct. 8, 2020, with my son as he’s begging for his life and not a threat at all, they weren’t practicing what they should have been,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want this to never, ever happen again,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was co-reported by The California Reporting Project and The California Newsroom, a collaboration of public media outlets across the state. Special thanks to Berkeley Journalism’s Investigative Reporting Program, Stanford’s Big Local News, and the Ira A. Lipman Center for Journalism and Civil and Human Rights.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The city of Stockton has agreed to settle a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of Shayne Sutherland, a 29-year-old who died after being held face down by Stockton Police officers in 2020, for $6 million, the family’s attorneys announced Thursday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland’s mother, Karen Sutherland, said nothing could replace her son, but the settlement feels like an acknowledgment of responsibility from Stockton Police that she has been hoping for. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘It shows that they’re taking responsibility for their police officers causing the wrongful death of my son.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“It shows that they’re taking responsibility for their police officers causing the wrongful death of my son,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Stockton Police Department did not respond to requests for comment about the settlement and would not discuss the case for an earlier story reported by The California Newsroom and The California Reporting Project.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland died after an early morning run-in with Stockton Police Officers Ronald Zalunardo and John Afanasiev at an AMPM convenience store.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland had been acting strangely in the store, wandering in and out and asking to use the store phone and the clerk’s cellphone, according to police reports, surveillance footage and 911 recordings. He called 911 himself and said he needed a taxi.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The store clerk also called 911 to report that Sutherland was threatening him with the wine bottle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the officers arrived, Sutherland followed them outside, sat against a wall as instructed and answered the officers’ questions. After a while, Sutherland stood up suddenly, and officers tackled him to the ground, holding him face down for about eight minutes, according to body camera footage. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The Sutherland family filed the federal civil rights suit against the city of Stockton, Officers Zalunardo and Afanasiev and former Stockton Police Chief Eric Jones in 2021, citing wrongful death, negligence and excessive use of force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland left behind a son, 8, and daughter, 7. At the press conference announcing the settlement, his mother spoke of the hole his death left in their lives. His son wears a keychain with a photo of Sutherland, she said, and his daughter asks about why he died so young.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The settlement funds will go to Sutherland’s two children and his mother. The Stockton City Council has approved the settlement, but a judge still needs to sign off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Experts have warned for decades that holding people face down for prolonged periods can compress a person’s torso and restrict their ability to breathe and pump blood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles/posasph.pdf\">1995 U.S. Department of Justice bulletin\u003c/a> warned that face-down holds — known as prone restraint — can result in positional asphyxia or not being able to breathe due to the position of the body.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977047\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11977047\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karen Sutherland sits by her son Shayne’s gravesite at the Park View Cemetery in Manteca, Calif., on Feb. 24, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>New research published in 2022 also notes that prone restraint \u003ca href=\"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35869602/\">may cause cardiac arrest\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DOJ bulletin advises officers to turn people onto their sides or sit them up as soon as they’re handcuffed to allow them to breathe more easily. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘Once someone has been handcuffed, you get them off their stomach, even if they’re still struggling.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Zalunardo and Afanasiev handcuffed Sutherland within 30 seconds but didn’t turn him over until nearly eight minutes later. Afanasiev put his weight on Sutherland’s back for about half of that time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Seth Stoughton, a former police officer who now teaches law at the University of South Carolina, said that deaths following prone restraint are easy to prevent as long as officers follow this procedure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I would say any, or at least damn near any defensive-tactics use-of-force trainer, any police expert, they’re going to tell you: Once someone has been handcuffed, you get them off their stomach, even if they’re still struggling,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California passed a law, AB 490, in 2021 that \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220AB490\">banned police from using maneuvers that put people at significant risk of positional asphyxia\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Assemblymember Mike Gipson, who authored the bill, is a former police officer. He said the bill was inspired by the deaths of numerous people, including George Floyd and Angelo Quinto, who died after being held face down by police officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Antioch, California, respectively.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977052\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11977052\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-26-BL-KQED-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karen Sutherland holds a photo collage of her son Shayne at Park View Cemetery, where he is buried, in Manteca, Calif., on Feb. 24, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Gipson said the potential deadliness of prone restraint necessitates a total ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We cannot afford these techniques to be used at all,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gipson stressed the need for more comprehensive training to prevent these deaths and accountability for those who have died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/feb/28/california-police-officers-prone-restraint-deaths\">February 2024 investigation\u003c/a> by the California Newsroom and the California Reporting Project found that between 2016 and 2022, at least 22 people died in California after being held face down by police. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>At least two of those people died after AB 490 went into effect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the Sutherland case and decades of warnings by experts about the dangers of prone restraint, the Stockton Police Department made \u003ca href=\"https://cms3.revize.com/revize/stockton/Documents/Services/Police%20Department/Police%20News%20and%20Information/General%20Orders/300%20Use%20of%20Force.pdf\">an updated use-of-force policy effective on March 11, 2024\u003c/a>, that states that positional and restraint asphyxia “remain the subject of debate among experts and medical professionals” and “are not universally recognized medical conditions.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The department did not respond to requests for comment about the updated policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Families of people in California who have died following prone restraint have won at least $41 million in lawsuits across the state, according to court documents and press reports obtained by the California Newsroom and the California Reporting Project.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Sutherland settlement is not included in that tally, as a judge hasn’t approved the agreement. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The San Joaquin County Medical Examiner attributed Sutherland’s death to a cardiac arrest and noted that meth intoxication also played a role. The death was ruled accidental.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the Sutherland family commissioned a second autopsy as part of the lawsuit. Former San Joaquin County Medical Examiner Dr. Bennet Omalu, who performed the procedure, ruled Sutherland’s death a homicide and said he died due to positional asphyxia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karen Sutherland said she hopes the hefty settlement will help deter other police departments from similar practices and encourage officers to follow their pledge to protect and serve.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Because what happened that day on Oct. 8, 2020, with my son as he’s begging for his life and not a threat at all, they weren’t practicing what they should have been,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want this to never, ever happen again,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was co-reported by The California Reporting Project and The California Newsroom, a collaboration of public media outlets across the state. Special thanks to Berkeley Journalism’s Investigative Reporting Program, Stanford’s Big Local News, and the Ira A. Lipman Center for Journalism and Civil and Human Rights.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "despite-decades-of-warnings-people-are-still-dying-after-police-hold-them-face-down",
"title": "Despite Decades of Warnings, People Are Still Dying After Police Hold Them Face Down",
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"content": "\u003cp>[dropcap]O[/dropcap]n a Thursday morning in October 2020, less than five months after George Floyd was held on his stomach by Minneapolis police until he died, Shayne Sutherland called 911 from a convenience store in Stockton, California, and asked for a taxi.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the operator told Sutherland he’d dialed 911, he said someone was trying to rob him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Stockton Police Officers Ronald Zalunardo and John Afanasiev arrived at the store about 15 minutes later. In the meantime, a store employee had called 911, saying Sutherland was threatening him with a wine bottle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In body camera footage that captured the officers’ response, Sutherland seems fidgety, and his speech is difficult to understand at times, but he doesn’t appear violent, and he isn’t armed. He cooperates with police, addressing Zalunardo as “sir” and sitting against a wall outside the store as instructed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The officers question Sutherland. When he tells them he can’t remember why he’s under court supervision, Afanasiev says, “The drugs probably have something to do with it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“How long you been using meth,” Zalnunardo asks. Sutherland stutters and says he’s been using cocaine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland briefly stands, then sits when ordered to do so. A minute later, he stands up again. This time, the officers tackle him to the ground and hold him belly-down — a position known as prone restraint. Thirty seconds later, his hands are cuffed behind his back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That could have been the end of the encounter. Experts say prone restraint can be a safe, effective way to subdue someone and get them into handcuffs — so long as they’re quickly placed in a “recovery position” on their side or in a seated position to allow them to breathe more easily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Zalunardo and Afanasiev didn’t do that. The body camera footage shows them holding Sutherland belly-down for more than eight minutes. For nearly half that time, Afanasiev lays across Sutherland’s back. Sutherland panics, alternating between moaning and screaming for help as Zalunardo, who uses his baton and body weight to help keep Sutherland’s shoulder down, repeatedly tells him, “Relax!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Please let me breathe,” Sutherland begs, his voice barely decipherable. In between shrieks and gasps, he calls out, “Mom!” He begs for help. “Please let me live.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before the officers notice that he’s turning colors and losing consciousness, Sutherland, his mouth bloody from being slammed and scraped against the ground, sputters: “I’m f—ing dead.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another five-and-half minutes pass before officers roll Sutherland onto his side and begin to render aid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland was declared dead 47 minutes later at a hospital.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/embed/kCbdeXLgPcM?si=8NP_MTnHOxTuUMd9\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Exclusive findings: \u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>‘It’s deeply concerning’\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As far back as the 1990s, medical experts and law enforcement officials have been aware of the dangers of prone restraint. A number of organizations and law enforcement agencies, including the U.S. Department of Justice, the Chicago Police Department and the New Orleans Police Department, warned officers of these dangers and advised them on how to minimize risks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many training manuals have since been updated to address the risks of prone restraint and the importance of using the recovery position. Ohio State Police officers are forbidden from using prone restraint. A Nevada law forbids the practice. In California, a law that became effective in 2022, AB 490, bans any maneuvers that put people at risk of being unable to breathe due to the position of their body, or positional asphyxia, a common cause of death in prone restraint cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But a new review of law enforcement data shows that, despite growing awareness of the dangers of prone restraint, in California, the problem is pervasive. After the passage of \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201520160AB71\">AB 71\u003c/a> in 2015, California began tracking data about when people died after police use of force. Between 2016 and 2022, at least 22 people have died in the state after being restrained stomach-down by law enforcement officers, according to a new analysis of currently available state use-of-force data by the \u003cem>California Reporting Project,\u003c/em> \u003cem>The California Newsroom\u003c/em> and \u003cem>The Guardian\u003c/em>. Our examination also included police reports, death investigations, district attorney reviews, body-worn camera footage, 911 calls and lawsuits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"#reported\">Read more on how we reported this story\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Other key findings:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>Nineteen of the 22 people who died following prone restraint tested positive for meth.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Five died after May 2020, when Minneapolis police murdered George Floyd.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Two of those people died after AB 490 went into effect.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>All 22 cases involved people in crisis — either struggling with addiction, mental illness or otherwise behaving erratically.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Almost half of those who died were Latino, followed by white people — a trend that reflects larger use-of-force data in California.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Two of those who died were armed, but not with guns.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>“We really shouldn’t have any of these deaths,” said Seth W. Stoughton, a former police officer in Tallahassee, Florida, who teaches criminal law and procedure at the University of South Carolina’s Joseph F. Rice School of Law. “Any time there’s prolonged prone restraint, something’s going wrong. It should not happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Seth W. Stoughton, former police officer, Tallahassee, Florida\"]‘We really shouldn’t have any of these deaths. Any time there’s prolonged prone restraint, something’s going wrong. It should not happen.’[/pullquote]“My general disgust [is] that we’re still having to talk about this,” he said. ”It’s a little depressing that we’re coming up on 30 years of making the same mistake over and over again. That’s really frustrating.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s deeply concerning to learn about the deaths of individuals in California due to positional asphyxia, even after it was banned by AB 490,” wrote California Assemblymember Mike Gipson, who was the primary author of the bill, in an emailed response to the findings. “These incidents underscore the urgent need for comprehensive training and accountability measures within law enforcement agencies.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Others who have died following prone restraint by California police officers between 2016 and 2022 include:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Isabel De La Torre\u003c/strong>, died on March 26, 2022, after her partner, who was five months pregnant, called 911 in Clovis, California, because she believed De La Torre was unconscious, according to official records and court documents. When De La Torre awoke, her partner hung up the phone, but Clovis police officers responded anyway. De La Torre tried to turn the officers away, hiding in a bathroom, writhing and screaming, allegedly holding a knife. When she came out of the room, officers ordered a police dog to bite her, bringing her to the ground, where officers handcuffed her and held her in the prone position for more than three minutes. She died of positional and compressional asphyxia due to prone restraint, according to the Fresno County Sheriff-Coroner. Her family sued the department for wrongful death and is set to receive a $1.9 million settlement.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Mario Gonzalez\u003c/strong>, who died on April 19, 2021, in Alameda, California. When police responded to a call about a man sitting in a park and talking to himself, officials said they found Gonzalez so intoxicated he couldn’t \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24117516-da_report_gonzalez#document/p5/a2407325\">speak in full sentences\u003c/a>. He refused to take his hands out of his pockets, according to official reports, leading two officers to hold him down on his stomach while another held his legs. \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBJnToNolHw\">Body camera \u003c/a>footage of the incident shows officers repeatedly telling each other not to put too much force on him, but they continued to hold him prone after he was handcuffed. He died of the “toxic effects of methamphetamine” after suffering a cardiopulmonary arrest, according to the Alameda County Coroner’s Bureau. His family sued the city of Alameda, the officers involved in Gonzalez’s death and the police chief at the time and won a settlement of $11 million. In 2023, the Alameda County district attorney \u003ca href=\"https://www.alcoda.org/alameda-county-district-attorneys-office-announces-pau/\">reopened\u003c/a> her office’s investigation into whether the officers acted criminally.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Edward Bronstein\u003c/strong>, who died on March 31, 2020, in Altadena, near Los Angeles. California Highway Patrol officers had detained Bronstein in an L.A. County station on suspicion of driving under the influence. When Bronstein declined to give a blood sample, officers forced him face down onto a mat, at which point he said, “I’ll do it willingly,” \u003ca href=\"https://vimeo.com/812954416\">a video of the incident shows\u003c/a>. An officer can be heard saying, “It’s too late.” Five officers continued to pin Bronstein to the ground. As they drew blood, Bronstein screamed, “I can’t breathe” and “Let me breathe” multiple times before his breathing and pulse stopped. Officers performed CPR to no avail. In 2023, the\u003ca href=\"https://da.lacounty.gov/media/news/seven-california-highway-patrol-officers-charged-connection-death-edward-bronstein\"> Los Angeles County district attorney charged \u003c/a>a CHP sergeant, six officers and a nurse with involuntary manslaughter and assault under the color of authority. His family was awarded a $24 million settlement in a civil wrongful death suit.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>And there may be more deaths beyond the 22 we found. While the state receives data from law enforcement agencies for deaths that occur after police use of force, it isn’t necessarily complete. That’s because agencies don’t always submit data to the state as they’re required to do, or data is otherwise excluded from the \u003ca href=\"https://openjustice.doj.ca.gov/data\">state’s use-of-force database\u003c/a>. For example, Angelo Quinto died in 2020 after Antioch police officers held him prone, but his case is not in the database. Gipson, the assemblymember, said Quinto’s death was the impetus for the new legislation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the passage of AB 490, training manuals for the \u003ca href=\"https://www.antiochca.gov/fc/police/apd-policy-manual.pdf\">Antioch Police Department\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.scsdonline.com/admin-forms.html?download=76:department-policy\">Stanislaus County Sheriff’s Department\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"https://static1.squarespace.com/static/542ec317e4b0d41ade8801fb/t/62abca4da30bf052232349fd/1655425619484/6-15-22+Policy_Manual.pdf\">Sonoma County Sheriff’s Department\u003c/a> say that positional asphyxia is “the subject of debate among experts and medical professionals.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977047\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11977047\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karen Sutherland sits by her son Shayne’s gravesite at the Park View Cemetery in Manteca, San Joaquin County, on Feb. 24, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>The science of prone restraint: ‘You’re just watching a preventable death’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>When a person is lying prone on a hard surface, their chest cavity is compressed and breathing becomes difficult, especially when their hands are cuffed behind their backs. Add the body weight of one or more police officers, and compression increases, restricting the movement of the ribcage and diaphragm, which are vital for the inhalation of oxygen and exhalation of carbon dioxide. The lack of proper ventilation puts stress on many parts of the body, including the heart, as noted in a \u003ca href=\"https://www.disabilityrightsca.org/system/files?file=file-attachments/701801.pdf\">2002 study by Disability Rights California\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The warnings go even further back. In a \u003ca href=\"https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles/posasph.pdf\">1995 bulletin (PDF)\u003c/a>, the U.S. Department of Justice cautioned law enforcement officers about the deadliness of positional asphyxia. “As soon as the suspect is handcuffed, get him off his stomach,” it reads.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bulletin outlines how subjects on drugs are at higher risk of death in the position, noting that “cocaine-induced bizarre or frenzied behavior… may increase a subject’s susceptibility to sudden death by effecting an increase of the heart rate to a critical level.” It also said that “drugs and/or alcohol” pose a “major risk factor” because “subjects may not realize they are suffocating.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Dr. Alon Steinberg, California cardiologist, who studies prone restraint\"]‘It’s horrible because you’re just watching a preventable death, and you know the person’s suffering.’[/pullquote]The bulletin explains that suspects restrained in a prone position often appear to be resisting officers when, in fact, they’re fighting, perhaps involuntarily, to get oxygen and carbon dioxide in and out of their bodies as their chest is squeezed. As the memo reads: “The individual experiences increased difficulty breathing. The natural reaction to oxygen deficiency occurs — the person struggles more violently. The officer applies more compression to subdue the individual.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s horrible because you’re just watching a preventable death, and you know the person’s suffering,” said Dr. Alon Steinberg, a California cardiologist who studies prone restraint and has viewed hours of footage of people being held stomach-down by police.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Steinberg, who serves as an expert witness, believes that cardiac arrests following prone restraint might be caused by more than just a lack of oxygen in the heart muscle. When someone can adequately breathe, the expulsion of carbon dioxide regulates the level of acid in the blood. But when breathing and blood flow are restricted, acid can build and cause cardiac arrest, as Steinberg and forensic pathologists Dr. Victor Weedn and Dr. Peter Speth proposed in a \u003ca href=\"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35869602/\">2022 study\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dr. Daniel Wohlgelernter, a cardiologist who has also testified in a number of prone-restraint cases, agrees. He pointed out that putting someone in prone restraint when they are in a hyperactive state — as people often are when on stimulants or in crisis — can exacerbate acidosis and cause a “double whammy.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have carbon dioxide accumulation, development of lethal or potentially lethal metabolic acidosis at the same time that we have deprivation of oxygen,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite widespread agreement about the dangers of positional asphyxia caused by prone restraint, some studies have argued that the restriction of airflow caused by prone restraint is not, in most cases, enough to kill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Medical and legal experts have pointed out flaws in the studies, which have been done on healthy, sober individuals in police-free environments and don’t duplicate a real-life prone-restraint scenario.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Studies like that, if they actually had the potential to kill anyone, would never be approved by an institutional review board,” said Joanna Naples-Mitchell, an attorney with Physicians for Human Rights. “So it’s not something that’s actually possible to model in the real world in a safe way.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977048\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11977048 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karen Sutherland holds a necklace with her son Shayne’s fingerprint and name at Park View Cemetery in Manteca, San Joaquin County, on Feb. 24, 2024, where Shayne is buried. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Sorting out causes of death: ‘Alive and fine’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Of the 22 deaths we found where people died after being held stomach-down, coroners and medical examiners attributed acute methamphetamine toxicity to 10 deaths. Coroners are usually elected, and few places require them to have a medical background.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wohlgelernter and Steinberg are skeptical of those determinations. Both were adamant that in the prone restraint cases they’ve reviewed, methamphetamine, on its own, was not to blame for deaths.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In no cases did I see that the individuals were destined to die on that day, if not for the interaction with law enforcement and the prone restraint compressive asphyxia,” Wohlgelernter said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Steinberg pointed out that while people can overdose on meth, those who wind up dead after being restrained face down were “alive and fine” before they had a run-in with police.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Dr. Daniel Wohlgelernter, cardiologist, Santa Monica, California\"]‘In no cases did I see that the individuals were destined to die on that day, if not for the interaction with law enforcement and the prone restraint compressive asphyxia.’[/pullquote]“They’re alive beforehand. They’re alive for a few minutes in the prone position, and then after a prolonged episode of restraint, people die,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dr. Odey Ukpo, chief medical examiner-coroner for Los Angeles County, where seven deaths following prone restraint were attributed to meth use or toxicity, said it’s more complicated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What some people don’t realize is that a cause-of-death [determination] is a medical opinion,” he said. “It’s based on deductive reasoning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For instance, Ukpo said he looks for signs of petechiae, a dot-like pattern of blood in the eyes or on the gums, before ruling whether someone died of asphyxia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To Seth Stoughton, the University of South Carolina law professor and former police officer, who wrote an \u003ca href=\"https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22-510/251192/20221230160849621_Stoughton%20Amicus%20Br.pdf\">amicus brief (PDF)\u003c/a> about the dangers of positional asphyxia that was submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022, causes of death are beside the point. Prone restraint, he argues, is so easy to perform safely that it should never lead to deaths in the first place, no matter who’s being restrained.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Whether they’re dying of oxygen deprivation or metabolic acidosis is irrelevant,” he said. “People are still dying! And if you flip them over to their side, they don’t!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Stoughton served as an expert witness in the case against Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd. He says that if officers take the proper precautions to manage the scene and protect themselves, someone in handcuffs on their side is not a great danger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re talking about literally the difference between taking someone from their stomach and rolling them 90 degrees onto their side,” he said. “If there is any increase in risk at all [to officers], it is so marginal that it is vastly outweighed by the potential of saving that person’s life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In addition to training officers to use the recovery position as a matter of routine, experts say officers can keep an eye out for warning signs when restraining people prone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wohlgelernter says officers should watch for changes in alertness, speech or physical movements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Steinberg argues that the use of prone restraint should be limited.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Justin M. Feldman, principal research scientist at the \u003ca href=\"https://policingequity.org/\">Center for Policing Equity\u003c/a>, said that some incidents escalate because of officers’ bias against people who abuse drugs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think they fundamentally don’t respect people they view as addicts or tweakers or whatever the pejorative might be, and treat them accordingly without respect for their lives,” Feldman said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Peter Moskos, a criminologist with John Jay College of Criminal Justice and former Baltimore police officer, there should be a greater focus on preventing the events that lead people into the hands of police by getting them the help they need, such as jobs, housing, drug treatment and mental health care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At some point, it would have been nice if someone could have pulled a switch track and diverted that person, whether it’s community, family, other government agencies, anything,” he said. “But once you get to that point [of a police encounter], it’s kind of too late to offer an ideal solution.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977195\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11977195\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240227-TOXIC-RESTRAINT-CN-01.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"1138\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240227-TOXIC-RESTRAINT-CN-01.jpg 640w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240227-TOXIC-RESTRAINT-CN-01-160x285.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shayne Sutherland and his mother, Karen, in 2019. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Karen Sutherland)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>‘He knew he was dying’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The San Joaquin County medical examiner’s office determined that Shayne Sutherland’s cause of death was cardiac arrest due to “acute methamphetamine toxicity” with a contributing factor of “physical restraint by law enforcement.” In other words, meth, not police, was primarily responsible for Sutherland’s death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland’s family wasn’t satisfied with the medical examiner’s findings or with the Stockton Police Department’s response to his death. In October 2021, they filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city of Stockton, Officers Zalunardo and Afanasiev and former Stockton Police Chief Eric Jones. The suit alleges wrongful death, excessive force and interfering with Sutherland’s constitutional rights by force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They did not have that right to judge him that morning,” his mother, Karen Sutherland, said. “They did not have that right to do what they did.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Families of people in California who have died following prone restraint have won at least $41 million in civil suits across the state, according to court documents and press reports.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the year leading up to her son’s death, Karen managed to get Shayne into rehab for a stint, but finding mental health care and ongoing treatment was a struggle. When people like Shayne reach out for help, she said, “They’re turned away, or they’re told they have to wait.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[But] when you have a mental health problem, you can’t wait,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last December, Karen pulled into Park View Cemetery in Manteca — about 20 minutes south of Stockton — and walked to her son’s grave. Sitting on a blanket, she talked about Shayne’s life: his “teddy bear” lovability; the fishing and camping trips with his two kids, Shayne Jr., 8, and Demi, 7; coaching the Manteca Chargers youth football team.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Karen Sutherland, mother of Shayne Sutherland\"]‘I’ve always been able to handle things. I’m a very strong person, but not when this happened. This broke me — completely shattered me.’[/pullquote]She talked about the hard times, too: the cocaine and meth addiction; the split with the mother of his children; the “little, petty, stupid, whatever crimes” that, she said, “are in no way in any comparison of any type of magnitude of the crime that those two police officers committed that day when they killed my son.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve always been able to handle things,” she said. “I’m a very strong person, but not when this happened. This broke me — completely shattered me.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After Shayne’s death, Stockton PD determined that Zalunardo and Afanasiev acted within policy. The only issue the investigation raised was that Zalunardo left his baton “unsecured on the ground near the suspect” when administering aid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Stockton Police Department did not respond to our requests for comments and interviews with the officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karen has watched the footage of Shayne’s final encounter with police. But she says she’ll never turn on the sound, because others have told her what she’d have to hear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He knew he was dying,” she said. “He was being tortured. And knowing that tortures me every second, man. Every second.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karen chose this particular grave site because of the morning sun that hits it each day. She’s come to believe that God reached down to stop Shayne’s suffering — not just at the hands of police, but in life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the winter sunshine, the top of Shayne’s headstone reads: “God reached down and rescued me.”\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was published in partnership with the \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/us\">\u003cem>Guardian\u003c/em>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Additional reporting by Bella Arnold, Hanisha Harjani, Simmerdeep Kaur, Grace Marion, Adam Solorzano and Krissy Waite of Berkeley Journalism’s Investigative Reporting Program; Leila Barghouty, Jacqueline Munis and Camryn Pak of Stanford University’s Big Local News; and Brian Krans of The California Newsroom. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The California Newsroom is a collaboration of public media outlets throughout the state, with NPR as its national partner. The \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://projects.scpr.org/california-reporting-project/\">\u003cem>California Reporting Project\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> collected police records. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This project was completed with the support of a grant from Columbia University’s\u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://journalism.columbia.edu/news/lipman-center-awards-180000-grants-reporting-abuses-us-criminal-justice-system\">\u003cem> Ira A. Lipman Center for Journalism and Civil and Human Rights\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> in conjunction with Arnold Ventures. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003ca id=\"reported\">\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>How We Reported This Story\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the 1990s, experts have warned that restraining someone prone, or on their stomach, can kill them. When someone is agitated, on stimulants or acting erratically, they are also more likely to die if officers use prone restraint, according to medical experts. Former police officers and criminologists say that putting someone on their side or seated after they’re handcuffed saves lives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2020, Antioch police officers held Angelo Quinto down on his stomach after responding to a call from his family. His death inspired California legislation, which went into effect in 2022, that prohibits officers from using techniques such as prone restraint that “involve a substantial risk of positional asphyxia.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Newsroom and The California Reporting Project wanted to better understand how many people were dying after officers used prone restraint in the Golden State.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the passage of state law \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201520160AB71\">AB 71\u003c/a>, California law enforcement agencies submit \u003ca href=\"https://openjustice.doj.ca.gov/data\">anonymized data\u003c/a> to the state Department of Justice’s Use of Force Incident Reporting database when officers seriously injure or kill people. That data contains information listing the types of force officers used and whether someone died. Currently, the data includes incidents that occurred from 2016 to 2022. Although people can die from prone restraint after being otherwise injured, we wanted to focus on cases where the cause of death was more clear. We filtered the data to incidents where someone died and officers used a control hold but did not use a gun, Taser or carotid restraint. Outside of carotid holds, the data does not distinguish between specific types of restraint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To better identify the decedents, reporters then combined the use-of-force data with data from \u003ca href=\"https://openjustice.doj.ca.gov/data\">California’s Death In-Custody\u003c/a> database. To ascertain whether officers specifically used prone restraint on those decedents, we used public record requests to obtain records and body camera footage from law enforcement agencies, district attorneys, medical examiner/coroners and oversight agencies about the incidents. We also obtained lawsuits in cases where loved ones sued local authorities. Two people reviewed those records, and an editor checked that work. We were unable to obtain enough records on four people’s deaths and excluded them from our analysis. Through our reporting, we determined five were incorrectly marked as not having been tased and removed them from our analysis. We also found that two people did not clearly die after a prone restraint and cut them from our analysis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, we know that this data was incomplete because it did not include Angelo Quinto. We had records showing that officers used prone restraint, so we included him in our analysis despite his not appearing in the state’s use-of-force data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Justin Feldman, principal research scientist at the \u003ca href=\"https://policingequity.org/\">Center for Policing Equity\u003c/a>, says that it’s not uncommon for prone restraint deaths to go unreported. In \u003ca href=\"https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/35083738/FELDMAN-DISSERTATION-2018.pdf?sequence=3&isAllowed=y\">a study\u003c/a>, he found that in \u003ca href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/11/police-killings-counted-harvard-study\">more than half the cases when police kill someone, it’s not documented on the death certificate\u003c/a> and so may not be properly recorded.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Feldman said the “number one predictor” of misreported deaths was when officers didn’t shoot someone, such as when they used prone restraint or a Taser.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two police departments would not release police reports to the \u003cem>California Reporting Project\u003c/em> because the death investigations found the men died of other causes, such as methamphetamine toxicity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "'Please let me live' were among the last words uttered by a young Stockton man who died after police put him in what's known as a prone restraint. At least 22 people have died in California since 2016 after being restrained stomach-down by law enforcement, according to a new analysis.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">O\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>n a Thursday morning in October 2020, less than five months after George Floyd was held on his stomach by Minneapolis police until he died, Shayne Sutherland called 911 from a convenience store in Stockton, California, and asked for a taxi.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the operator told Sutherland he’d dialed 911, he said someone was trying to rob him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Stockton Police Officers Ronald Zalunardo and John Afanasiev arrived at the store about 15 minutes later. In the meantime, a store employee had called 911, saying Sutherland was threatening him with a wine bottle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In body camera footage that captured the officers’ response, Sutherland seems fidgety, and his speech is difficult to understand at times, but he doesn’t appear violent, and he isn’t armed. He cooperates with police, addressing Zalunardo as “sir” and sitting against a wall outside the store as instructed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The officers question Sutherland. When he tells them he can’t remember why he’s under court supervision, Afanasiev says, “The drugs probably have something to do with it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“How long you been using meth,” Zalnunardo asks. Sutherland stutters and says he’s been using cocaine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland briefly stands, then sits when ordered to do so. A minute later, he stands up again. This time, the officers tackle him to the ground and hold him belly-down — a position known as prone restraint. Thirty seconds later, his hands are cuffed behind his back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That could have been the end of the encounter. Experts say prone restraint can be a safe, effective way to subdue someone and get them into handcuffs — so long as they’re quickly placed in a “recovery position” on their side or in a seated position to allow them to breathe more easily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Zalunardo and Afanasiev didn’t do that. The body camera footage shows them holding Sutherland belly-down for more than eight minutes. For nearly half that time, Afanasiev lays across Sutherland’s back. Sutherland panics, alternating between moaning and screaming for help as Zalunardo, who uses his baton and body weight to help keep Sutherland’s shoulder down, repeatedly tells him, “Relax!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Please let me breathe,” Sutherland begs, his voice barely decipherable. In between shrieks and gasps, he calls out, “Mom!” He begs for help. “Please let me live.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before the officers notice that he’s turning colors and losing consciousness, Sutherland, his mouth bloody from being slammed and scraped against the ground, sputters: “I’m f—ing dead.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another five-and-half minutes pass before officers roll Sutherland onto his side and begin to render aid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland was declared dead 47 minutes later at a hospital.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/kCbdeXLgPcM?si=8NP_MTnHOxTuUMd9'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/kCbdeXLgPcM?si=8NP_MTnHOxTuUMd9'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003ch2>\u003cstrong>Exclusive findings: \u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>‘It’s deeply concerning’\u003c/strong>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As far back as the 1990s, medical experts and law enforcement officials have been aware of the dangers of prone restraint. A number of organizations and law enforcement agencies, including the U.S. Department of Justice, the Chicago Police Department and the New Orleans Police Department, warned officers of these dangers and advised them on how to minimize risks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many training manuals have since been updated to address the risks of prone restraint and the importance of using the recovery position. Ohio State Police officers are forbidden from using prone restraint. A Nevada law forbids the practice. In California, a law that became effective in 2022, AB 490, bans any maneuvers that put people at risk of being unable to breathe due to the position of their body, or positional asphyxia, a common cause of death in prone restraint cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But a new review of law enforcement data shows that, despite growing awareness of the dangers of prone restraint, in California, the problem is pervasive. After the passage of \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201520160AB71\">AB 71\u003c/a> in 2015, California began tracking data about when people died after police use of force. Between 2016 and 2022, at least 22 people have died in the state after being restrained stomach-down by law enforcement officers, according to a new analysis of currently available state use-of-force data by the \u003cem>California Reporting Project,\u003c/em> \u003cem>The California Newsroom\u003c/em> and \u003cem>The Guardian\u003c/em>. Our examination also included police reports, death investigations, district attorney reviews, body-worn camera footage, 911 calls and lawsuits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"#reported\">Read more on how we reported this story\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Other key findings:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>Nineteen of the 22 people who died following prone restraint tested positive for meth.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Five died after May 2020, when Minneapolis police murdered George Floyd.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Two of those people died after AB 490 went into effect.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>All 22 cases involved people in crisis — either struggling with addiction, mental illness or otherwise behaving erratically.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Almost half of those who died were Latino, followed by white people — a trend that reflects larger use-of-force data in California.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Two of those who died were armed, but not with guns.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>“We really shouldn’t have any of these deaths,” said Seth W. Stoughton, a former police officer in Tallahassee, Florida, who teaches criminal law and procedure at the University of South Carolina’s Joseph F. Rice School of Law. “Any time there’s prolonged prone restraint, something’s going wrong. It should not happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“My general disgust [is] that we’re still having to talk about this,” he said. ”It’s a little depressing that we’re coming up on 30 years of making the same mistake over and over again. That’s really frustrating.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s deeply concerning to learn about the deaths of individuals in California due to positional asphyxia, even after it was banned by AB 490,” wrote California Assemblymember Mike Gipson, who was the primary author of the bill, in an emailed response to the findings. “These incidents underscore the urgent need for comprehensive training and accountability measures within law enforcement agencies.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Others who have died following prone restraint by California police officers between 2016 and 2022 include:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Isabel De La Torre\u003c/strong>, died on March 26, 2022, after her partner, who was five months pregnant, called 911 in Clovis, California, because she believed De La Torre was unconscious, according to official records and court documents. When De La Torre awoke, her partner hung up the phone, but Clovis police officers responded anyway. De La Torre tried to turn the officers away, hiding in a bathroom, writhing and screaming, allegedly holding a knife. When she came out of the room, officers ordered a police dog to bite her, bringing her to the ground, where officers handcuffed her and held her in the prone position for more than three minutes. She died of positional and compressional asphyxia due to prone restraint, according to the Fresno County Sheriff-Coroner. Her family sued the department for wrongful death and is set to receive a $1.9 million settlement.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Mario Gonzalez\u003c/strong>, who died on April 19, 2021, in Alameda, California. When police responded to a call about a man sitting in a park and talking to himself, officials said they found Gonzalez so intoxicated he couldn’t \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24117516-da_report_gonzalez#document/p5/a2407325\">speak in full sentences\u003c/a>. He refused to take his hands out of his pockets, according to official reports, leading two officers to hold him down on his stomach while another held his legs. \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBJnToNolHw\">Body camera \u003c/a>footage of the incident shows officers repeatedly telling each other not to put too much force on him, but they continued to hold him prone after he was handcuffed. He died of the “toxic effects of methamphetamine” after suffering a cardiopulmonary arrest, according to the Alameda County Coroner’s Bureau. His family sued the city of Alameda, the officers involved in Gonzalez’s death and the police chief at the time and won a settlement of $11 million. In 2023, the Alameda County district attorney \u003ca href=\"https://www.alcoda.org/alameda-county-district-attorneys-office-announces-pau/\">reopened\u003c/a> her office’s investigation into whether the officers acted criminally.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Edward Bronstein\u003c/strong>, who died on March 31, 2020, in Altadena, near Los Angeles. California Highway Patrol officers had detained Bronstein in an L.A. County station on suspicion of driving under the influence. When Bronstein declined to give a blood sample, officers forced him face down onto a mat, at which point he said, “I’ll do it willingly,” \u003ca href=\"https://vimeo.com/812954416\">a video of the incident shows\u003c/a>. An officer can be heard saying, “It’s too late.” Five officers continued to pin Bronstein to the ground. As they drew blood, Bronstein screamed, “I can’t breathe” and “Let me breathe” multiple times before his breathing and pulse stopped. Officers performed CPR to no avail. In 2023, the\u003ca href=\"https://da.lacounty.gov/media/news/seven-california-highway-patrol-officers-charged-connection-death-edward-bronstein\"> Los Angeles County district attorney charged \u003c/a>a CHP sergeant, six officers and a nurse with involuntary manslaughter and assault under the color of authority. His family was awarded a $24 million settlement in a civil wrongful death suit.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>And there may be more deaths beyond the 22 we found. While the state receives data from law enforcement agencies for deaths that occur after police use of force, it isn’t necessarily complete. That’s because agencies don’t always submit data to the state as they’re required to do, or data is otherwise excluded from the \u003ca href=\"https://openjustice.doj.ca.gov/data\">state’s use-of-force database\u003c/a>. For example, Angelo Quinto died in 2020 after Antioch police officers held him prone, but his case is not in the database. Gipson, the assemblymember, said Quinto’s death was the impetus for the new legislation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the passage of AB 490, training manuals for the \u003ca href=\"https://www.antiochca.gov/fc/police/apd-policy-manual.pdf\">Antioch Police Department\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.scsdonline.com/admin-forms.html?download=76:department-policy\">Stanislaus County Sheriff’s Department\u003c/a> and the \u003ca href=\"https://static1.squarespace.com/static/542ec317e4b0d41ade8801fb/t/62abca4da30bf052232349fd/1655425619484/6-15-22+Policy_Manual.pdf\">Sonoma County Sheriff’s Department\u003c/a> say that positional asphyxia is “the subject of debate among experts and medical professionals.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977047\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11977047\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-09-BL-KQED-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karen Sutherland sits by her son Shayne’s gravesite at the Park View Cemetery in Manteca, San Joaquin County, on Feb. 24, 2024. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>The science of prone restraint: ‘You’re just watching a preventable death’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>When a person is lying prone on a hard surface, their chest cavity is compressed and breathing becomes difficult, especially when their hands are cuffed behind their backs. Add the body weight of one or more police officers, and compression increases, restricting the movement of the ribcage and diaphragm, which are vital for the inhalation of oxygen and exhalation of carbon dioxide. The lack of proper ventilation puts stress on many parts of the body, including the heart, as noted in a \u003ca href=\"https://www.disabilityrightsca.org/system/files?file=file-attachments/701801.pdf\">2002 study by Disability Rights California\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The warnings go even further back. In a \u003ca href=\"https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles/posasph.pdf\">1995 bulletin (PDF)\u003c/a>, the U.S. Department of Justice cautioned law enforcement officers about the deadliness of positional asphyxia. “As soon as the suspect is handcuffed, get him off his stomach,” it reads.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bulletin outlines how subjects on drugs are at higher risk of death in the position, noting that “cocaine-induced bizarre or frenzied behavior… may increase a subject’s susceptibility to sudden death by effecting an increase of the heart rate to a critical level.” It also said that “drugs and/or alcohol” pose a “major risk factor” because “subjects may not realize they are suffocating.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The bulletin explains that suspects restrained in a prone position often appear to be resisting officers when, in fact, they’re fighting, perhaps involuntarily, to get oxygen and carbon dioxide in and out of their bodies as their chest is squeezed. As the memo reads: “The individual experiences increased difficulty breathing. The natural reaction to oxygen deficiency occurs — the person struggles more violently. The officer applies more compression to subdue the individual.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s horrible because you’re just watching a preventable death, and you know the person’s suffering,” said Dr. Alon Steinberg, a California cardiologist who studies prone restraint and has viewed hours of footage of people being held stomach-down by police.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Steinberg, who serves as an expert witness, believes that cardiac arrests following prone restraint might be caused by more than just a lack of oxygen in the heart muscle. When someone can adequately breathe, the expulsion of carbon dioxide regulates the level of acid in the blood. But when breathing and blood flow are restricted, acid can build and cause cardiac arrest, as Steinberg and forensic pathologists Dr. Victor Weedn and Dr. Peter Speth proposed in a \u003ca href=\"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35869602/\">2022 study\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dr. Daniel Wohlgelernter, a cardiologist who has also testified in a number of prone-restraint cases, agrees. He pointed out that putting someone in prone restraint when they are in a hyperactive state — as people often are when on stimulants or in crisis — can exacerbate acidosis and cause a “double whammy.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have carbon dioxide accumulation, development of lethal or potentially lethal metabolic acidosis at the same time that we have deprivation of oxygen,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite widespread agreement about the dangers of positional asphyxia caused by prone restraint, some studies have argued that the restriction of airflow caused by prone restraint is not, in most cases, enough to kill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Medical and legal experts have pointed out flaws in the studies, which have been done on healthy, sober individuals in police-free environments and don’t duplicate a real-life prone-restraint scenario.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Studies like that, if they actually had the potential to kill anyone, would never be approved by an institutional review board,” said Joanna Naples-Mitchell, an attorney with Physicians for Human Rights. “So it’s not something that’s actually possible to model in the real world in a safe way.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977048\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11977048 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240224-TOXICRESTRAINT-12-BL-KQED-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karen Sutherland holds a necklace with her son Shayne’s fingerprint and name at Park View Cemetery in Manteca, San Joaquin County, on Feb. 24, 2024, where Shayne is buried. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Sorting out causes of death: ‘Alive and fine’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Of the 22 deaths we found where people died after being held stomach-down, coroners and medical examiners attributed acute methamphetamine toxicity to 10 deaths. Coroners are usually elected, and few places require them to have a medical background.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wohlgelernter and Steinberg are skeptical of those determinations. Both were adamant that in the prone restraint cases they’ve reviewed, methamphetamine, on its own, was not to blame for deaths.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In no cases did I see that the individuals were destined to die on that day, if not for the interaction with law enforcement and the prone restraint compressive asphyxia,” Wohlgelernter said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Steinberg pointed out that while people can overdose on meth, those who wind up dead after being restrained face down were “alive and fine” before they had a run-in with police.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“They’re alive beforehand. They’re alive for a few minutes in the prone position, and then after a prolonged episode of restraint, people die,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dr. Odey Ukpo, chief medical examiner-coroner for Los Angeles County, where seven deaths following prone restraint were attributed to meth use or toxicity, said it’s more complicated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What some people don’t realize is that a cause-of-death [determination] is a medical opinion,” he said. “It’s based on deductive reasoning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For instance, Ukpo said he looks for signs of petechiae, a dot-like pattern of blood in the eyes or on the gums, before ruling whether someone died of asphyxia.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To Seth Stoughton, the University of South Carolina law professor and former police officer, who wrote an \u003ca href=\"https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22-510/251192/20221230160849621_Stoughton%20Amicus%20Br.pdf\">amicus brief (PDF)\u003c/a> about the dangers of positional asphyxia that was submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022, causes of death are beside the point. Prone restraint, he argues, is so easy to perform safely that it should never lead to deaths in the first place, no matter who’s being restrained.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Whether they’re dying of oxygen deprivation or metabolic acidosis is irrelevant,” he said. “People are still dying! And if you flip them over to their side, they don’t!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Stoughton served as an expert witness in the case against Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd. He says that if officers take the proper precautions to manage the scene and protect themselves, someone in handcuffs on their side is not a great danger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re talking about literally the difference between taking someone from their stomach and rolling them 90 degrees onto their side,” he said. “If there is any increase in risk at all [to officers], it is so marginal that it is vastly outweighed by the potential of saving that person’s life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In addition to training officers to use the recovery position as a matter of routine, experts say officers can keep an eye out for warning signs when restraining people prone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wohlgelernter says officers should watch for changes in alertness, speech or physical movements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Steinberg argues that the use of prone restraint should be limited.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Justin M. Feldman, principal research scientist at the \u003ca href=\"https://policingequity.org/\">Center for Policing Equity\u003c/a>, said that some incidents escalate because of officers’ bias against people who abuse drugs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think they fundamentally don’t respect people they view as addicts or tweakers or whatever the pejorative might be, and treat them accordingly without respect for their lives,” Feldman said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Peter Moskos, a criminologist with John Jay College of Criminal Justice and former Baltimore police officer, there should be a greater focus on preventing the events that lead people into the hands of police by getting them the help they need, such as jobs, housing, drug treatment and mental health care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At some point, it would have been nice if someone could have pulled a switch track and diverted that person, whether it’s community, family, other government agencies, anything,” he said. “But once you get to that point [of a police encounter], it’s kind of too late to offer an ideal solution.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11977195\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11977195\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240227-TOXIC-RESTRAINT-CN-01.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"1138\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240227-TOXIC-RESTRAINT-CN-01.jpg 640w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/02/240227-TOXIC-RESTRAINT-CN-01-160x285.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shayne Sutherland and his mother, Karen, in 2019. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Karen Sutherland)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>‘He knew he was dying’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The San Joaquin County medical examiner’s office determined that Shayne Sutherland’s cause of death was cardiac arrest due to “acute methamphetamine toxicity” with a contributing factor of “physical restraint by law enforcement.” In other words, meth, not police, was primarily responsible for Sutherland’s death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sutherland’s family wasn’t satisfied with the medical examiner’s findings or with the Stockton Police Department’s response to his death. In October 2021, they filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city of Stockton, Officers Zalunardo and Afanasiev and former Stockton Police Chief Eric Jones. The suit alleges wrongful death, excessive force and interfering with Sutherland’s constitutional rights by force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They did not have that right to judge him that morning,” his mother, Karen Sutherland, said. “They did not have that right to do what they did.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Families of people in California who have died following prone restraint have won at least $41 million in civil suits across the state, according to court documents and press reports.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the year leading up to her son’s death, Karen managed to get Shayne into rehab for a stint, but finding mental health care and ongoing treatment was a struggle. When people like Shayne reach out for help, she said, “They’re turned away, or they’re told they have to wait.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[But] when you have a mental health problem, you can’t wait,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last December, Karen pulled into Park View Cemetery in Manteca — about 20 minutes south of Stockton — and walked to her son’s grave. Sitting on a blanket, she talked about Shayne’s life: his “teddy bear” lovability; the fishing and camping trips with his two kids, Shayne Jr., 8, and Demi, 7; coaching the Manteca Chargers youth football team.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>She talked about the hard times, too: the cocaine and meth addiction; the split with the mother of his children; the “little, petty, stupid, whatever crimes” that, she said, “are in no way in any comparison of any type of magnitude of the crime that those two police officers committed that day when they killed my son.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve always been able to handle things,” she said. “I’m a very strong person, but not when this happened. This broke me — completely shattered me.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After Shayne’s death, Stockton PD determined that Zalunardo and Afanasiev acted within policy. The only issue the investigation raised was that Zalunardo left his baton “unsecured on the ground near the suspect” when administering aid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Stockton Police Department did not respond to our requests for comments and interviews with the officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karen has watched the footage of Shayne’s final encounter with police. But she says she’ll never turn on the sound, because others have told her what she’d have to hear.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He knew he was dying,” she said. “He was being tortured. And knowing that tortures me every second, man. Every second.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karen chose this particular grave site because of the morning sun that hits it each day. She’s come to believe that God reached down to stop Shayne’s suffering — not just at the hands of police, but in life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the winter sunshine, the top of Shayne’s headstone reads: “God reached down and rescued me.”\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was published in partnership with the \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/us\">\u003cem>Guardian\u003c/em>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Additional reporting by Bella Arnold, Hanisha Harjani, Simmerdeep Kaur, Grace Marion, Adam Solorzano and Krissy Waite of Berkeley Journalism’s Investigative Reporting Program; Leila Barghouty, Jacqueline Munis and Camryn Pak of Stanford University’s Big Local News; and Brian Krans of The California Newsroom. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The California Newsroom is a collaboration of public media outlets throughout the state, with NPR as its national partner. The \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://projects.scpr.org/california-reporting-project/\">\u003cem>California Reporting Project\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> collected police records. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This project was completed with the support of a grant from Columbia University’s\u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://journalism.columbia.edu/news/lipman-center-awards-180000-grants-reporting-abuses-us-criminal-justice-system\">\u003cem> Ira A. Lipman Center for Journalism and Civil and Human Rights\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem> in conjunction with Arnold Ventures. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003ca id=\"reported\">\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>How We Reported This Story\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the 1990s, experts have warned that restraining someone prone, or on their stomach, can kill them. When someone is agitated, on stimulants or acting erratically, they are also more likely to die if officers use prone restraint, according to medical experts. Former police officers and criminologists say that putting someone on their side or seated after they’re handcuffed saves lives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2020, Antioch police officers held Angelo Quinto down on his stomach after responding to a call from his family. His death inspired California legislation, which went into effect in 2022, that prohibits officers from using techniques such as prone restraint that “involve a substantial risk of positional asphyxia.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Newsroom and The California Reporting Project wanted to better understand how many people were dying after officers used prone restraint in the Golden State.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the passage of state law \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201520160AB71\">AB 71\u003c/a>, California law enforcement agencies submit \u003ca href=\"https://openjustice.doj.ca.gov/data\">anonymized data\u003c/a> to the state Department of Justice’s Use of Force Incident Reporting database when officers seriously injure or kill people. That data contains information listing the types of force officers used and whether someone died. Currently, the data includes incidents that occurred from 2016 to 2022. Although people can die from prone restraint after being otherwise injured, we wanted to focus on cases where the cause of death was more clear. We filtered the data to incidents where someone died and officers used a control hold but did not use a gun, Taser or carotid restraint. Outside of carotid holds, the data does not distinguish between specific types of restraint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To better identify the decedents, reporters then combined the use-of-force data with data from \u003ca href=\"https://openjustice.doj.ca.gov/data\">California’s Death In-Custody\u003c/a> database. To ascertain whether officers specifically used prone restraint on those decedents, we used public record requests to obtain records and body camera footage from law enforcement agencies, district attorneys, medical examiner/coroners and oversight agencies about the incidents. We also obtained lawsuits in cases where loved ones sued local authorities. Two people reviewed those records, and an editor checked that work. We were unable to obtain enough records on four people’s deaths and excluded them from our analysis. Through our reporting, we determined five were incorrectly marked as not having been tased and removed them from our analysis. We also found that two people did not clearly die after a prone restraint and cut them from our analysis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, we know that this data was incomplete because it did not include Angelo Quinto. We had records showing that officers used prone restraint, so we included him in our analysis despite his not appearing in the state’s use-of-force data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Justin Feldman, principal research scientist at the \u003ca href=\"https://policingequity.org/\">Center for Policing Equity\u003c/a>, says that it’s not uncommon for prone restraint deaths to go unreported. In \u003ca href=\"https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/35083738/FELDMAN-DISSERTATION-2018.pdf?sequence=3&isAllowed=y\">a study\u003c/a>, he found that in \u003ca href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/11/police-killings-counted-harvard-study\">more than half the cases when police kill someone, it’s not documented on the death certificate\u003c/a> and so may not be properly recorded.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Feldman said the “number one predictor” of misreported deaths was when officers didn’t shoot someone, such as when they used prone restraint or a Taser.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two police departments would not release police reports to the \u003cem>California Reporting Project\u003c/em> because the death investigations found the men died of other causes, such as methamphetamine toxicity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "'Trust Has Been Broken': California DOJ Demands Vallejo Police Reforms, Citing Major Rights Violations",
"headTitle": "‘Trust Has Been Broken’: California DOJ Demands Vallejo Police Reforms, Citing Major Rights Violations | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>California Attorney General Rob Bonta is demanding major reforms of the beleaguered Vallejo Police Department, which has been subject to intense criticism in recent years over its high rate of police killings and very\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11919385/in-vallejo-investigations-of-police-take-so-long-officers-kill-again-before-reviews-are-done\"> slow, and sometimes incomplete, investigations of those incidents.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bonta’s Department of Justice on Monday filed a consent decree, which lays out the court-ordered police reforms the city of Vallejo must implement over the next five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At its core, this new agreement is about building and strengthening trust between the Vallejo Police Department and the community it serves,” Bonta said at a press conference on Monday at Vallejo City Hall. “It’s about correcting injustices and enhancing public safety for all people in Vallejo.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The consent decree comes more than three years after the state DOJ \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11823146/state-attorney-general-to-review-and-reform-vallejo-police-department-following-fatal-shooting\">initiated a collaborative effort \u003c/a>with the city to “review and reform” policing practices, arguing that “the number and nature of [police killings] raised concerns among members of the community.” Then-Attorney General Xavier Becerra announced that action in June 2020, just days after the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/sean-monterrosa\">high-profile police killing of Sean Monterrosa\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11826613]As part of its contract with the state, the city agreed to implement 45 reforms of the department. But when that agreement expired in June 2023, fewer than half of the recommendations had actually gone into effect, Bonta said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The stipulated agreement that Bonta’s office filed in Solano Superior Court on Monday requires an independent auditor to monitor Vallejo’s progress on the outstanding reforms, under the supervision of the court, while also mandating additional changes to its police department. As part of that agreement, the department must address and rectify a slew of alleged shortcomings, including racial disparities in its policing practices, how it trains officers on de-escalation techniques and unlawful uses of force, and the manner in which it engages with the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The decree also requires that the city change the process of how it handles civilian complaints.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This work and these reforms are more needed and more necessary,” Bonta said, announcing the action just days after \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-10-16/vallejo-police-officer-punches-woman-in-face-during-arrest-in-viral-video\">a video was made public\u003c/a> of a Vallejo officer punching a female driver in the face during an arrest. “Trust has been broken.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 2010 and late 2020, Vallejo police officers killed 19 people, \u003ca href=\"https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/23/how-a-deadly-police-force-ruled-a-city\">the second-highest rate among America’s 100 largest police forces\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state DOJ is additionally expected to file a lawsuit in Solano County Superior Court alleging that Vallejo police officers have routinely violated the constitutional rights of the citizens they are sworn to protect, the local news site \u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org/2023/10/16/state-doj-to-impose-sweeping-reforms-on-vallejo-police/\">Open Vallejo\u003c/a> reported Monday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bonta was joined on Monday by Vallejo Mayor Robert McConnell and the interim police chief, Jason Ta. Both said they would be cooperating with the state moving forward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Police reform consisting of a change in daily culture is not easy,” McConnell said. “As we make these changes, small and large, it will demand the full attention and understanding of the citizens of Vallejo.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bonta also said his office is still looking into the June 2020 police killing of Monterrosa, even though Becerra, his predecessor, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11826054/state-attorney-general-wont-investigate-vallejo-polices-fatal-shooting-of-sean-monterrosa\">declined to independently investigate the case\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In that incident, Vallejo police officer Jarrett Tonn, sitting in the back seat of an unmarked police vehicle,\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11826613/vallejo-police-release-video-of-deadly-shooting-of-sean-monterrosa\"> fired a semi-automatic rifle five times through the windshield\u003c/a>, hitting Monterrosa once. The shooting took place as officers were responding to reports of a break-in at a Walgreens during the unrest following the murder of George Floyd.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Former Vallejo Police Chief Shawny Williams said at the time that Monterrosa, a 22-year-old Latino man from San Francisco, dropped to his knees and put his hands above his waist, revealing what Tonn thought was the butt of a handgun, but was actually a hammer in the pocket of his sweatshirt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Williams fired Tonn after an independent investigation. But this summer,\u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/vallejo-detective-who-killed-sean-monterrosa-to-be-reinstated-with-back-pay/\"> Tonn got his job back\u003c/a> — with back pay — after an arbitrator ruled that the city didn’t follow proper procedure when firing him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11919385,news_11768008,news_11768675 label='Related Stories']The city has also faced criticism for its handling of investigations into numerous other police use-of-force cases, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/vallejo-says-it-inadvertently-destroyed-records-in-five-police-shooting-investigations/\"> “inadvertently” destroying records\u003c/a> related to five shootings and taking so long to conduct investigations that, in some instances, officers killed other people while still under investigation for prior shootings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In another high-profile incident, Vallejo police officer Zachary Jacobsen shot and killed Angel Ramos, 21, in his mother’s backyard in 2017, following a fight that broke out during a family gathering there. Responding to calls from neighbors about a disturbance, Jacobsen said he shot Ramos four times after witnessing him “hovering” above another man while making stabbing motions with a kitchen knife, according to the Solano County district attorney’s report on the incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Ramos’ family \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11768675/going-against-the-polices-narrative\">disputed the police narrative of the shooting\u003c/a>, insisting that he did not have a knife and was only punching the man. Ultimately, no knife was found near Ramos’ body. The family filed a wrongful death lawsuit, and\u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/vallejo-reaches-2-8m-settlement-for-police-killing-of-angel-ramos/\"> last November\u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/vallejo-reaches-2-8m-settlement-for-police-killing-of-angel-ramos/\"> reached a $2.8 million settlement with the city\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And in February 2019, another Vallejo police killing \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/31/us/willie-mccoy-shooting-video.html\">made national headlines \u003c/a>when six officers \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11768008/the-life-and-death-of-willie-mccoy\">fired 55 bullets at Willie McCoy\u003c/a>, a 20-year-old Black man who had fallen asleep in his car in a Taco Bell parking lot and had just begun to stir as the officers yelled at him to raise his hands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The following year, reporting from Open Vallejo revealed a years-long tradition among some Vallejo police officers of \u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org/2020/07/28/vallejo-police-bend-badge-tips-to-mark-fatal-shootings/\">bending their badges to mark the fatal shootings they had made\u003c/a>. Former police captain John Whitney told the media outlet that he was forced out of the department after raising concerns about the badge-bending tradition in the wake of McCoy’s death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement, civil rights attorney John Burris, who has sued Vallejo’s police department multiple times for its mistreatment of Black residents, commended Bonta and the city for reaching the consent degree. But he also cautioned that rank-and-file officers, and the police union that represents them, would likely stand in the way of any real reform. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Make no mistake that this is just the beginning; it will take an [unwavering] commitment by city leaders and police leadership to implement the changes,” Burris said. “Change is hard, and the leadership must hold officers accountable; otherwise, the consent decree will not be worth the paper that it is written [on].”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>California Attorney General Rob Bonta is demanding major reforms of the beleaguered Vallejo Police Department, which has been subject to intense criticism in recent years over its high rate of police killings and very\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11919385/in-vallejo-investigations-of-police-take-so-long-officers-kill-again-before-reviews-are-done\"> slow, and sometimes incomplete, investigations of those incidents.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bonta’s Department of Justice on Monday filed a consent decree, which lays out the court-ordered police reforms the city of Vallejo must implement over the next five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At its core, this new agreement is about building and strengthening trust between the Vallejo Police Department and the community it serves,” Bonta said at a press conference on Monday at Vallejo City Hall. “It’s about correcting injustices and enhancing public safety for all people in Vallejo.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The consent decree comes more than three years after the state DOJ \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11823146/state-attorney-general-to-review-and-reform-vallejo-police-department-following-fatal-shooting\">initiated a collaborative effort \u003c/a>with the city to “review and reform” policing practices, arguing that “the number and nature of [police killings] raised concerns among members of the community.” Then-Attorney General Xavier Becerra announced that action in June 2020, just days after the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/sean-monterrosa\">high-profile police killing of Sean Monterrosa\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>As part of its contract with the state, the city agreed to implement 45 reforms of the department. But when that agreement expired in June 2023, fewer than half of the recommendations had actually gone into effect, Bonta said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The stipulated agreement that Bonta’s office filed in Solano Superior Court on Monday requires an independent auditor to monitor Vallejo’s progress on the outstanding reforms, under the supervision of the court, while also mandating additional changes to its police department. As part of that agreement, the department must address and rectify a slew of alleged shortcomings, including racial disparities in its policing practices, how it trains officers on de-escalation techniques and unlawful uses of force, and the manner in which it engages with the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The decree also requires that the city change the process of how it handles civilian complaints.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This work and these reforms are more needed and more necessary,” Bonta said, announcing the action just days after \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-10-16/vallejo-police-officer-punches-woman-in-face-during-arrest-in-viral-video\">a video was made public\u003c/a> of a Vallejo officer punching a female driver in the face during an arrest. “Trust has been broken.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 2010 and late 2020, Vallejo police officers killed 19 people, \u003ca href=\"https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/23/how-a-deadly-police-force-ruled-a-city\">the second-highest rate among America’s 100 largest police forces\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state DOJ is additionally expected to file a lawsuit in Solano County Superior Court alleging that Vallejo police officers have routinely violated the constitutional rights of the citizens they are sworn to protect, the local news site \u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org/2023/10/16/state-doj-to-impose-sweeping-reforms-on-vallejo-police/\">Open Vallejo\u003c/a> reported Monday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bonta was joined on Monday by Vallejo Mayor Robert McConnell and the interim police chief, Jason Ta. Both said they would be cooperating with the state moving forward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Police reform consisting of a change in daily culture is not easy,” McConnell said. “As we make these changes, small and large, it will demand the full attention and understanding of the citizens of Vallejo.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bonta also said his office is still looking into the June 2020 police killing of Monterrosa, even though Becerra, his predecessor, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11826054/state-attorney-general-wont-investigate-vallejo-polices-fatal-shooting-of-sean-monterrosa\">declined to independently investigate the case\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In that incident, Vallejo police officer Jarrett Tonn, sitting in the back seat of an unmarked police vehicle,\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11826613/vallejo-police-release-video-of-deadly-shooting-of-sean-monterrosa\"> fired a semi-automatic rifle five times through the windshield\u003c/a>, hitting Monterrosa once. The shooting took place as officers were responding to reports of a break-in at a Walgreens during the unrest following the murder of George Floyd.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Former Vallejo Police Chief Shawny Williams said at the time that Monterrosa, a 22-year-old Latino man from San Francisco, dropped to his knees and put his hands above his waist, revealing what Tonn thought was the butt of a handgun, but was actually a hammer in the pocket of his sweatshirt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Williams fired Tonn after an independent investigation. But this summer,\u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/vallejo-detective-who-killed-sean-monterrosa-to-be-reinstated-with-back-pay/\"> Tonn got his job back\u003c/a> — with back pay — after an arbitrator ruled that the city didn’t follow proper procedure when firing him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The city has also faced criticism for its handling of investigations into numerous other police use-of-force cases, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/vallejo-says-it-inadvertently-destroyed-records-in-five-police-shooting-investigations/\"> “inadvertently” destroying records\u003c/a> related to five shootings and taking so long to conduct investigations that, in some instances, officers killed other people while still under investigation for prior shootings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In another high-profile incident, Vallejo police officer Zachary Jacobsen shot and killed Angel Ramos, 21, in his mother’s backyard in 2017, following a fight that broke out during a family gathering there. Responding to calls from neighbors about a disturbance, Jacobsen said he shot Ramos four times after witnessing him “hovering” above another man while making stabbing motions with a kitchen knife, according to the Solano County district attorney’s report on the incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Ramos’ family \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11768675/going-against-the-polices-narrative\">disputed the police narrative of the shooting\u003c/a>, insisting that he did not have a knife and was only punching the man. Ultimately, no knife was found near Ramos’ body. The family filed a wrongful death lawsuit, and\u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/vallejo-reaches-2-8m-settlement-for-police-killing-of-angel-ramos/\"> last November\u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"https://www.vallejosun.com/vallejo-reaches-2-8m-settlement-for-police-killing-of-angel-ramos/\"> reached a $2.8 million settlement with the city\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And in February 2019, another Vallejo police killing \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/31/us/willie-mccoy-shooting-video.html\">made national headlines \u003c/a>when six officers \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11768008/the-life-and-death-of-willie-mccoy\">fired 55 bullets at Willie McCoy\u003c/a>, a 20-year-old Black man who had fallen asleep in his car in a Taco Bell parking lot and had just begun to stir as the officers yelled at him to raise his hands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The following year, reporting from Open Vallejo revealed a years-long tradition among some Vallejo police officers of \u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org/2020/07/28/vallejo-police-bend-badge-tips-to-mark-fatal-shootings/\">bending their badges to mark the fatal shootings they had made\u003c/a>. Former police captain John Whitney told the media outlet that he was forced out of the department after raising concerns about the badge-bending tradition in the wake of McCoy’s death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement, civil rights attorney John Burris, who has sued Vallejo’s police department multiple times for its mistreatment of Black residents, commended Bonta and the city for reaching the consent degree. But he also cautioned that rank-and-file officers, and the police union that represents them, would likely stand in the way of any real reform. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Make no mistake that this is just the beginning; it will take an [unwavering] commitment by city leaders and police leadership to implement the changes,” Burris said. “Change is hard, and the leadership must hold officers accountable; otherwise, the consent decree will not be worth the paper that it is written [on].”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "i-need-to-be-able-to-go-on-with-my-life-sean-moores-mother-is-still-awaiting-justice-years-after-her-son-was-killed-by-sfpd",
"title": "'I Need to Be Able to Go on With My Life': Sean Moore's Mother Is Still Awaiting Justice, Years After Her Son Was Killed by SFPD",
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"headTitle": "‘I Need to Be Able to Go on With My Life’: Sean Moore’s Mother Is Still Awaiting Justice, Years After Her Son Was Killed by SFPD | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>Cleo Moore is tired of waiting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’s 84, and instead of celebrating the joy of her new great-grandchild, she spends much of her time waiting to hear back from San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins about the status of a case involving the police officer who shot her son, Sean, in 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sean Moore, a Black man who was unarmed when he was shot, died three years later from complications related to the injury.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the officer who shot him was charged with manslaughter, the case has dragged on for two years without a preliminary hearing — usually considered an early step in a trial.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The delay has taken a toll.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My days are spent going from one graveyard to the other,” said Moore, who is mourning both her son and her late husband. “I need to get over this. I need to be able to go on with my life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moore believes her son was given less opportunity than many other people to turn his life around because he was Black. And since his death, she too has felt marginalized in her now years-long effort to advance the case against the officer who pulled the trigger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11949391\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11949391\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A middle-aged African American man and an older African American woman at home, woman is seated, the man is standing as they look at the camera with sullen expressions.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sean Moore’s brother, Kenneth Blackmon, and mother, Cleo Moore, sit at the kitchen table at her home in Daly City on March 31, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 2021, then-DA Chesa Boudin \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11894821/sf-da-charges-officer-with-homicide-in-2017-on-duty-shooting-of-sean-moore\">charged SFPD officer Kenneth Cha\u003c/a> with involuntary manslaughter and assault for Moore’s death, marking only the second time the city has ever filed homicide charges against an officer for an on-duty incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, nearly a year since Boudin’s recall, the decision to pursue a case against Cha lies in the hands of Jenkins. And the chances of her moving forward with it, many observers say, do not look promising.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, Moore’s trust in Jenkins was shaken when the district attorney canceled a meeting Moore scheduled with her to discuss the case. Even before that, Moore had little confidence in Jenkins’ commitment to prosecute police, after the DA’s office \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11940624/blaming-boudin-sf-d-a-brooke-jenkins-wants-to-dismiss-historic-case-against-sfpd-officer-who-killed-keita-oneil\">dismissed charges earlier this year against former SFPD officer Christopher Samayoa\u003c/a>, who in 2017 shot and killed Keita O’Neil, also an unarmed Black man.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jenkins’ office did not respond to requests for an interview and declined to comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the years of waiting, Moore was offered a glimmer of hope in late April when she told San Francisco Superior Court Judge Loretta M. Giorgi that too much time had passed since Cha had been charged.[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Cleo Moore, mother of Sean Moore\"]‘My days are spent going from one graveyard to the other. I need to get over this. I need to be able to go on with my life.’[/pullquote]“Please, I need some justice. I hear the defense attorney needs more time. He needs more evidence. What more time does he need to have?” she told the judge in court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Giorgi agreed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I let [the attorneys] know when we come back in four weeks we will set a preliminary hearing,” Giorgi said. “I’m going to push them. I promise you, I’m going to push them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But when Giorgi told the defense and prosecution to be ready for that now-scheduled May 26 court date, Assistant District Attorney Darby Williams asked the judge if she could approach the bench and conferred with her and the defense in a hushed tone, inaudible to others in the courtroom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s those kinds of secretive exchanges that worry Moore, she says, leaving her with little left to cling to except faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can’t even grieve for my son being gone because I have to listen to all this garbage,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A mental health struggle\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The few images the public has seen of Sean Moore are mostly taken from body camera footage from the night officers showed up at his doorstep and later shot him. The 46-year-old, who claimed he was being unduly harassed, appears enraged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in Cleo Moore’s Daly City home, photos of her son during happier times are laid out across her piano like a shrine. In one, Sean embraces family members. In another he wraps his arms around his prom date. A third captures him smiling broadly, as he poses in a bright red-and-white uniform, holding a baseball bat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sean was born and raised in San Francisco, and later moved to Daly City. He played basketball and varsity baseball at Archbishop Riordan High School, and continued playing baseball at Skyline College in nearby San Bruno, where he received a “most improved player” award. He and his family were decades-long 49ers ticket holders at Candlestick Park.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11949393\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11949393\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Color photo of a smiling young African American boy on a piano with flowers next to it.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A school photo of Sean Moore sits on a piano at the home of his mother, Cleo Moore, in Daly City on March 31, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Cleo bonded with her son over sports. They bowled together as partners, earning a first-place trophy at Westlake Bowl in Daly City.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But as an adult, Sean’s mental health began to deteriorate, his mother says. He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, which prevented him from holding down a job, and he moved back into his family’s home in San Francisco’s Ingleside neighborhood. Cleo says she helped him by picking up his medications, to avoid potential conflicts with pharmacy staff at the hospital.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC1697453539&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I supported my children in whatever they did,” Cleo said. “I tried to do the best that I can do. I can’t control what happened in later life, when someone becomes ill. If I could push a button and correct it, I would.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She also made calls to San Francisco city services seeking mental health interventions for her son, but because Sean had private health insurance, through Kaiser Permanente, she was directed back to them. Cleo, though, says Kaiser was not up to the task of meeting her son’s mental health needs, especially when they reached crisis level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The city of San Francisco, like most of the country, does not have the appropriate responses to mental illness,” said Yoel Haile, director of the ACLU Northern California’s criminal justice program, who is helping Moore’s family decipher the legal process and negotiate with the DA’s office. “Sean had as much resources as someone can, right? At least by way of what his family was able to provide for him. And most people are nowhere near that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11949399\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11949399\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023.jpg\" alt=\"A tombstone with flowers on the grave.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The grave site of Sean Moore in Colma on April 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>A deadly encounter\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At about 4 a.m. on Jan. 6, 2017, SFPD officers Cha and Colin Patino \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11894821/sf-da-charges-officer-with-homicide-in-2017-on-duty-shooting-of-sean-moore\">knocked on the front-door gate of Sean Moore’s Ingleside apartment\u003c/a>, responding to a neighbor’s noise complaint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Moore opened the door, he looked agitated as he stood behind the still-closed safety gate, and repeatedly yelled at the officers to leave, \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBb3_WvFtXk\">the body camera video shows\u003c/a>. Roughly eight minutes later, after the officers continued to demand that Moore open the gate, he finally did so and stood near the top of the steps. The officers then yelled at him to get on the ground. When Moore refused, Patino struck him with a baton and Cha fired his gun twice, hitting Moore in the stomach and groin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Three years later, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11894821/sf-da-charges-officer-with-homicide-in-2017-on-duty-shooting-of-sean-moore\">Moore died in San Quentin State Prison\u003c/a>, where he had been serving time for an unrelated conviction. A Marin County coroner investigation found the cause of death to be an obstruction in his stomach caused by scar tissue from the gunshot wound inflicted three years earlier.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DA may use those facts to push for the case to be dismissed, argues Rebecca Young, the prosecutor Boudin had initially assigned to the case, but who was later fired by Jenkins.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Young, Williams, who took over the prosecution, asked for a research memo to determine whether the DA’s office could establish a connection between Moore’s 2017 shooting and his subsequent death in 2020.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Young suspects Williams is trying “to find a way to break the chain of causation” between the shooting and the death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11942842\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11942842\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"An older African American woman speaks into a microphone at a rally.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cleo Moore, whose son Sean Moore was shot by San Francisco police in 2017, attends a rally in support of both the family of Keita O’Neil and her son outside the Supreme Court of California building in San Francisco on March 6, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Court records obtained by KQED show repeated delays in setting a preliminary hearing date, after the judge granted repeated requests from attorneys on both sides for additional time to seek and review what they called “voluminous” medical documents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Haile, from the ACLU, agrees that most signs point to Jenkins dismissing the case against Cha, noting that she has not only delayed court proceedings, but also \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/jenkins-police-investigate-17782463.php#:~:text=San%20Francisco%20District%20Attorney%20Brooke,public%20commitment%20to%20police%20accountability.\">reportedly downsized the division in her office\u003c/a> devoted to investigating police misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A lonely fight for justice\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In late April, Williams finally met with Cleo Moore, telling her that the lack of communication over the case shouldn’t continue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I apologize, and I bear responsibility for that,” Williams told Moore, as the two stood in a hallway in San Francisco Superior Court, with a scrum of reporters watching.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s the first time she, Darby Williams, has said anything to me,” Moore later told KQED, explaining she had been worried about being placated in front of the press.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moore says her ongoing fight for justice for her son has been a lonely one, and worries about a dearth of local political pressure from the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Compared to many other communities across the country with larger Black populations, not as many San Franciscans typically turn out to protest after police kill an unarmed Black man, noted Tinisch Hollins, executive director of Californians for Safety and Justice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11949401\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11949401\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023.jpg\" alt=\"An African American woman looks at a photo of a young African American man while seated at a table at home.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cleo Moore, the mother of Sean Moore, pulls a school wallet photo of Sean from a bag of her late husband’s belongings at her home in Daly City on March 31, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It goes without saying that the displacement and outmigration of San Francisco, Black San Francisco, has impacted us politically,” said Hollins, who grew up in San Francisco’s historically Black Bayview neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>BART board member Lateefah Simon, who is now running for Congress in the East Bay but grew up in San Francisco’s Fillmore District, echoed that sentiment. She noted that the city’s declining Black population may have translated into a lack of political will to prosecute police who kill unarmed Black men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s not gonna be a thousand people of African descent outside the DA’s office or the court building,” Simon said. “The organized Black left is diminishing, there is absolutely no question about that. When community power begins to die down, there’s less pressure.”[aside postID=news_11942654 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63455_003_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-1020x680.jpg']In January, after Memphis police officers beat and killed Tyre Nichols, an unarmed 29-year-old Black man, during a traffic stop, San Francisco Mayor London Breed and DA Jenkins both spoke at a rally on the steps of City Hall in support of Nichols’ family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cleo Moore, who was invited by one of the organizers to attend the protest, noticed that neither Breed nor Jenkins mentioned another unarmed Black man also killed police: her son.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And neither official stopped to speak to Moore about her son’s case, she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Why invite me to come to a rally like that, when you get the mayor that walks out and says, ‘Oh, we got to figure out some kind of way to keep them from killing our Black men.’ And she turns around and goes back up into her office or wherever,” Moore said. “That was a slam in my face.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Cleo Moore, 84, has been waiting years for a preliminary hearing in the case against the officer who shot her son — a delay she says has taken a major toll.",
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"title": "'I Need to Be Able to Go on With My Life': Sean Moore's Mother Is Still Awaiting Justice, Years After Her Son Was Killed by SFPD | KQED",
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"headline": "'I Need to Be Able to Go on With My Life': Sean Moore's Mother Is Still Awaiting Justice, Years After Her Son Was Killed by SFPD",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Cleo Moore is tired of waiting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’s 84, and instead of celebrating the joy of her new great-grandchild, she spends much of her time waiting to hear back from San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins about the status of a case involving the police officer who shot her son, Sean, in 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sean Moore, a Black man who was unarmed when he was shot, died three years later from complications related to the injury.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the officer who shot him was charged with manslaughter, the case has dragged on for two years without a preliminary hearing — usually considered an early step in a trial.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The delay has taken a toll.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My days are spent going from one graveyard to the other,” said Moore, who is mourning both her son and her late husband. “I need to get over this. I need to be able to go on with my life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moore believes her son was given less opportunity than many other people to turn his life around because he was Black. And since his death, she too has felt marginalized in her now years-long effort to advance the case against the officer who pulled the trigger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11949391\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11949391\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A middle-aged African American man and an older African American woman at home, woman is seated, the man is standing as they look at the camera with sullen expressions.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64213_001_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sean Moore’s brother, Kenneth Blackmon, and mother, Cleo Moore, sit at the kitchen table at her home in Daly City on March 31, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 2021, then-DA Chesa Boudin \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11894821/sf-da-charges-officer-with-homicide-in-2017-on-duty-shooting-of-sean-moore\">charged SFPD officer Kenneth Cha\u003c/a> with involuntary manslaughter and assault for Moore’s death, marking only the second time the city has ever filed homicide charges against an officer for an on-duty incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, nearly a year since Boudin’s recall, the decision to pursue a case against Cha lies in the hands of Jenkins. And the chances of her moving forward with it, many observers say, do not look promising.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, Moore’s trust in Jenkins was shaken when the district attorney canceled a meeting Moore scheduled with her to discuss the case. Even before that, Moore had little confidence in Jenkins’ commitment to prosecute police, after the DA’s office \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11940624/blaming-boudin-sf-d-a-brooke-jenkins-wants-to-dismiss-historic-case-against-sfpd-officer-who-killed-keita-oneil\">dismissed charges earlier this year against former SFPD officer Christopher Samayoa\u003c/a>, who in 2017 shot and killed Keita O’Neil, also an unarmed Black man.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jenkins’ office did not respond to requests for an interview and declined to comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the years of waiting, Moore was offered a glimmer of hope in late April when she told San Francisco Superior Court Judge Loretta M. Giorgi that too much time had passed since Cha had been charged.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘My days are spent going from one graveyard to the other. I need to get over this. I need to be able to go on with my life.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“Please, I need some justice. I hear the defense attorney needs more time. He needs more evidence. What more time does he need to have?” she told the judge in court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Giorgi agreed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I let [the attorneys] know when we come back in four weeks we will set a preliminary hearing,” Giorgi said. “I’m going to push them. I promise you, I’m going to push them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But when Giorgi told the defense and prosecution to be ready for that now-scheduled May 26 court date, Assistant District Attorney Darby Williams asked the judge if she could approach the bench and conferred with her and the defense in a hushed tone, inaudible to others in the courtroom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s those kinds of secretive exchanges that worry Moore, she says, leaving her with little left to cling to except faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can’t even grieve for my son being gone because I have to listen to all this garbage,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A mental health struggle\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The few images the public has seen of Sean Moore are mostly taken from body camera footage from the night officers showed up at his doorstep and later shot him. The 46-year-old, who claimed he was being unduly harassed, appears enraged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in Cleo Moore’s Daly City home, photos of her son during happier times are laid out across her piano like a shrine. In one, Sean embraces family members. In another he wraps his arms around his prom date. A third captures him smiling broadly, as he poses in a bright red-and-white uniform, holding a baseball bat.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sean was born and raised in San Francisco, and later moved to Daly City. He played basketball and varsity baseball at Archbishop Riordan High School, and continued playing baseball at Skyline College in nearby San Bruno, where he received a “most improved player” award. He and his family were decades-long 49ers ticket holders at Candlestick Park.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11949393\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11949393\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Color photo of a smiling young African American boy on a piano with flowers next to it.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/RS64217_007_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A school photo of Sean Moore sits on a piano at the home of his mother, Cleo Moore, in Daly City on March 31, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Cleo bonded with her son over sports. They bowled together as partners, earning a first-place trophy at Westlake Bowl in Daly City.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But as an adult, Sean’s mental health began to deteriorate, his mother says. He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, which prevented him from holding down a job, and he moved back into his family’s home in San Francisco’s Ingleside neighborhood. Cleo says she helped him by picking up his medications, to avoid potential conflicts with pharmacy staff at the hospital.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC1697453539&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I supported my children in whatever they did,” Cleo said. “I tried to do the best that I can do. I can’t control what happened in later life, when someone becomes ill. If I could push a button and correct it, I would.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She also made calls to San Francisco city services seeking mental health interventions for her son, but because Sean had private health insurance, through Kaiser Permanente, she was directed back to them. Cleo, though, says Kaiser was not up to the task of meeting her son’s mental health needs, especially when they reached crisis level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The city of San Francisco, like most of the country, does not have the appropriate responses to mental illness,” said Yoel Haile, director of the ACLU Northern California’s criminal justice program, who is helping Moore’s family decipher the legal process and negotiate with the DA’s office. “Sean had as much resources as someone can, right? At least by way of what his family was able to provide for him. And most people are nowhere near that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11949399\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11949399\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023.jpg\" alt=\"A tombstone with flowers on the grave.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/001_KQED_SeanMooreGraveSite_04052023-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The grave site of Sean Moore in Colma on April 5, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>A deadly encounter\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At about 4 a.m. on Jan. 6, 2017, SFPD officers Cha and Colin Patino \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11894821/sf-da-charges-officer-with-homicide-in-2017-on-duty-shooting-of-sean-moore\">knocked on the front-door gate of Sean Moore’s Ingleside apartment\u003c/a>, responding to a neighbor’s noise complaint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Moore opened the door, he looked agitated as he stood behind the still-closed safety gate, and repeatedly yelled at the officers to leave, \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBb3_WvFtXk\">the body camera video shows\u003c/a>. Roughly eight minutes later, after the officers continued to demand that Moore open the gate, he finally did so and stood near the top of the steps. The officers then yelled at him to get on the ground. When Moore refused, Patino struck him with a baton and Cha fired his gun twice, hitting Moore in the stomach and groin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Three years later, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11894821/sf-da-charges-officer-with-homicide-in-2017-on-duty-shooting-of-sean-moore\">Moore died in San Quentin State Prison\u003c/a>, where he had been serving time for an unrelated conviction. A Marin County coroner investigation found the cause of death to be an obstruction in his stomach caused by scar tissue from the gunshot wound inflicted three years earlier.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DA may use those facts to push for the case to be dismissed, argues Rebecca Young, the prosecutor Boudin had initially assigned to the case, but who was later fired by Jenkins.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Young, Williams, who took over the prosecution, asked for a research memo to determine whether the DA’s office could establish a connection between Moore’s 2017 shooting and his subsequent death in 2020.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Young suspects Williams is trying “to find a way to break the chain of causation” between the shooting and the death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11942842\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11942842\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"An older African American woman speaks into a microphone at a rally.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/RS63462_010_KQED_KeitaONeilRally_03062023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cleo Moore, whose son Sean Moore was shot by San Francisco police in 2017, attends a rally in support of both the family of Keita O’Neil and her son outside the Supreme Court of California building in San Francisco on March 6, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Court records obtained by KQED show repeated delays in setting a preliminary hearing date, after the judge granted repeated requests from attorneys on both sides for additional time to seek and review what they called “voluminous” medical documents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Haile, from the ACLU, agrees that most signs point to Jenkins dismissing the case against Cha, noting that she has not only delayed court proceedings, but also \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/jenkins-police-investigate-17782463.php#:~:text=San%20Francisco%20District%20Attorney%20Brooke,public%20commitment%20to%20police%20accountability.\">reportedly downsized the division in her office\u003c/a> devoted to investigating police misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A lonely fight for justice\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In late April, Williams finally met with Cleo Moore, telling her that the lack of communication over the case shouldn’t continue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I apologize, and I bear responsibility for that,” Williams told Moore, as the two stood in a hallway in San Francisco Superior Court, with a scrum of reporters watching.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s the first time she, Darby Williams, has said anything to me,” Moore later told KQED, explaining she had been worried about being placated in front of the press.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Moore says her ongoing fight for justice for her son has been a lonely one, and worries about a dearth of local political pressure from the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Compared to many other communities across the country with larger Black populations, not as many San Franciscans typically turn out to protest after police kill an unarmed Black man, noted Tinisch Hollins, executive director of Californians for Safety and Justice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11949401\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11949401\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023.jpg\" alt=\"An African American woman looks at a photo of a young African American man while seated at a table at home.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/05/006_KQED_SeanMooreFamily_03312023-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cleo Moore, the mother of Sean Moore, pulls a school wallet photo of Sean from a bag of her late husband’s belongings at her home in Daly City on March 31, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It goes without saying that the displacement and outmigration of San Francisco, Black San Francisco, has impacted us politically,” said Hollins, who grew up in San Francisco’s historically Black Bayview neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>BART board member Lateefah Simon, who is now running for Congress in the East Bay but grew up in San Francisco’s Fillmore District, echoed that sentiment. She noted that the city’s declining Black population may have translated into a lack of political will to prosecute police who kill unarmed Black men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s not gonna be a thousand people of African descent outside the DA’s office or the court building,” Simon said. “The organized Black left is diminishing, there is absolutely no question about that. When community power begins to die down, there’s less pressure.”\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In January, after Memphis police officers beat and killed Tyre Nichols, an unarmed 29-year-old Black man, during a traffic stop, San Francisco Mayor London Breed and DA Jenkins both spoke at a rally on the steps of City Hall in support of Nichols’ family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cleo Moore, who was invited by one of the organizers to attend the protest, noticed that neither Breed nor Jenkins mentioned another unarmed Black man also killed police: her son.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And neither official stopped to speak to Moore about her son’s case, she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Why invite me to come to a rally like that, when you get the mayor that walks out and says, ‘Oh, we got to figure out some kind of way to keep them from killing our Black men.’ And she turns around and goes back up into her office or wherever,” Moore said. “That was a slam in my face.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "antioch-police-racist-texting-scandal-confirms-what-many-black-and-brown-residents-have-decried-for-years",
"title": "Antioch Police Racist Texting Scandal Confirms What Many Black and Brown Residents Have Decried for Years",
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"headTitle": "Antioch Police Racist Texting Scandal Confirms What Many Black and Brown Residents Have Decried for Years | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Warning: This story includes quotations with racist and vulgar language as well as descriptions of violent attacks.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kathryn Wade marched up to the microphone in the City Council chambers before the meeting had even started with something to say. Wade is no stranger to the City Council in Antioch. She’s been coming here to talk and yell about the Antioch Police Department (APD) and their treatment of Black people for the past decade, since she was just one of a small handful of residents speaking up.[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Gigi Crowder, executive director of NAMI Contra Costa\"]‘I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city. But then I believed that there was a possibility for change.’[/pullquote]Now, on this early Tuesday evening in April, she was far from alone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Shut it all down,” Wade screamed across the packed room.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch sits in the middle of a storm of scandal after the release of violent, racist, homophobic and sexist text messages by the city’s police officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The disturbing texts came to light during an investigation by the FBI and the Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office into \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/09/10/exclusive-fbi-criminal-investigation-of-antioch-pittsburg-cops-grows-grand-jury-convening/\">alleged misconduct\u003c/a> by police in Antioch and the neighboring city of Pittsburg. Some of the issues being investigated include violent and excessive use of police dogs and eliciting false confessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this month, the DA’s office released two reports \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">detailing the contents\u003c/a> of multiple\u003ca href=\"https://www.contracosta.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/78905/Terryon-Pugh-Redacted-Investigative-Report\"> text message\u003c/a> exchanges written by 17 Antioch police officers from various time periods between 2019 and 2022. They include two texts from \u003ca href=\"https://www.antiochpoa.org/about/presidents-message\">Rick Hoffman\u003c/a>, the president of Antioch’s police union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But far more officers were included on the text chains, according to a letter sent by Ellen McDonnell , the county’s chief public defender, to DA Diana Becton. According to McDonnell, 45 officers — almost half of the entire department — had received the texts and did nothing. At least 16 of those “are in leadership roles at APD as detectives, sergeants, and lieutenants,” McDonnell wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to have to listen,” Wade cried out in the council chambers. Her words were directed at the council members, Mayor Lamar Thorpe, and Police Chief Steven Ford, who joined the department last year, after most of the text messages were sent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to have to absorb a lot of people’s pain,” Wade told them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Including her pain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wade’s son, Malad Baldwin, was 22-years-old when he was\u003ca href=\"https://www.courthousenews.com/cops-will-face-moms-distress-claim-in-sons-beating/\"> a victim of police violence\u003c/a>, she claims. In 2014, he was asleep in Wade’s car parked outside their house when police dragged him from the vehicle and beat him, according to a lawsuit filed against the city and the officers. In the complaint, Wade said she came out of the house to see them striking her son, and that they beat him until he lost consciousness. The suit claims that police slammed Baldwin into the sidewalk, spread his legs and repeatedly struck him there. “They hit him right in between his butt cheeks,” Wade said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police claim Baldwin was drunk and combative. He was charged with resisting arrest, but those charges were dropped. The lawsuit was settled out of court, with officers admitting no wrongdoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wade says the beating changed her son. He was depressed, riddled with anxiety, unable to hold down a job. That was the first of several incidents between Baldwin and Antioch police. Wade says it was as if they were stalking him, harassing him every where he went.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2020, Baldwin died by suicide. Wade faults Antioch police for her son’s mental trauma, and ultimately for his death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police have not yet responded to requests for comment regarding subsequent interactions with Baldwin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, Wade says, “It feels like my baby died all over again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because Baldwin was mentioned in the text messages.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>“I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city”\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Officers joked about Baldwin’s claims that they beat him on his backside, and about the department using deadly force. “But we kill more Mexicans than anything else. So Blacks can feel safe,” one officer texted. “Sorry. Reverse that,” he followed up a minute later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those are some of the tamer texts released.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You’ll hear people talk about “old Antioch” — which refers to the place it used to be: White, working class, a sundown town, where people of color knew not to be after dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But all that has changed. Antioch is now 36% white, 35% Latino, and 20% Black, according to the\u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/antiochcitycalifornia/LND110210\"> 2020 census\u003c/a>. The shift happened both gradually and quickly. At first, Black people and other people of color moved here for the reasons everyone else did: bigger houses, better schools, a shot at the suburban American dream.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947886\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947886\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Two Black men, and one woman hold signs at a rally. One sign says: 'Fire & Decertify.' The others says 'We demand accountability.'\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dozens of community members and activists join a rally outside of the Antioch Police Department on April 18, 2023, to protest the racist and homophobic text messages shared among members of the department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In the past decade or so, gentrification and exploding housing costs in cities such as San Francisco and Oakland drove displaced poor people here — especially people of color. As Oakland’s Black population shrank, Antioch’s grew.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This new great migration is happening across America, changing the suburbs that have long been thought of as white space into the most diverse places in the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On this Tuesday night, the special meeting of the City Council was narrowly focused on addressing the ballooning scandal resulting from the racist texts, with the council voting to audit the department’s internal affairs division, its hiring and promotional practices, and to perform an equity audit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those all passed easily, but the meeting, like the one the week before, was about more than just policy. People needed to speak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Almost 100 people protested in front of the police station ahead of the council meeting, walking a stone’s throw from City Hall.[aside label=\"related coverage\" tag=\"antioch\"]“Antioch didn’t look like this, but it does now,” said Timothy Manly. “When everybody was fixing their issues in the ’60s, Antioch didn’t think that they’d have to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the ’60s, Antioch was almost entirely white.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re just reaping what you sowed,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some people told stories of their own encounters with Antioch police, others spoke of the experiences of children and loved ones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These individuals that have spoken tonight are victims of police brutality, they are victims of crimes,” Public Defender Ellen McDonnell said when it was her turn at the dais. “The community and our clients have been sounding the alarm about your police department for years and years and years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Shayla Bowers talked about how important it was to name the officers. “Our Black and brown people, as you see in this room, we got names, we got banners, we are public about our deaths in our community,” she said. “We need to be public about these police officers that are doing harm in our community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city,” said Gigi Crowder, the executive director of NAMI Contra Costa, an affiliate of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, and an Antioch resident. “But then I believed that there was a possibility for change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She believed that, she told the council, because it wasn’t just demographics that were shifting — the balance of power was too.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I’ll bury that N*&*er in my fields’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>For a long time the Antioch’s leadership did not reflect its diversifying population. That changed in 2020, with a Black majority emerging on the five-person City Council, including Mayor Thorpe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In 2020, when all I asked for was a community to look at policies to do police reform,” Thorpe reminded the council chambers, “people lost their collective minds.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If they could’ve hung me from the highest tree in Antioch they would have,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A group of pro-police, almost entirely white residents, many affiliated with a private Facebook group called “Back the Blue,” flooded the then-online-only council meetings, pushing back against the new majority, and any suggestions of police reform. They mounted a recall campaign against Thorpe, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/recall-of-antioch-mayor-dies-following-allegations-of-fraud\">which failed to gather enough signatures\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11887516/why-was-angelo-quintos-death-ruled-an-accident\">December 2020 death of Angelo Quinto\u003c/a> in the custody of Antioch police, the council voted for police to wear body cameras, a reform many police departments passed over a decade ago, but Antioch had long resisted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In one of the released texts, body cameras are mentioned. Discussing an arrest made with the Pittsburg Police Department, whose officers did have cameras, an Antioch officer wrote: “If Pitt didn’t have all those body cams and that was us … we would have f&*ked him up more.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another police officer, Devon Wenger, responded, “I agree. That’s why I don’t like body cameras.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947926\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947926\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg\" alt=\"A small group of Black women stand on the sidewalk holding signs and protesting racism among police in Antioch.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kiora Hansen and Della Currie join the protest in Antioch in front of the city’s police department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In a statement to \u003ca href=\"https://abcnews.go.com/US/city-antioch-police-officers-face-lawsuit-alleged-civil/story?id=98728222\">ABC News\u003c/a>, Wenger denied he was being racist, pointing out that he only sent that one text. “Out of both released reports, the initial 21-page-report and the secondary 14-page report, I just simply said I do not like body cams,” he told them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To put it bluntly, that’s not racist.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wenger also suggested that the investigation into Antioch police may have been “corrupted.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>NPR’s requests to speak to the officers named in the DA’s report were either ignored or declined.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mayor Thorpe shows up in the police text messages too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll buy someone a prime rib dinner at House of prime rib to 40 that mfr during the protest today,” one officer texted, referring to “the potential use of a .40mm less lethal launcher being utilized” on the mayor, the \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">DA’s report \u003c/a>explains. A .40mm weapon is a kind of gun that fires hard-foam projectiles. Their use \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-06-12/protesters-complain-about-excessive-force\">against protesters and for crowd control\u003c/a>, as well as their designation as less lethal, has been criticized.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That text was sent in June 2020, during the heart of the \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/06/05/867060621/being-black-in-america-we-have-a-place-in-this-world-too\">national uprising\u003c/a> over the \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/05/27/862956646/george-floyds-death-stokes-call-for-minneapolis-officers-to-be-charged-with-murd\">murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer\u003c/a>. Another text referred to Floyd as “the gorilla who died.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The text messages continuously refer to Black people as “gorillas” and “monkeys,” and officers repeatedly texted photos of gorillas to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A young activist, Shagoofa Khan, prominent in organizing protests in Antioch, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11837708/a-hunger-strike-in-antioch-and-what-it-says-about-the-changing-suburbs\">a hunger strike in front of the police station\u003c/a>, was also mentioned in the texts. She “looks like an Arabian nights cum dumpster,” a sergeant wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The same sergeant, Josh Evans, texted in reference to the arrest of a Black suspect, “I’ll bury that N*&*er in my fields.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Four minutes later he texted again. “And yes… it was a hard R on purpose.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I’m only stopping them cuz they black’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The texts aren’t just filled with racist and sexist vitriol, they also seem to suggest possible civil rights violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On a group chat, one officer asks the others what they are doing. The response from another, “violating civil rights.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Racial profiling was a “modus operandi with respect to these officers,” civil rights lawyer John Burris claimed at a news conference on April 20, announcing a federal lawsuit against the city, the police department, and individual officers on behalf of a growing list of victims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They would stop people just because they were Black, they would harass them, they would search them, and ultimately arrest them if they thought they could get away with it,” he alleged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They didn’t want any kind of oral, written, videotape of the confession,” he went on. “They wanted the confession to be such that they could make up the confession and convince their superiors that the person has confessed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris said he was also disturbed by text messages that suggested officers took pleasure in using violent force, especially on Black people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris’ clients include those who say they were repeatedly targeted and falsely accused by Antioch police officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Adam Carpenter, one of the plaintiffs, was arrested for possession of a firearm by four of the officers named in the scandal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have been harassed and targeted and railroaded by the Antioch police department for the last 10 years,” Carpenter told a scrum of reporters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947885\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947885\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A young woman with a bullhorn leads protesters on the street holding signs.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shagoofa Khan leads a rally of dozens of community members from the Antioch Police Department to City Hall on April 18, 2023, to protest the racist and homophobic text messages shared among the department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>According to the lawsuit, in the year before his arrest he was stopped by the same officers almost 10 times.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carpenter spent 11 months in jail before all charges against him were dropped. The complaint alleges that one of the officers involved in Carpenter’s arrest texted, “I’m only stopping them cuz they black.” It alleges another wrote, “I sometimes just say people gave me a full confession when they didn’t. gets filed easier.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They have basically ruined my life,” Carpenter said. “I’ve not been able to get a job, and I’m a journeyman by trade, a painter.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s been devastating, like living in hell.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Others shared similar stories, claiming patterns of harassment, planted evidence, and manufactured confessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Antioch city attorney as well as current and former police chiefs have not yet responded to requests for comment on the litigation.[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Antioch Mayor Lamar Thorpe\"]‘In 2020, when all I asked for was a community to look at policies to do police reform, people lost their collective minds.’[/pullquote]Michael Rains, a former police officer and lawyer who represents some, but not all, of the officers, responded with a brief statement. “I understand this story is newsworthy on a number of fronts,” he wrote, “including, from my perspective, whether the due process and privacy rights of officers were abandoned by the Court and District Attorney.” But he added that he has advised his clients not to speak publicly, and is himself not granting interviews “at the present time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Current Antioch Police Chief Steven Ford, who is Black, came from San Francisco to lead the department a year ago. At the first council meeting after the scandal broke, he said that he is trying not to reform, but to reframe policing there. “We’re going to shift how things are done structurally, how they are done politically, how they are done administratively,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No one can tell yet just how many \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11946551/antiochs-racist-police-text-message-scandal-could-mean-dropped-charges-in-other-cases\">criminal cases might hang in the balance \u003c/a>after these revelations. Burris, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/congressmen-want-us-attorney-general-to-investigate-antioch-police\">alongside others\u003c/a> including two members of Congress, are calling for the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the Antioch Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carpenter said that in a strange way, he was grateful to read all the texts. At least they confirmed for everyone else what he’d been experiencing for so long.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It has been the same for Kathryn Wade. Reading the texts may have reopened the wound of her son’s death, but at least, she says, “Everything is out in the open, now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=These+California+police+officers+have+created+a+scandal.+They+sent+racist+texts&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Residents of color in this rapidly changing Bay Area suburb have long accused the police department of racism, corruption and abuse.",
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"title": "Antioch Police Racist Texting Scandal Confirms What Many Black and Brown Residents Have Decried for Years | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Warning: This story includes quotations with racist and vulgar language as well as descriptions of violent attacks.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kathryn Wade marched up to the microphone in the City Council chambers before the meeting had even started with something to say. Wade is no stranger to the City Council in Antioch. She’s been coming here to talk and yell about the Antioch Police Department (APD) and their treatment of Black people for the past decade, since she was just one of a small handful of residents speaking up.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Now, on this early Tuesday evening in April, she was far from alone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Shut it all down,” Wade screamed across the packed room.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch sits in the middle of a storm of scandal after the release of violent, racist, homophobic and sexist text messages by the city’s police officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The disturbing texts came to light during an investigation by the FBI and the Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office into \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/09/10/exclusive-fbi-criminal-investigation-of-antioch-pittsburg-cops-grows-grand-jury-convening/\">alleged misconduct\u003c/a> by police in Antioch and the neighboring city of Pittsburg. Some of the issues being investigated include violent and excessive use of police dogs and eliciting false confessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this month, the DA’s office released two reports \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">detailing the contents\u003c/a> of multiple\u003ca href=\"https://www.contracosta.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/78905/Terryon-Pugh-Redacted-Investigative-Report\"> text message\u003c/a> exchanges written by 17 Antioch police officers from various time periods between 2019 and 2022. They include two texts from \u003ca href=\"https://www.antiochpoa.org/about/presidents-message\">Rick Hoffman\u003c/a>, the president of Antioch’s police union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But far more officers were included on the text chains, according to a letter sent by Ellen McDonnell , the county’s chief public defender, to DA Diana Becton. According to McDonnell, 45 officers — almost half of the entire department — had received the texts and did nothing. At least 16 of those “are in leadership roles at APD as detectives, sergeants, and lieutenants,” McDonnell wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to have to listen,” Wade cried out in the council chambers. Her words were directed at the council members, Mayor Lamar Thorpe, and Police Chief Steven Ford, who joined the department last year, after most of the text messages were sent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to have to absorb a lot of people’s pain,” Wade told them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Including her pain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wade’s son, Malad Baldwin, was 22-years-old when he was\u003ca href=\"https://www.courthousenews.com/cops-will-face-moms-distress-claim-in-sons-beating/\"> a victim of police violence\u003c/a>, she claims. In 2014, he was asleep in Wade’s car parked outside their house when police dragged him from the vehicle and beat him, according to a lawsuit filed against the city and the officers. In the complaint, Wade said she came out of the house to see them striking her son, and that they beat him until he lost consciousness. The suit claims that police slammed Baldwin into the sidewalk, spread his legs and repeatedly struck him there. “They hit him right in between his butt cheeks,” Wade said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police claim Baldwin was drunk and combative. He was charged with resisting arrest, but those charges were dropped. The lawsuit was settled out of court, with officers admitting no wrongdoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wade says the beating changed her son. He was depressed, riddled with anxiety, unable to hold down a job. That was the first of several incidents between Baldwin and Antioch police. Wade says it was as if they were stalking him, harassing him every where he went.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2020, Baldwin died by suicide. Wade faults Antioch police for her son’s mental trauma, and ultimately for his death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police have not yet responded to requests for comment regarding subsequent interactions with Baldwin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, Wade says, “It feels like my baby died all over again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because Baldwin was mentioned in the text messages.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>“I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city”\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Officers joked about Baldwin’s claims that they beat him on his backside, and about the department using deadly force. “But we kill more Mexicans than anything else. So Blacks can feel safe,” one officer texted. “Sorry. Reverse that,” he followed up a minute later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those are some of the tamer texts released.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You’ll hear people talk about “old Antioch” — which refers to the place it used to be: White, working class, a sundown town, where people of color knew not to be after dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But all that has changed. Antioch is now 36% white, 35% Latino, and 20% Black, according to the\u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/antiochcitycalifornia/LND110210\"> 2020 census\u003c/a>. The shift happened both gradually and quickly. At first, Black people and other people of color moved here for the reasons everyone else did: bigger houses, better schools, a shot at the suburban American dream.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947886\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947886\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Two Black men, and one woman hold signs at a rally. One sign says: 'Fire & Decertify.' The others says 'We demand accountability.'\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dozens of community members and activists join a rally outside of the Antioch Police Department on April 18, 2023, to protest the racist and homophobic text messages shared among members of the department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In the past decade or so, gentrification and exploding housing costs in cities such as San Francisco and Oakland drove displaced poor people here — especially people of color. As Oakland’s Black population shrank, Antioch’s grew.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This new great migration is happening across America, changing the suburbs that have long been thought of as white space into the most diverse places in the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On this Tuesday night, the special meeting of the City Council was narrowly focused on addressing the ballooning scandal resulting from the racist texts, with the council voting to audit the department’s internal affairs division, its hiring and promotional practices, and to perform an equity audit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those all passed easily, but the meeting, like the one the week before, was about more than just policy. People needed to speak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Almost 100 people protested in front of the police station ahead of the council meeting, walking a stone’s throw from City Hall.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“Antioch didn’t look like this, but it does now,” said Timothy Manly. “When everybody was fixing their issues in the ’60s, Antioch didn’t think that they’d have to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the ’60s, Antioch was almost entirely white.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re just reaping what you sowed,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some people told stories of their own encounters with Antioch police, others spoke of the experiences of children and loved ones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These individuals that have spoken tonight are victims of police brutality, they are victims of crimes,” Public Defender Ellen McDonnell said when it was her turn at the dais. “The community and our clients have been sounding the alarm about your police department for years and years and years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Shayla Bowers talked about how important it was to name the officers. “Our Black and brown people, as you see in this room, we got names, we got banners, we are public about our deaths in our community,” she said. “We need to be public about these police officers that are doing harm in our community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city,” said Gigi Crowder, the executive director of NAMI Contra Costa, an affiliate of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, and an Antioch resident. “But then I believed that there was a possibility for change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She believed that, she told the council, because it wasn’t just demographics that were shifting — the balance of power was too.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I’ll bury that N*&*er in my fields’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>For a long time the Antioch’s leadership did not reflect its diversifying population. That changed in 2020, with a Black majority emerging on the five-person City Council, including Mayor Thorpe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In 2020, when all I asked for was a community to look at policies to do police reform,” Thorpe reminded the council chambers, “people lost their collective minds.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If they could’ve hung me from the highest tree in Antioch they would have,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A group of pro-police, almost entirely white residents, many affiliated with a private Facebook group called “Back the Blue,” flooded the then-online-only council meetings, pushing back against the new majority, and any suggestions of police reform. They mounted a recall campaign against Thorpe, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/recall-of-antioch-mayor-dies-following-allegations-of-fraud\">which failed to gather enough signatures\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11887516/why-was-angelo-quintos-death-ruled-an-accident\">December 2020 death of Angelo Quinto\u003c/a> in the custody of Antioch police, the council voted for police to wear body cameras, a reform many police departments passed over a decade ago, but Antioch had long resisted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In one of the released texts, body cameras are mentioned. Discussing an arrest made with the Pittsburg Police Department, whose officers did have cameras, an Antioch officer wrote: “If Pitt didn’t have all those body cams and that was us … we would have f&*ked him up more.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another police officer, Devon Wenger, responded, “I agree. That’s why I don’t like body cameras.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947926\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947926\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg\" alt=\"A small group of Black women stand on the sidewalk holding signs and protesting racism among police in Antioch.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kiora Hansen and Della Currie join the protest in Antioch in front of the city’s police department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In a statement to \u003ca href=\"https://abcnews.go.com/US/city-antioch-police-officers-face-lawsuit-alleged-civil/story?id=98728222\">ABC News\u003c/a>, Wenger denied he was being racist, pointing out that he only sent that one text. “Out of both released reports, the initial 21-page-report and the secondary 14-page report, I just simply said I do not like body cams,” he told them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To put it bluntly, that’s not racist.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wenger also suggested that the investigation into Antioch police may have been “corrupted.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>NPR’s requests to speak to the officers named in the DA’s report were either ignored or declined.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mayor Thorpe shows up in the police text messages too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll buy someone a prime rib dinner at House of prime rib to 40 that mfr during the protest today,” one officer texted, referring to “the potential use of a .40mm less lethal launcher being utilized” on the mayor, the \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">DA’s report \u003c/a>explains. A .40mm weapon is a kind of gun that fires hard-foam projectiles. Their use \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-06-12/protesters-complain-about-excessive-force\">against protesters and for crowd control\u003c/a>, as well as their designation as less lethal, has been criticized.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That text was sent in June 2020, during the heart of the \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/06/05/867060621/being-black-in-america-we-have-a-place-in-this-world-too\">national uprising\u003c/a> over the \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/05/27/862956646/george-floyds-death-stokes-call-for-minneapolis-officers-to-be-charged-with-murd\">murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer\u003c/a>. Another text referred to Floyd as “the gorilla who died.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The text messages continuously refer to Black people as “gorillas” and “monkeys,” and officers repeatedly texted photos of gorillas to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A young activist, Shagoofa Khan, prominent in organizing protests in Antioch, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11837708/a-hunger-strike-in-antioch-and-what-it-says-about-the-changing-suburbs\">a hunger strike in front of the police station\u003c/a>, was also mentioned in the texts. She “looks like an Arabian nights cum dumpster,” a sergeant wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The same sergeant, Josh Evans, texted in reference to the arrest of a Black suspect, “I’ll bury that N*&*er in my fields.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Four minutes later he texted again. “And yes… it was a hard R on purpose.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I’m only stopping them cuz they black’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The texts aren’t just filled with racist and sexist vitriol, they also seem to suggest possible civil rights violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On a group chat, one officer asks the others what they are doing. The response from another, “violating civil rights.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Racial profiling was a “modus operandi with respect to these officers,” civil rights lawyer John Burris claimed at a news conference on April 20, announcing a federal lawsuit against the city, the police department, and individual officers on behalf of a growing list of victims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They would stop people just because they were Black, they would harass them, they would search them, and ultimately arrest them if they thought they could get away with it,” he alleged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They didn’t want any kind of oral, written, videotape of the confession,” he went on. “They wanted the confession to be such that they could make up the confession and convince their superiors that the person has confessed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris said he was also disturbed by text messages that suggested officers took pleasure in using violent force, especially on Black people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris’ clients include those who say they were repeatedly targeted and falsely accused by Antioch police officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Adam Carpenter, one of the plaintiffs, was arrested for possession of a firearm by four of the officers named in the scandal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have been harassed and targeted and railroaded by the Antioch police department for the last 10 years,” Carpenter told a scrum of reporters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947885\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947885\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A young woman with a bullhorn leads protesters on the street holding signs.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shagoofa Khan leads a rally of dozens of community members from the Antioch Police Department to City Hall on April 18, 2023, to protest the racist and homophobic text messages shared among the department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>According to the lawsuit, in the year before his arrest he was stopped by the same officers almost 10 times.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carpenter spent 11 months in jail before all charges against him were dropped. The complaint alleges that one of the officers involved in Carpenter’s arrest texted, “I’m only stopping them cuz they black.” It alleges another wrote, “I sometimes just say people gave me a full confession when they didn’t. gets filed easier.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They have basically ruined my life,” Carpenter said. “I’ve not been able to get a job, and I’m a journeyman by trade, a painter.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s been devastating, like living in hell.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Others shared similar stories, claiming patterns of harassment, planted evidence, and manufactured confessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Antioch city attorney as well as current and former police chiefs have not yet responded to requests for comment on the litigation.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘In 2020, when all I asked for was a community to look at policies to do police reform, people lost their collective minds.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Michael Rains, a former police officer and lawyer who represents some, but not all, of the officers, responded with a brief statement. “I understand this story is newsworthy on a number of fronts,” he wrote, “including, from my perspective, whether the due process and privacy rights of officers were abandoned by the Court and District Attorney.” But he added that he has advised his clients not to speak publicly, and is himself not granting interviews “at the present time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Current Antioch Police Chief Steven Ford, who is Black, came from San Francisco to lead the department a year ago. At the first council meeting after the scandal broke, he said that he is trying not to reform, but to reframe policing there. “We’re going to shift how things are done structurally, how they are done politically, how they are done administratively,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No one can tell yet just how many \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11946551/antiochs-racist-police-text-message-scandal-could-mean-dropped-charges-in-other-cases\">criminal cases might hang in the balance \u003c/a>after these revelations. Burris, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/congressmen-want-us-attorney-general-to-investigate-antioch-police\">alongside others\u003c/a> including two members of Congress, are calling for the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the Antioch Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carpenter said that in a strange way, he was grateful to read all the texts. At least they confirmed for everyone else what he’d been experiencing for so long.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It has been the same for Kathryn Wade. Reading the texts may have reopened the wound of her son’s death, but at least, she says, “Everything is out in the open, now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=These+California+police+officers+have+created+a+scandal.+They+sent+racist+texts&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "in-vallejo-investigations-of-police-take-so-long-officers-kill-again-before-reviews-are-done",
"title": "In Vallejo, Investigations of Police Take So Long, Officers Kill Again Before Reviews Are Done",
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"headTitle": "In Vallejo, Investigations of Police Take So Long, Officers Kill Again Before Reviews Are Done | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>This article was produced for ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network in partnership with \u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org/\">Open Vallejo\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around dinner time on Feb. 13, 2018, Ronell Foster was riding his bike on a wide road that runs through the historic downtown of Vallejo, California. The 33-year-old did not own a car, and cycled nearly everywhere he went around his hometown, often flanked by his teenage son and 5-year-old daughter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that night, Foster was riding alone, swerving in and out of traffic lanes without a bike light, and caught the attention of officer Ryan McMahon, who pursued Foster in his car. Foster hit the brakes, and McMahon ordered him to “come over and sit in front of my car,” according to the officer’s deposition in a civil rights lawsuit filed by Foster’s family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Stop messing with me,” Foster responded before taking off on his bike in the opposite direction, McMahon recalled in his deposition testimony. The officer got back in his car and chased him down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Foster soon fell from his bike and ran away. When McMahon continued the chase on foot, Vallejo policy required him to notify the department by radio. But that’s not what he did. Instead, he left his patrol car and followed Foster toward a dark walkway between two houses.[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Louis Dekmar, police chief, LaGrange, Georgia, and former civil rights police monitor, US Department of Justice\"]‘This isn’t accepted practice. This isn’t even basement standard practice. Any agency that takes that long is saying that this isn’t a priority.’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As they ran, McMahon tased the African American man in the back without a warning, although officers are required to give one unless it puts them in danger. The officer later said he did so in part because he saw Foster grabbing his pants, causing him to think Foster had a firearm. Foster, who was unarmed, kept running but fell. As he tried to get up, McMahon pushed him, causing Foster to fall down a small flight of cement stairs, the officer testified in the lawsuit. McMahon then straddled his back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Body camera footage shows Foster lying on the pavement without fighting back when McMahon, standing next to him, fired his Taser once more. Then the officer struck Foster in the head and body with a 13-inch metal flashlight, Foster’s family alleged in court records. As McMahon swung to hit again, Foster caught the flashlight and tried to get up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While some facts of the case are disputed, what happened next is not: McMahon shot Foster seven times. Autopsy records show he hit Foster once in the head, four times in the back and twice on the left side of his body, killing him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s all good,” McMahon said as backup arrived minutes later. “He’s down. He’s down.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919407\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 678px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.10-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919407 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.10-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a Black man smiling and wearing a beanie and hoodie.\" width=\"678\" height=\"970\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.10-PM.png 678w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.10-PM-160x229.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 678px) 100vw, 678px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ronell Foster \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A diverse waterfront city of 125,000 located in the San Francisco Bay Area, Vallejo has garnered \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/21/us/willie-mccoy-police-shooting.html\">national attention\u003c/a> in recent years for its \u003ca href=\"https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/23/how-a-deadly-police-force-ruled-a-city\">rate of police killings\u003c/a>, which far outpaces those of all but two California cities, San Bernardino and South Gate, according to \u003ca href=\"https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/vallejo-police-highest-rate-of-residents-shot-per-capita-in-northern-california-nbc-bay-area-probes-causes/190344/\">a 2019 NBC Bay Area report\u003c/a>. Eight families of people killed by police over the last decade have filed civil suits against Vallejo, which has paid out more than $8.3 million in settlements so far, with three cases ongoing. (The single largest settlement, $5.7 million, went to the Foster family.) In July 2020, Open Vallejo exposed a tradition in which \u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org/2020/07/28/vallejo-police-bend-badge-tips-to-mark-fatal-shootings/\">officers bent their badges to mark their fatal shootings\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, Open Vallejo and ProPublica have looked at what happens inside the department after those killings occur, examining more than 15,000 pages of police, forensic and court files related to the city’s 17 fatal police shootings since 2011. Based on records that emerged after dozens of public records requests and two lawsuits filed by Open Vallejo, the news organizations found a pattern of delayed and incomplete investigations, with dire consequences.[aside label=\"Related Posts\" link1=\"https://www.kqed.org/vallejopolicing, The Fight Against Policing in Vallejo\"]In the Foster case, when top department leadership ultimately reviewed reports and evidence more than a year and a half after Foster was killed, it found McMahon had violated department policies — both by pursuing Foster on foot without notifying the department and without backup and by failing to turn on his body camera before using deadly force. (While McMahon only turned on his body camera after he fired, the camera is designed to automatically capture 30 seconds of preactivation footage.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Officer McMahon failed to recognize his safety and the safety of the suspect Ronnell Foster outweighed apprehension for a minor traffic/pedestrian violation,” then-police chief Joseph Allio wrote in a memorandum. Allio ordered that McMahon “attend a 1 to 3-day course on officer safety and tactics focusing on critical incidents.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But by the time that training was ordered, the officer had been involved in the killing of another African American man.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to our first-of-its-kind review of Vallejo’s investigations of police killings, six of the department’s 17 fatal shootings between 2011 and 2020 involved an officer using deadly force while still under investigation for a prior killing. In three of those cases, including McMahon’s, department officials noted officers’ initial mistakes in their reports, but not until after their second killing. In all three, the investigation into the second killing also revealed significant tactical errors, like not considering the use of nonlethal weapons. In one case, officials identified the same mistake in two killings involving the same officer.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Investigations into police killings were ongoing when the same officers used deadly force again\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Vallejo’s reviews of police killings have dragged on for years. Six times since 2011, the incident was still under review when the same officer was involved in another fatal encounter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919408\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11919408\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-800x598.png\" alt=\"A graph.\" width=\"800\" height=\"598\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-800x598.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-1020x762.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-160x120.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-1536x1148.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-1920x1435.png 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop.png 2000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Note: The Vallejo Police Department was unable to produce a final administrative report for the killings of Sherman Peacock and Peter Mestler. The end date for the investigations into those two killings reflects the district attorney’s final review of each case. All officers either declined to comment or did not respond to requests for comment for this story. \u003ccite>(Lucas Waldron/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The news organizations also found that the department consistently failed to properly complete essential investigative tasks and took more than a year on average to close its administrative investigations of fatal shootings — methods that experts say are at odds with best practices promoted by the U.S. Department of Justice and used by police agencies around the country.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This isn’t accepted practice. This isn’t even basement standard practice,” said Louis Dekmar, the police chief in LaGrange, Georgia, since 1995, and a former civil rights police monitor for the U.S. Department of Justice. “Any agency that takes that long is saying that this isn’t a priority.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officials in the Foster case mishandled a crucial piece of evidence, police records show, then took months to request that the crime lab analyze it for fingerprints. Nineteen months passed between the killing and the submission of investigative findings to the police chief. Only then was the chief able to fully assess the case and consider discipline for that shooting. McMahon later testified that he feared for his life and that Foster, holding the flashlight, faced him “in a boxer type stance.” But body camera footage does not support the officer’s claim that Foster was facing him, and an expert for Foster’s family who reviewed enhanced footage and other forensic evidence concluded that Foster had immediately turned away. McMahon remained on the job, and was later fired over his involvement in the killing of another man, during which, a department investigation found, he endangered a fellow officer by shooting from behind him. He did not respond to requests for comment for this story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a March phone call, Shawny Williams, Vallejo’s police chief since November 2019, agreed to an interview but declined to schedule it; after we shared our findings with the department in writing, he provided a statement that pointed to recent administrative changes, like implementing a yearly crisis intervention training and requiring officers to use deescalation tactics when possible before engaging with a suspect. Williams also noted proposed reforms to how the department investigates its fatal shootings — some of which mirror recommendations first made to the department by a law enforcement consultant two years ago. Among them: a deadline for officials to produce their findings once all the evidence has been gathered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Williams declined to answer questions about any specific cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“While I cannot comment on critical incidents which occurred prior to my arrival, or on ongoing matters, I can confirm that overall, the VPD continues the process of implementing police reforms,” the chief wrote. “All the above changes are designed to create enhanced internal accountability and will provide a more transparent process for our department and the community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘A remarkable amount of incompetence’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>While there is no universal timeline for internal investigations, guidelines developed for the Department of Justice by a group of local police officials say departments should, at minimum, complete their probes before any statute of limitations on officer discipline expires (one year, in California, with some exceptions). \u003ca href=\"https://cops.usdoj.gov/ric/Publications/cops-p164-pub.pdf\">“It is preferable,” the group wrote, “to conclude investigations within 180 days.”\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in some of the DOJ’s own reviews of police departments across the country, it has pushed for even shorter deadlines when it comes to investigating an officer’s use of force, including fatal shootings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2012, for example, the Justice Department mandated that the East Haven Police Department in Connecticut complete deadly force investigations within 60 days and forward a report to the chief, who has 45 days to complete the review. And in 2014, the DOJ required a similar deadline in Albuquerque for reviews of serious uses of force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in Vallejo, Open Vallejo and ProPublica found that the police department has taken an average of 20 months to review fatal shootings, from the time of a police killing to the date a chief signed off on the investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A number of mistakes drove delays in Vallejo and undermined the integrity of investigations. One core problem: Some witnesses to killings reported long delays before officers took their statements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s what happened in 2012, after Jaime Alvarado and his wife, Rocio Alvarado, said \u003ca href=\"https://www.buzzfeed.com/albertsamaha/three-shootings-in-vallejo\">they witnessed Vallejo police shoot their neighbor Jeremiah Moore\u003c/a>, a young man whose mother said he was on the autism spectrum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Police had responded to 911 calls about loud noises coming from Moore’s home, including the sound of glass breaking. Although officers and an intoxicated witness later claimed Moore had been armed with a .22-caliber rifle, Jaime Alvarado said Moore was naked and unarmed, with his hands up and shaking from fright, when he was shot and killed by Vallejo officer Sean Kenney. (A forensic analysis could not find Moore’s fingerprints on the rifle, which was recovered in his home, while a later one found small traces of his blood on it.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919410\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 666px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.37-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919410 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.37-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a white man smiling broadly as if laughing, with a goatee, beard, baseball cap, and baggy T-shirt.\" width=\"666\" height=\"954\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.37-PM.png 666w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.37-PM-160x229.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 666px) 100vw, 666px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jeremiah Moore \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Alvarado said he tried to approach a Vallejo officer a few hours after he saw the killing through his second-floor window, but was told that “we don’t have time to talk” and to “get inside the house.” No one from the department tried to contact him after that, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They would not pay attention to me,” Alvarado told Open Vallejo and ProPublica.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Alvarado, detectives didn’t take his statement until several months later, after an attorney hired by Moore’s family to sue the city facilitated the interview. Yet there is no record of that interview in Vallejo’s case file, and the department ultimately cleared the officer in the killing. Neither the Moore family attorney nor the police department responded to questions about Alvarado’s account. The Moore family’s lawsuit was settled in 2016 for $250,000.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was one of three investigations among the 17 killings in which Vallejo detectives interviewed one or more eyewitnesses months later or did not interview them at all, despite a county policy that states department officials are responsible for “immediately” securing crime scenes, including identifying and sequestering witnesses in order to obtain their statements. In each of these cases, the witnesses’ accounts directly contradicted claims by police that the victims had been armed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it was not the only type of delay. In 11 of the 17 cases, investigators did not meet a 30-day goal set by the county to complete their reports. Detectives often took even longer to request analysis on important evidence, such as bullets fired by officers, fingerprinting, DNA samples and weapons allegedly carried by the victims. In six investigations, Vallejo sent requests for evidence testing to a crime lab half a year or more following the killings. In most of those cases, the delayed analyses appear to have hampered the investigations or led to cases being closed by investigators before some forensic reports could be included.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-11919415\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile-800x964.png\" alt=\"A graph.\" width=\"800\" height=\"964\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile-800x964.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile-1020x1229.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile-160x193.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile.png 1260w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Foster’s case, detectives didn’t seek fingerprint testing of the flashlight that McMahon claimed Foster used as a weapon until eight months after the killing. When they finally made a request, the lab could not find Foster’s fingerprints. Experts say \u003ca href=\"https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233901042_Determination_of_latent_fingerprint_degradation_patterns_-_A_real_fieldwork_study\">long delays can cause biological evidence to degrade\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The consequences of delayed resolutions of investigations are severe,” the Justice Department wrote in its \u003ca href=\"https://www.justice.gov/opa/file/925846/download\">investigation of the Chicago Police Department in 2017\u003c/a>, triggered after a white officer fatally shot Black teenager Laquan McDonald. “Memories fade, evidence is lost, and investigators may not be able to locate those crucial witnesses needed to determine whether misconduct has occurred.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For years, the Solano County district attorney’s office based their decisions about whether to charge Vallejo police officers primarily on evidence gathered by Vallejo officials. This made some of the detectives’ missteps especially meaningful. For example, in three of the killings from 2012, prosecutors cleared officers before all the evidence in the case had been analyzed by forensic experts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Either there is a remarkable amount of incompetence or it’s malicious,” said Seth Stoughton, a professor at the University of South Carolina School of Law and former Florida police officer, about the Vallejo Police Department. “Neither should be acceptable.” Stoughton testified as a national police standards expert for the prosecution in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who was convicted of the murder of George Floyd.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Williams, the Vallejo police chief, declined to answer specific questions about the numerous delays.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Solano County’s current district attorney, Krishna Abrams, who took office shortly after the officer involved in the Moore shooting was cleared, also declined to comment on the findings of this investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, Abrams wrote in a statement that her office has continued to make it a priority to use best practices for investigating officer-involved fatal incidents. She pointed to rule changes from 2020 that require that future investigations of Vallejo killings involve criminal investigators from other departments in the county. She did not comment, however, on another rule change made that year that removed a 30-day target for detectives to complete their reports.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>While investigations drag, officers kill again\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As Vallejo’s investigations dragged on, sometimes for years, officers who had killed patrolled the city’s streets, their mistakes unaddressed. In three cases, department officials flagged officers’ actions only after they were involved in another killing, police records show.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officer Sean Kenney killed Anton Barrett in May 2012. Kenney was still under investigation for that shooting when, on the morning of Sept. 2, 2012, he and his partner, Dustin Joseph, pulled up in front of the home of a man named Mario Romero. Romero, who identified as Black, Indigenous and Latino, was sitting in his parked Ford Thunderbird with his brother-in-law, police and court records show. The two white officers claimed that the young men seemed shocked to see them approaching and that Romero’s car was encroaching on the sidewalk, according to the officers’ depositions in a civil rights lawsuit filed by Romero’s family. Kenney also claimed that a similar vehicle had been involved in a shooting the prior month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Within seconds and without exchanging a word, Kenney and Joseph exited their vehicle and started firing, according to Joseph’s deposition. Then, Kenney jumped on the hood of the Thunderbird, according to court and police records.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The officers fired 31 rounds in total, striking Romero, a father of one, 30 times in the face, neck, forearms, chest and left side of his body. His brother-in-law was hit once in the pelvis and survived. Officers pulled both men from the car after the shooting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919411\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 664px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.49-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919411 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.49-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a Black man with longish hair smiling and looking up at the viewer, wearing a Black T-shirt.\" width=\"664\" height=\"948\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.49-PM.png 664w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.49-PM-160x228.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 664px) 100vw, 664px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mario Romero \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Joseph told detectives that Romero had briefly gotten out of the car and grabbed the butt of a gun in his waistband, though officials never found a firearm. Kenney claimed he recovered a pellet gun wedged between the rear portion of the driver’s seat and the center console. Two weeks after the incident, the officers were sent back to patrol. While police experts said many departments don’t prohibit this, they also said that having officers with open deadly force investigations go out on patrol can be dangerous for officers and community members alike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It would take detectives another eight weeks to interview Romero’s three sisters, eyewitnesses in the case who contradicted the officers’ accounts. They said they never saw Romero with a firearm and that their brother remained inside the car during the incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before those interviews happened, though, Kenney had killed again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Oct. 21, 2012, the day after Romero’s funeral, Kenney fatally shot Jeremiah Moore, the young man whose neighbor Jamie Alvarado said was unarmed. It was Kenney’s third deadly incident that year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The next year, on March 20, 2013, Joseph and two others were involved in the fatal shooting of 42-year-old William Heinze, who had barricaded himself in a house with a firearm during a mental health crisis. It was Joseph’s second deadly incident in just over six months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919412\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 664px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.57-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919412 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.57-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a middle-aged white man smiling, with his lips closed so sort of tiredly, with a trim haircut and wearing a black T-shirt.\" width=\"664\" height=\"948\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.57-PM.png 664w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.57-PM-160x228.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 664px) 100vw, 664px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">William Heinze \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 2014, with investigations into those two killings pending, Joseph received a departmental Life-Saving Medal for a separate event and was promoted to corporal. Kenney, with three open deadly force investigations, was awarded the Medal of Valor for his role in the Moore shooting, according to Kenney’s deposition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Roughly two years after the Romero shooting, the department’s Critical Incident Review Board finally issued findings in the administrative probe. The panel is supposed to evaluate whether officers’ use of force was justified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In October 2014, it flagged the officers’ tactics during the incident. The board found that Kenney placed himself in a “tactically disadvantageous position with a potentially armed subject” when he jumped on the hood of Romero’s car, and noted officers could have waited at their car for backup, records show. Nevertheless, officials noted, “The board felt that the officers relied upon their past training to successfully endure this dangerous and rapidly evolving incident.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It still recommended additional training, without specifying whether the training was intended for the two officers or the department as a whole. The board then failed to forward its own completed report to supervisors for nearly a year. During that time, the city settled the lawsuit for $2 million.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet another year would pass before then-Vallejo Police Chief Andrew Bidou assessed the case for disciplinary, training and policy considerations. Bidou approved the board’s findings, but he did not take further action in the case, the files show. By then, criminal accountability had been ruled out, too. The district attorney had declined to file charges three years earlier. His report noted that Vallejo investigators had interviewed Romero’s sisters long after the incident; the prosecutor suggested that the delay made their statements less credible than the officers’ accounts. He was also missing forensic analyses that would later show that the DNA and fingerprints taken from the pellet gun could not be matched to Romero.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If that investigation had been run properly, Kenney would have been off the street and he wouldn’t have killed my son,” asserted Lisa Moore, the mother of Jeremiah Moore, Kenney’s third shooting victim, about Vallejo’s handling of the case. “Four years, that’s a long time to figure out, ‘Oh, we messed up. What did we do wrong so that this doesn’t happen again?’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kenney retired from the Vallejo Police Department in 2018, after the board cleared him in the Moore shooting. He declined to comment for this story. As for Joseph, the Vallejo board ultimately flagged officers’ tactics during his second deadly incident, and recommended training. Joseph, who did not respond to requests for comment, left Vallejo in 2019 to join the nearby Fairfield Police Department, where Fairfield officials said he is currently on leave.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘With this delay, there is no justice’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The review board’s actions in the Romero case were not an anomaly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Made up of two to six ranked officers from within the Vallejo PD, the Critical Incident Review Board reviews an investigation, identifies whether officers violated any policies and makes recommendations to the chief, according to the department’s policy manuals. Our analysis of the 17 cases found that those reviews were consistently delayed. In 11 cases, the panel sent its report up the chain of command more than one year after the incident. And in six of those cases, the board sat on its findings for months before forwarding them, delaying the review of the chief of police, who makes the final decision on discipline, according to the analysis by Open Vallejo and ProPublica. In two cases from 2011 and 2012, the department was unable to show that a final administrative review was completed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The news organizations’ analysis found that the board often cleared officers even when it noted problems with how they had handled a shooting. In fact, the CIRB never determined that any officers had violated department policies, according to the department’s records. Often, it recommended training. But in at least a few of those cases, there is no evidence in training and investigative files that the involved officers completed it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In two cases in which the chief considered potential discipline, he opened yet another investigation because the board’s probe was insufficient, creating additional delays. All these delays by both the CIRB and the chief matter in part because California law gives departments only one year to impose discipline once officials learn of an incident, though that timeline is paused during a criminal investigation. (That timeframe expired in one of the 17 killings that we reviewed.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Experts said Vallejo’s approach is fundamentally flawed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s the whole purpose of having a disciplinary process in place: to assess quickly whether or not officers have engaged in misconduct and, if they’re a threat to the public, to get them removed from the department and off the streets,” said Judge LaDoris Hazzard Cordell, a former Superior Court judge for the County of Santa Clara. From 2010 to 2015, Cordell served as the independent police auditor for the city of San José, which created the office in 1993 following the beating of Rodney King by the Los Angeles Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What is happening in Vallejo is quite the opposite: It’s just delay, delay. And with this delay, there is no justice,” Cordell said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over and over, the board seemed to miss opportunities to help the department fix practices that contributed to those killings. Despite delays, the CIRB did, in fact, note plenty of problems: officers who didn’t turn on their body cameras, failed to use less lethal options, mismanaged crime scenes or did not wait for backup. But, time and again, the board reports neither called out individual officers for problematic behavior nor recommended policy changes as a result of the failures they repeatedly identified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The most common problem identified by the CIRB in its reviews of killings was that officers acted without sufficient “cover,” meaning they didn’t properly use structures like cars for protection when confronting civilians, amplifying the risk to themselves and others in already-dangerous situations. When officers don’t take cover, “they put themselves in jeopardy — they create jeopardy,” said Dekmar, the former civil rights police monitor for the U.S. Department of Justice. “That results in a use of force that may have been avoided.” Investigators noted cover issues in six of Vallejo’s 17 killings since 2011.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It first surfaced in the 2012 case of Marshall Tobin, a 43-year-old Black man who was sitting in his car sobbing over his phone when two officers, both under deadly force investigations for prior killings, approached him. Police had received a call about an armed man in a parking lot. After Tobin emerged from his car, officers tased him and then fired at least 11 rounds at him, killing him. The officers told investigators that after he was tased, Tobin had reached for a gun in his waistband. They did not respond to requests for comment for this story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919413\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 670px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.06-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919413 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.06-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a Black man with sort of long hair and facial stubble, wearing a light T-shirt and dark jacket. He is looking straight at the viewer, unsmiling, as if this image is taken from a driver's license photo.\" width=\"670\" height=\"954\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.06-PM.png 670w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.06-PM-160x228.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 670px) 100vw, 670px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Marshall Tobin \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A year and a half later, the CIRB found in its review that the officers had approached Tobin on foot, “leaving the cover and concealment of the vehicles.” It recommended additional department training in how to use cover, but it did not officially flag the officers’ behavior or find that they had violated a policy. (Two months after that, one of those two officers, from inside his patrol car, shot at a Latino man fleeing a traffic stop — the officer’s third fatal incident in two years. The board approved of the shooting, and the chief cleared him.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At some point after the Tobin killing, then-police chief Joseph Kreins, who reviewed seven fatal shootings between 2012 and 2014, did add a clause to the policy manual that “encouraged” officers on vehicle pursuits to “remember the importance of cover, concealment, and safe distance.” But in 2015, despite the board’s findings in the Romero and Tobin shootings, the next chief of police, Andrew Bidou, removed it. Neither Kreins nor Bidou responded to requests for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The issue emerged again in 2017, when officers killed Jeffrey Barboa, a father of one who police said was wanted for an armed robbery. Following a high-speed pursuit that ended in a crash, Barboa had approached officers while holding a knife over his head. The officers, standing within 15 feet, did not step back, police records show. As Barboa slowly walked toward the officers, they fired approximately 50 rounds at him, hitting him at least 30 times in the chest, face, neck, arms and legs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919414\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 664px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.12-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919414 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.12-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a middle-aged Latino man with dark hair, unsmiling, wearing a collared shirt and jacket.\" width=\"664\" height=\"946\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.12-PM.png 664w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.12-PM-160x228.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 664px) 100vw, 664px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jeffrey Barboa \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>More than 28 months after that shooting, in December 2019, the CIRB found in its report that had the officers taken cover or put more distance between themselves and Barboa, they would have created time to communicate with him and “deploy less-lethal alternatives.” “It is this positioning that likely caused the situation to speed up,” the board wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nevertheless, the review board responded as it usually did: It identified no policy violation or specific officer at fault and issued a list of training recommendations with no accompanying plan to implement them. There is no evidence in the department’s reports that Vallejo officials took further action in the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Reporting for this project was supported by a grant from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.propublica.org/people/mariam-elba\">Mariam Elba\u003c/a> contributed research. Geoffrey King contributed reporting.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Vallejo's flawed handling of fatal police shootings allowed six officers to use deadly force again before their first cases were decided. Experts say the department's system needs oversight.",
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"title": "In Vallejo, Investigations of Police Take So Long, Officers Kill Again Before Reviews Are Done | KQED",
"description": "Vallejo's flawed handling of fatal police shootings allowed six officers to use deadly force again before their first cases were decided. Experts say the department's system needs oversight.",
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"nprByline": "\u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org\">Laurence Du Sault, Open Vallejo\u003c/a>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>This article was produced for ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network in partnership with \u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org/\">Open Vallejo\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around dinner time on Feb. 13, 2018, Ronell Foster was riding his bike on a wide road that runs through the historic downtown of Vallejo, California. The 33-year-old did not own a car, and cycled nearly everywhere he went around his hometown, often flanked by his teenage son and 5-year-old daughter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that night, Foster was riding alone, swerving in and out of traffic lanes without a bike light, and caught the attention of officer Ryan McMahon, who pursued Foster in his car. Foster hit the brakes, and McMahon ordered him to “come over and sit in front of my car,” according to the officer’s deposition in a civil rights lawsuit filed by Foster’s family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Stop messing with me,” Foster responded before taking off on his bike in the opposite direction, McMahon recalled in his deposition testimony. The officer got back in his car and chased him down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Foster soon fell from his bike and ran away. When McMahon continued the chase on foot, Vallejo policy required him to notify the department by radio. But that’s not what he did. Instead, he left his patrol car and followed Foster toward a dark walkway between two houses.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘This isn’t accepted practice. This isn’t even basement standard practice. Any agency that takes that long is saying that this isn’t a priority.’",
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"citation": "Louis Dekmar, police chief, LaGrange, Georgia, and former civil rights police monitor, US Department of Justice",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As they ran, McMahon tased the African American man in the back without a warning, although officers are required to give one unless it puts them in danger. The officer later said he did so in part because he saw Foster grabbing his pants, causing him to think Foster had a firearm. Foster, who was unarmed, kept running but fell. As he tried to get up, McMahon pushed him, causing Foster to fall down a small flight of cement stairs, the officer testified in the lawsuit. McMahon then straddled his back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Body camera footage shows Foster lying on the pavement without fighting back when McMahon, standing next to him, fired his Taser once more. Then the officer struck Foster in the head and body with a 13-inch metal flashlight, Foster’s family alleged in court records. As McMahon swung to hit again, Foster caught the flashlight and tried to get up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While some facts of the case are disputed, what happened next is not: McMahon shot Foster seven times. Autopsy records show he hit Foster once in the head, four times in the back and twice on the left side of his body, killing him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s all good,” McMahon said as backup arrived minutes later. “He’s down. He’s down.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919407\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 678px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.10-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919407 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.10-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a Black man smiling and wearing a beanie and hoodie.\" width=\"678\" height=\"970\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.10-PM.png 678w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.10-PM-160x229.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 678px) 100vw, 678px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ronell Foster \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A diverse waterfront city of 125,000 located in the San Francisco Bay Area, Vallejo has garnered \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/21/us/willie-mccoy-police-shooting.html\">national attention\u003c/a> in recent years for its \u003ca href=\"https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/23/how-a-deadly-police-force-ruled-a-city\">rate of police killings\u003c/a>, which far outpaces those of all but two California cities, San Bernardino and South Gate, according to \u003ca href=\"https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/vallejo-police-highest-rate-of-residents-shot-per-capita-in-northern-california-nbc-bay-area-probes-causes/190344/\">a 2019 NBC Bay Area report\u003c/a>. Eight families of people killed by police over the last decade have filed civil suits against Vallejo, which has paid out more than $8.3 million in settlements so far, with three cases ongoing. (The single largest settlement, $5.7 million, went to the Foster family.) In July 2020, Open Vallejo exposed a tradition in which \u003ca href=\"https://openvallejo.org/2020/07/28/vallejo-police-bend-badge-tips-to-mark-fatal-shootings/\">officers bent their badges to mark their fatal shootings\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, Open Vallejo and ProPublica have looked at what happens inside the department after those killings occur, examining more than 15,000 pages of police, forensic and court files related to the city’s 17 fatal police shootings since 2011. Based on records that emerged after dozens of public records requests and two lawsuits filed by Open Vallejo, the news organizations found a pattern of delayed and incomplete investigations, with dire consequences.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"link1": "https://www.kqed.org/vallejopolicing, The Fight Against Policing in Vallejo"
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In the Foster case, when top department leadership ultimately reviewed reports and evidence more than a year and a half after Foster was killed, it found McMahon had violated department policies — both by pursuing Foster on foot without notifying the department and without backup and by failing to turn on his body camera before using deadly force. (While McMahon only turned on his body camera after he fired, the camera is designed to automatically capture 30 seconds of preactivation footage.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Officer McMahon failed to recognize his safety and the safety of the suspect Ronnell Foster outweighed apprehension for a minor traffic/pedestrian violation,” then-police chief Joseph Allio wrote in a memorandum. Allio ordered that McMahon “attend a 1 to 3-day course on officer safety and tactics focusing on critical incidents.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But by the time that training was ordered, the officer had been involved in the killing of another African American man.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to our first-of-its-kind review of Vallejo’s investigations of police killings, six of the department’s 17 fatal shootings between 2011 and 2020 involved an officer using deadly force while still under investigation for a prior killing. In three of those cases, including McMahon’s, department officials noted officers’ initial mistakes in their reports, but not until after their second killing. In all three, the investigation into the second killing also revealed significant tactical errors, like not considering the use of nonlethal weapons. In one case, officials identified the same mistake in two killings involving the same officer.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Investigations into police killings were ongoing when the same officers used deadly force again\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Vallejo’s reviews of police killings have dragged on for years. Six times since 2011, the incident was still under review when the same officer was involved in another fatal encounter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919408\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11919408\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-800x598.png\" alt=\"A graph.\" width=\"800\" height=\"598\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-800x598.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-1020x762.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-160x120.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-1536x1148.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop-1920x1435.png 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220627-openvallejo-desktop.png 2000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Note: The Vallejo Police Department was unable to produce a final administrative report for the killings of Sherman Peacock and Peter Mestler. The end date for the investigations into those two killings reflects the district attorney’s final review of each case. All officers either declined to comment or did not respond to requests for comment for this story. \u003ccite>(Lucas Waldron/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The news organizations also found that the department consistently failed to properly complete essential investigative tasks and took more than a year on average to close its administrative investigations of fatal shootings — methods that experts say are at odds with best practices promoted by the U.S. Department of Justice and used by police agencies around the country.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This isn’t accepted practice. This isn’t even basement standard practice,” said Louis Dekmar, the police chief in LaGrange, Georgia, since 1995, and a former civil rights police monitor for the U.S. Department of Justice. “Any agency that takes that long is saying that this isn’t a priority.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officials in the Foster case mishandled a crucial piece of evidence, police records show, then took months to request that the crime lab analyze it for fingerprints. Nineteen months passed between the killing and the submission of investigative findings to the police chief. Only then was the chief able to fully assess the case and consider discipline for that shooting. McMahon later testified that he feared for his life and that Foster, holding the flashlight, faced him “in a boxer type stance.” But body camera footage does not support the officer’s claim that Foster was facing him, and an expert for Foster’s family who reviewed enhanced footage and other forensic evidence concluded that Foster had immediately turned away. McMahon remained on the job, and was later fired over his involvement in the killing of another man, during which, a department investigation found, he endangered a fellow officer by shooting from behind him. He did not respond to requests for comment for this story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a March phone call, Shawny Williams, Vallejo’s police chief since November 2019, agreed to an interview but declined to schedule it; after we shared our findings with the department in writing, he provided a statement that pointed to recent administrative changes, like implementing a yearly crisis intervention training and requiring officers to use deescalation tactics when possible before engaging with a suspect. Williams also noted proposed reforms to how the department investigates its fatal shootings — some of which mirror recommendations first made to the department by a law enforcement consultant two years ago. Among them: a deadline for officials to produce their findings once all the evidence has been gathered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Williams declined to answer questions about any specific cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“While I cannot comment on critical incidents which occurred prior to my arrival, or on ongoing matters, I can confirm that overall, the VPD continues the process of implementing police reforms,” the chief wrote. “All the above changes are designed to create enhanced internal accountability and will provide a more transparent process for our department and the community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘A remarkable amount of incompetence’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>While there is no universal timeline for internal investigations, guidelines developed for the Department of Justice by a group of local police officials say departments should, at minimum, complete their probes before any statute of limitations on officer discipline expires (one year, in California, with some exceptions). \u003ca href=\"https://cops.usdoj.gov/ric/Publications/cops-p164-pub.pdf\">“It is preferable,” the group wrote, “to conclude investigations within 180 days.”\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in some of the DOJ’s own reviews of police departments across the country, it has pushed for even shorter deadlines when it comes to investigating an officer’s use of force, including fatal shootings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2012, for example, the Justice Department mandated that the East Haven Police Department in Connecticut complete deadly force investigations within 60 days and forward a report to the chief, who has 45 days to complete the review. And in 2014, the DOJ required a similar deadline in Albuquerque for reviews of serious uses of force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in Vallejo, Open Vallejo and ProPublica found that the police department has taken an average of 20 months to review fatal shootings, from the time of a police killing to the date a chief signed off on the investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A number of mistakes drove delays in Vallejo and undermined the integrity of investigations. One core problem: Some witnesses to killings reported long delays before officers took their statements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s what happened in 2012, after Jaime Alvarado and his wife, Rocio Alvarado, said \u003ca href=\"https://www.buzzfeed.com/albertsamaha/three-shootings-in-vallejo\">they witnessed Vallejo police shoot their neighbor Jeremiah Moore\u003c/a>, a young man whose mother said he was on the autism spectrum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Police had responded to 911 calls about loud noises coming from Moore’s home, including the sound of glass breaking. Although officers and an intoxicated witness later claimed Moore had been armed with a .22-caliber rifle, Jaime Alvarado said Moore was naked and unarmed, with his hands up and shaking from fright, when he was shot and killed by Vallejo officer Sean Kenney. (A forensic analysis could not find Moore’s fingerprints on the rifle, which was recovered in his home, while a later one found small traces of his blood on it.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919410\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 666px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.37-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919410 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.37-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a white man smiling broadly as if laughing, with a goatee, beard, baseball cap, and baggy T-shirt.\" width=\"666\" height=\"954\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.37-PM.png 666w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.37-PM-160x229.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 666px) 100vw, 666px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jeremiah Moore \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Alvarado said he tried to approach a Vallejo officer a few hours after he saw the killing through his second-floor window, but was told that “we don’t have time to talk” and to “get inside the house.” No one from the department tried to contact him after that, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They would not pay attention to me,” Alvarado told Open Vallejo and ProPublica.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Alvarado, detectives didn’t take his statement until several months later, after an attorney hired by Moore’s family to sue the city facilitated the interview. Yet there is no record of that interview in Vallejo’s case file, and the department ultimately cleared the officer in the killing. Neither the Moore family attorney nor the police department responded to questions about Alvarado’s account. The Moore family’s lawsuit was settled in 2016 for $250,000.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was one of three investigations among the 17 killings in which Vallejo detectives interviewed one or more eyewitnesses months later or did not interview them at all, despite a county policy that states department officials are responsible for “immediately” securing crime scenes, including identifying and sequestering witnesses in order to obtain their statements. In each of these cases, the witnesses’ accounts directly contradicted claims by police that the victims had been armed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it was not the only type of delay. In 11 of the 17 cases, investigators did not meet a 30-day goal set by the county to complete their reports. Detectives often took even longer to request analysis on important evidence, such as bullets fired by officers, fingerprinting, DNA samples and weapons allegedly carried by the victims. In six investigations, Vallejo sent requests for evidence testing to a crime lab half a year or more following the killings. In most of those cases, the delayed analyses appear to have hampered the investigations or led to cases being closed by investigators before some forensic reports could be included.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-11919415\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile-800x964.png\" alt=\"A graph.\" width=\"800\" height=\"964\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile-800x964.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile-1020x1229.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile-160x193.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/20220701-vallejo-investigative-missteps-mobile.png 1260w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Foster’s case, detectives didn’t seek fingerprint testing of the flashlight that McMahon claimed Foster used as a weapon until eight months after the killing. When they finally made a request, the lab could not find Foster’s fingerprints. Experts say \u003ca href=\"https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233901042_Determination_of_latent_fingerprint_degradation_patterns_-_A_real_fieldwork_study\">long delays can cause biological evidence to degrade\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The consequences of delayed resolutions of investigations are severe,” the Justice Department wrote in its \u003ca href=\"https://www.justice.gov/opa/file/925846/download\">investigation of the Chicago Police Department in 2017\u003c/a>, triggered after a white officer fatally shot Black teenager Laquan McDonald. “Memories fade, evidence is lost, and investigators may not be able to locate those crucial witnesses needed to determine whether misconduct has occurred.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For years, the Solano County district attorney’s office based their decisions about whether to charge Vallejo police officers primarily on evidence gathered by Vallejo officials. This made some of the detectives’ missteps especially meaningful. For example, in three of the killings from 2012, prosecutors cleared officers before all the evidence in the case had been analyzed by forensic experts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Either there is a remarkable amount of incompetence or it’s malicious,” said Seth Stoughton, a professor at the University of South Carolina School of Law and former Florida police officer, about the Vallejo Police Department. “Neither should be acceptable.” Stoughton testified as a national police standards expert for the prosecution in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who was convicted of the murder of George Floyd.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Williams, the Vallejo police chief, declined to answer specific questions about the numerous delays.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Solano County’s current district attorney, Krishna Abrams, who took office shortly after the officer involved in the Moore shooting was cleared, also declined to comment on the findings of this investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, Abrams wrote in a statement that her office has continued to make it a priority to use best practices for investigating officer-involved fatal incidents. She pointed to rule changes from 2020 that require that future investigations of Vallejo killings involve criminal investigators from other departments in the county. She did not comment, however, on another rule change made that year that removed a 30-day target for detectives to complete their reports.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>While investigations drag, officers kill again\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As Vallejo’s investigations dragged on, sometimes for years, officers who had killed patrolled the city’s streets, their mistakes unaddressed. In three cases, department officials flagged officers’ actions only after they were involved in another killing, police records show.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officer Sean Kenney killed Anton Barrett in May 2012. Kenney was still under investigation for that shooting when, on the morning of Sept. 2, 2012, he and his partner, Dustin Joseph, pulled up in front of the home of a man named Mario Romero. Romero, who identified as Black, Indigenous and Latino, was sitting in his parked Ford Thunderbird with his brother-in-law, police and court records show. The two white officers claimed that the young men seemed shocked to see them approaching and that Romero’s car was encroaching on the sidewalk, according to the officers’ depositions in a civil rights lawsuit filed by Romero’s family. Kenney also claimed that a similar vehicle had been involved in a shooting the prior month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Within seconds and without exchanging a word, Kenney and Joseph exited their vehicle and started firing, according to Joseph’s deposition. Then, Kenney jumped on the hood of the Thunderbird, according to court and police records.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The officers fired 31 rounds in total, striking Romero, a father of one, 30 times in the face, neck, forearms, chest and left side of his body. His brother-in-law was hit once in the pelvis and survived. Officers pulled both men from the car after the shooting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919411\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 664px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.49-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919411 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.49-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a Black man with longish hair smiling and looking up at the viewer, wearing a Black T-shirt.\" width=\"664\" height=\"948\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.49-PM.png 664w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.49-PM-160x228.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 664px) 100vw, 664px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mario Romero \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Joseph told detectives that Romero had briefly gotten out of the car and grabbed the butt of a gun in his waistband, though officials never found a firearm. Kenney claimed he recovered a pellet gun wedged between the rear portion of the driver’s seat and the center console. Two weeks after the incident, the officers were sent back to patrol. While police experts said many departments don’t prohibit this, they also said that having officers with open deadly force investigations go out on patrol can be dangerous for officers and community members alike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It would take detectives another eight weeks to interview Romero’s three sisters, eyewitnesses in the case who contradicted the officers’ accounts. They said they never saw Romero with a firearm and that their brother remained inside the car during the incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before those interviews happened, though, Kenney had killed again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Oct. 21, 2012, the day after Romero’s funeral, Kenney fatally shot Jeremiah Moore, the young man whose neighbor Jamie Alvarado said was unarmed. It was Kenney’s third deadly incident that year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The next year, on March 20, 2013, Joseph and two others were involved in the fatal shooting of 42-year-old William Heinze, who had barricaded himself in a house with a firearm during a mental health crisis. It was Joseph’s second deadly incident in just over six months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919412\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 664px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.57-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919412 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.57-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a middle-aged white man smiling, with his lips closed so sort of tiredly, with a trim haircut and wearing a black T-shirt.\" width=\"664\" height=\"948\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.57-PM.png 664w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.48.57-PM-160x228.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 664px) 100vw, 664px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">William Heinze \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 2014, with investigations into those two killings pending, Joseph received a departmental Life-Saving Medal for a separate event and was promoted to corporal. Kenney, with three open deadly force investigations, was awarded the Medal of Valor for his role in the Moore shooting, according to Kenney’s deposition.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Roughly two years after the Romero shooting, the department’s Critical Incident Review Board finally issued findings in the administrative probe. The panel is supposed to evaluate whether officers’ use of force was justified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In October 2014, it flagged the officers’ tactics during the incident. The board found that Kenney placed himself in a “tactically disadvantageous position with a potentially armed subject” when he jumped on the hood of Romero’s car, and noted officers could have waited at their car for backup, records show. Nevertheless, officials noted, “The board felt that the officers relied upon their past training to successfully endure this dangerous and rapidly evolving incident.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It still recommended additional training, without specifying whether the training was intended for the two officers or the department as a whole. The board then failed to forward its own completed report to supervisors for nearly a year. During that time, the city settled the lawsuit for $2 million.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet another year would pass before then-Vallejo Police Chief Andrew Bidou assessed the case for disciplinary, training and policy considerations. Bidou approved the board’s findings, but he did not take further action in the case, the files show. By then, criminal accountability had been ruled out, too. The district attorney had declined to file charges three years earlier. His report noted that Vallejo investigators had interviewed Romero’s sisters long after the incident; the prosecutor suggested that the delay made their statements less credible than the officers’ accounts. He was also missing forensic analyses that would later show that the DNA and fingerprints taken from the pellet gun could not be matched to Romero.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If that investigation had been run properly, Kenney would have been off the street and he wouldn’t have killed my son,” asserted Lisa Moore, the mother of Jeremiah Moore, Kenney’s third shooting victim, about Vallejo’s handling of the case. “Four years, that’s a long time to figure out, ‘Oh, we messed up. What did we do wrong so that this doesn’t happen again?’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kenney retired from the Vallejo Police Department in 2018, after the board cleared him in the Moore shooting. He declined to comment for this story. As for Joseph, the Vallejo board ultimately flagged officers’ tactics during his second deadly incident, and recommended training. Joseph, who did not respond to requests for comment, left Vallejo in 2019 to join the nearby Fairfield Police Department, where Fairfield officials said he is currently on leave.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘With this delay, there is no justice’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The review board’s actions in the Romero case were not an anomaly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Made up of two to six ranked officers from within the Vallejo PD, the Critical Incident Review Board reviews an investigation, identifies whether officers violated any policies and makes recommendations to the chief, according to the department’s policy manuals. Our analysis of the 17 cases found that those reviews were consistently delayed. In 11 cases, the panel sent its report up the chain of command more than one year after the incident. And in six of those cases, the board sat on its findings for months before forwarding them, delaying the review of the chief of police, who makes the final decision on discipline, according to the analysis by Open Vallejo and ProPublica. In two cases from 2011 and 2012, the department was unable to show that a final administrative review was completed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The news organizations’ analysis found that the board often cleared officers even when it noted problems with how they had handled a shooting. In fact, the CIRB never determined that any officers had violated department policies, according to the department’s records. Often, it recommended training. But in at least a few of those cases, there is no evidence in training and investigative files that the involved officers completed it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In two cases in which the chief considered potential discipline, he opened yet another investigation because the board’s probe was insufficient, creating additional delays. All these delays by both the CIRB and the chief matter in part because California law gives departments only one year to impose discipline once officials learn of an incident, though that timeline is paused during a criminal investigation. (That timeframe expired in one of the 17 killings that we reviewed.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Experts said Vallejo’s approach is fundamentally flawed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s the whole purpose of having a disciplinary process in place: to assess quickly whether or not officers have engaged in misconduct and, if they’re a threat to the public, to get them removed from the department and off the streets,” said Judge LaDoris Hazzard Cordell, a former Superior Court judge for the County of Santa Clara. From 2010 to 2015, Cordell served as the independent police auditor for the city of San José, which created the office in 1993 following the beating of Rodney King by the Los Angeles Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What is happening in Vallejo is quite the opposite: It’s just delay, delay. And with this delay, there is no justice,” Cordell said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over and over, the board seemed to miss opportunities to help the department fix practices that contributed to those killings. Despite delays, the CIRB did, in fact, note plenty of problems: officers who didn’t turn on their body cameras, failed to use less lethal options, mismanaged crime scenes or did not wait for backup. But, time and again, the board reports neither called out individual officers for problematic behavior nor recommended policy changes as a result of the failures they repeatedly identified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The most common problem identified by the CIRB in its reviews of killings was that officers acted without sufficient “cover,” meaning they didn’t properly use structures like cars for protection when confronting civilians, amplifying the risk to themselves and others in already-dangerous situations. When officers don’t take cover, “they put themselves in jeopardy — they create jeopardy,” said Dekmar, the former civil rights police monitor for the U.S. Department of Justice. “That results in a use of force that may have been avoided.” Investigators noted cover issues in six of Vallejo’s 17 killings since 2011.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It first surfaced in the 2012 case of Marshall Tobin, a 43-year-old Black man who was sitting in his car sobbing over his phone when two officers, both under deadly force investigations for prior killings, approached him. Police had received a call about an armed man in a parking lot. After Tobin emerged from his car, officers tased him and then fired at least 11 rounds at him, killing him. The officers told investigators that after he was tased, Tobin had reached for a gun in his waistband. They did not respond to requests for comment for this story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919413\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 670px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.06-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919413 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.06-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a Black man with sort of long hair and facial stubble, wearing a light T-shirt and dark jacket. He is looking straight at the viewer, unsmiling, as if this image is taken from a driver's license photo.\" width=\"670\" height=\"954\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.06-PM.png 670w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.06-PM-160x228.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 670px) 100vw, 670px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Marshall Tobin \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A year and a half later, the CIRB found in its review that the officers had approached Tobin on foot, “leaving the cover and concealment of the vehicles.” It recommended additional department training in how to use cover, but it did not officially flag the officers’ behavior or find that they had violated a policy. (Two months after that, one of those two officers, from inside his patrol car, shot at a Latino man fleeing a traffic stop — the officer’s third fatal incident in two years. The board approved of the shooting, and the chief cleared him.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At some point after the Tobin killing, then-police chief Joseph Kreins, who reviewed seven fatal shootings between 2012 and 2014, did add a clause to the policy manual that “encouraged” officers on vehicle pursuits to “remember the importance of cover, concealment, and safe distance.” But in 2015, despite the board’s findings in the Romero and Tobin shootings, the next chief of police, Andrew Bidou, removed it. Neither Kreins nor Bidou responded to requests for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The issue emerged again in 2017, when officers killed Jeffrey Barboa, a father of one who police said was wanted for an armed robbery. Following a high-speed pursuit that ended in a crash, Barboa had approached officers while holding a knife over his head. The officers, standing within 15 feet, did not step back, police records show. As Barboa slowly walked toward the officers, they fired approximately 50 rounds at him, hitting him at least 30 times in the chest, face, neck, arms and legs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11919414\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 664px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.12-PM.png\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11919414 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.12-PM.png\" alt=\"A black-and-white watercolor illustration of a middle-aged Latino man with dark hair, unsmiling, wearing a collared shirt and jacket.\" width=\"664\" height=\"946\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.12-PM.png 664w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-12-at-3.49.12-PM-160x228.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 664px) 100vw, 664px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jeffrey Barboa \u003ccite>(Kate Copeland/ProPublica)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>More than 28 months after that shooting, in December 2019, the CIRB found in its report that had the officers taken cover or put more distance between themselves and Barboa, they would have created time to communicate with him and “deploy less-lethal alternatives.” “It is this positioning that likely caused the situation to speed up,” the board wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nevertheless, the review board responded as it usually did: It identified no policy violation or specific officer at fault and issued a list of training recommendations with no accompanying plan to implement them. There is no evidence in the department’s reports that Vallejo officials took further action in the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Reporting for this project was supported by a grant from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.propublica.org/people/mariam-elba\">Mariam Elba\u003c/a> contributed research. Geoffrey King contributed reporting.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"disqusTitle": "From Scandal to Scrutiny: How Vigilant Citizen Oversight Helped Reshape Oakland's Police Force",
"title": "From Scandal to Scrutiny: How Vigilant Citizen Oversight Helped Reshape Oakland's Police Force",
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"content": "\u003cp>The man was screaming, but the beating didn’t stop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was June 27, 2000, and the Oakland Police Department’s vaunted gang task force was at work in West Oakland. The officers worked one of the most dangerous beats in one of the most violent parts of the city. They called themselves the Riders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One member of the task force beat Delphine Allen on the soles of his feet with batons, according to trial testimony. Police pepper-sprayed him and drove him under a freeway overpass, where the beating continued, a rookie officer who witnessed the beating would later testify.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Allen called out for his mother, who lived nearby. “I thought they were going to kill me,” he said in court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The rookie police officer who witnessed the assault on Allen filed a complaint in July 2000. The resulting scandal upended the department and touched off a massive overhaul in how the department judges its own officers’ conduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, Oakland has arguably become the state’s most watched police department, under the guise of both a federal monitor and strong civilian oversight. In this city of 435,000, civilians have the power to overrule the police department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"related coverage\" tag=\"opd\"]“The direction that Oakland is taking is the inevitable path for a modern-day progressive police department,” said Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf. “And so I believe that we’re on the front lines, we’re the vanguard of police reform.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Statewide data helps tell that story. The Oakland Police Department \"sustains\" complaints against its officers at a rate higher than that of any other major law enforcement entity, except the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, according to a CalMatters analysis of California Department of Justice data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Complaints originate with citizens, or from the department’s internal affairs unit. \u003ca href=\"https://infogram.com/sustained-complaints-ratio-1hdw2jpkmelkj2l\">A sustained complaint\u003c/a> indicates the department believed the person who complained, and could discipline those officers involved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Statewide, law enforcement agencies marked as sustained 7.6% of complaints against their officers from 2016 to 2020. In those years, the Oakland Police Department \"sustained\" complaints at an average rate of 11.3%, the data shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2018 and 2020, the department sustained more than 15.2% of complaints, double the state average.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think we’re doing a much more thorough evaluation,” said Oakland Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong. “I also think when you have a community with very low trust in law enforcement, it means that law enforcement has to make sure that they have legitimate and professional processes so we can build trust.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe src=\"https://e.infogram.com/9d7a218a-38b0-4d06-b912-8e91e348d2c0?src=embed\" title=\"Oakland Police sustained complaints\" width=\"800\" height=\"837\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state's DOJ has collected the number of complaints and those sustained since 2016, the result of a bill that ordered agencies to establish a procedure to investigate complaints by the public against officers and publish the results.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Oakland police complaint process is now handled by both its internal affairs division and a civilian panel that oversees the department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And among the rank and file, there has been fallout.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, officers are leaving the department in higher numbers, from an average of about four per month late last year to 10 or 15 a month since then, according to Armstrong.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We haven’t seen these type of numbers since I’ve been at the department, and that’s been over two decades,” he said. “When you work in a big city that’s under the microscope like Oakland, I’m sure that can be challenging to some officers.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been pushing the same message to officers, that you can’t escape the calls for reform,” he added. “No matter where you go, you’re going to see more community involvement, the community paying more attention to the actions of officers.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The website \u003ca href=\"https://oaklandside.org/2022/03/09/police-officers-leaving-oakland-attrition-diversity/\">Oaklandside reported that\u003c/a>, in a sample of 30 exit interviews with Oakland police officers, half were leaving because of dissatisfaction with leadership at the police department or city, and seven cited “heavy discipline.” Others cited family reasons, low morale and better jobs, among other factors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been doing some exit interviews with officers that are choosing to go to other departments, and what I tell them is the Oakland way is going to be the American way any minute now,” Schaaf told CalMatters.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"h-the-oakland-riders-legacy\">The Oakland Riders' legacy\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Before the Oakland rookie police officer blew the whistle on the Riders, he was told that beating, kidnapping and planting drugs on people was simply how police work was done, he later testified in court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/OAKLAND-Riders-lied-brutalized-man-2629441.php\">trial in 2004\u003c/a>, the former rookie, Keith Batts, testified that he didn’t immediately report what he saw. He was new to the department and feared repercussions for reporting excessive use of force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Three members of the Riders would eventually be fired, but juries would later acquit them of some criminal charges and deadlock on many others. A fourth member, Riders leader Frank Vazquez, fled the city in November 2000, and prosecutors have said they \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2012/12/12/oakland-where-the-riders-are-today/\">believe he’s in hiding in Mexico\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than 100 people sued the police department in federal court. The cases were combined into a negotiated settlement agreement, in which the police department consented to reforms and accepted a federal monitoring team. The team would oversee dozens of proposed reforms at the department, especially concerning its use-of-force policy and the process by which complaints are treated.[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf\"]'The direction that Oakland is taking is the inevitable path for a modern-day progressive police department. And so I believe that we're on the front lines, we're the vanguard of police reform.'[/pullquote]The original monitoring team and its successor, appointed in 2010, have both praised and condemned the Oakland police for their conduct since 2003. But in the ensuing two decades, one fundamental change has made the biggest difference: Oakland residents have garnered a lot more power over their police department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>First, in \u003ca href=\"https://www.oaklandca.gov/resources/learn-more-about-measure-ll\">a 2016 ballot measure\u003c/a>, the city’s voters put the whole department under civilian oversight. Then, in 2020, the civilian police commission fired the city’s police chief.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In December, the city hired its first inspector general for the police department, a civilian position overseen by the civilian board.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rocky Lucia, an attorney for the Oakland Police Officers’ Association and several other Bay Area police department unions, said the level of oversight in Oakland exceeds what he’s seen anywhere else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They pay a lot more attention to police conduct in Oakland,” Lucia said. “There’s more eyes on people. There’s policies, software programs, there’s resources committed. It’s more than I’ve ever seen anywhere else in the state.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lucia wonders if Oakland should be spending the amount of money it does on oversight, given \u003ca href=\"https://www.oaklandca.gov/news/2021/opd-addresses-a-challenging-year-in-crime-with-year-end-data\">rising crime rates\u003c/a> that began during the pandemic and the city’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.oaklandca.gov/news/2020/city-of-oakland-faces-possible-62m-shortfall#:~:text=The%20report%20shows%20that%20the,indicates%20this%20shortfall%20is%20widening.\">always-muddy financial situation\u003c/a>, only 18 months removed from a $62 million budget shortfall. But he also acknowledges that the department is identifying potentially problematic officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They’re catching these things early,” Lucia said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"h-a-tale-of-two-scandals\">A tale of two scandals\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Two years before the beating of Delphine Allen, a different and more infamous gang task force controversy erupted 350 miles south: the Los Angeles Police Department’s Rampart scandal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums — or CRASH — unit was to Los Angeles what the Riders were to Oakland: an elite group of cops on a special detail that made big busts in the LAPD’s Rampart Division.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CRASH unit officers also were accused of robbing a bank, stealing cocaine from the evidence room and replacing it with Bisquick, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/lapd/scandal/cron.html\">beating a suspect until he vomited blood\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result, in 1998 the LAPD instituted a new policy: Any complaints against an officer would trigger an investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Complaints against officers piled up, major crimes arrests dropped, and officers started to complain that the system treated them unfairly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Complaints against officers soared,” wrote University of Chicago economics professor Canice Prendergast in \u003ca href=\"https://bfi.uchicago.edu/insight/research-summary/drive-and-wave-the-response-to-lapd-police-reforms-after-rampart/\">a 2021 paper analyzing the scandal’s fallout\u003c/a>. “These were sustained at high rates, resulting in suspensions, resignations and terminations at levels far higher than before.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Any complaint tied up officers’ promotions and transfers. Prendergast found that the level of sustained complaints was even more damaging to police morale.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In response, the officers radically reduced their engagement with the public, according to Prendergast’s paper, “Drive and Wave,” which is named after the practice of nonengagement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Arrests plummeted. The LAPD accepted a federal monitor from the U.S. Department of Justice in 2000 and nearly 90% of LAPD officers interviewed by the monitor in 2001 said a fear of discipline stopped them from “proactively” doing their jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, the LAPD was handed a big win by, of all things, the federal monitor itself, which encouraged the department to clear up its backlog of complaints.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prendergast found the police department’s solution in long-buried LAPD archives, a decision that was put out among the department’s employees but never publicized: The LAPD gave its commanding officers the power to dismiss complaints against their subordinates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That meant complaints could be dismissed moments after they were filed by an officer’s superior.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result, sustained complaints fell dramatically, beginning in 2003, and penalties for sustained complaints were much more rare, Prendergast found.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From 2016 to 2020, the last year for which statistics are available, the LAPD sustained complaints at a rate of 5.2%, below the statewide average for that period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Disciplinary measures across the board became less likely,” Prendergast wrote, “even when an investigation ruled against the officer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"h-some-officers-just-tired\">Some officers 'just tired'\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Under California law, there are four outcomes for \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-crime-numbers/\">a complaint against a police officer\u003c/a>:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>— Complaints can be sustained, meaning the investigation proved the allegation to be true by a preponderance of evidence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>— An officer can be exonerated, meaning the officer did what was described, but that action didn’t violate department law or policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>— Complaints can be ruled “unsustained,” meaning the investigation failed to clearly prove or disprove the allegation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>— Complaints can be determined “unfounded,” meaning the investigation clearly showed the allegation was untrue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For much of the Oakland Police Department’s time under a federal monitor, most complaints were relegated to the “unfounded” bin, said John Burris, one of two lead plaintiff attorneys in the settlement agreement between the police department and the city following the Riders scandal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But with increased civilian oversight since 2016, he said far fewer complaints were dismissed as unfounded.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris said cases dismissed as “unfounded” were the ones that bothered him the most.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[Complainants are] not lying. I may not be able to prove it, but something happened,” Burris said, and noted that unfounded complaints also disappear from officers’ personnel files.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, when a complaint is filed, the Oakland police and the Civilian Police Review Agency launch parallel investigations. Each draws its own conclusions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When there’s a difference of opinion, the question goes to another set of civilian monitors — the civilian Police Commission — which holds final authority on questions of officer misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tyfahra Milele, chair of the commission, said she can empathize with officers who feel they are over-policed by their civilian overseers. She said that officers tell her they’re more afraid to engage residents because they’re worried about a complaint, which can tie up their promotions and damage their careers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the recent police-related killings of Ahmaud Arbery in Atlanta, Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky, and George Floyd in Minneapolis, “there’s much more of a vigilance around police and accountability,” Milele said. “Some officers are like, ‘OK, I’m gonna go to work and ride this wave. Some [officers say], this isn’t the role for me, all these other factors are making it difficult.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then “we have some officers that are just tired,” she added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite what Burris, the attorney, described as widespread opposition among the department’s rank and file to civilian oversight, it has resulted in a higher level of scrutiny of officer behavior, according to lawyers on both sides of the city’s 2003 negotiated settlement agreement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Attorneys representing Allen, who originally brought the lawsuit in Oakland, expect the settlement agreement with the police department to end in 2023 or 2024.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A hearing before a U.S. District Court in San Francisco to determine the department’s progress is set for April 27.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s taken a long time, but we’re finally getting traction,” said Burris. “Our hope is we’ll fundamentally ingrain things in the culture.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He added, “It’s my worst nightmare about the case, that it’s all for naught. That it goes back to the way it was.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The man was screaming, but the beating didn’t stop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was June 27, 2000, and the Oakland Police Department’s vaunted gang task force was at work in West Oakland. The officers worked one of the most dangerous beats in one of the most violent parts of the city. They called themselves the Riders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One member of the task force beat Delphine Allen on the soles of his feet with batons, according to trial testimony. Police pepper-sprayed him and drove him under a freeway overpass, where the beating continued, a rookie officer who witnessed the beating would later testify.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Allen called out for his mother, who lived nearby. “I thought they were going to kill me,” he said in court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The rookie police officer who witnessed the assault on Allen filed a complaint in July 2000. The resulting scandal upended the department and touched off a massive overhaul in how the department judges its own officers’ conduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, Oakland has arguably become the state’s most watched police department, under the guise of both a federal monitor and strong civilian oversight. In this city of 435,000, civilians have the power to overrule the police department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“The direction that Oakland is taking is the inevitable path for a modern-day progressive police department,” said Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf. “And so I believe that we’re on the front lines, we’re the vanguard of police reform.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Statewide data helps tell that story. The Oakland Police Department \"sustains\" complaints against its officers at a rate higher than that of any other major law enforcement entity, except the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, according to a CalMatters analysis of California Department of Justice data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Complaints originate with citizens, or from the department’s internal affairs unit. \u003ca href=\"https://infogram.com/sustained-complaints-ratio-1hdw2jpkmelkj2l\">A sustained complaint\u003c/a> indicates the department believed the person who complained, and could discipline those officers involved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Statewide, law enforcement agencies marked as sustained 7.6% of complaints against their officers from 2016 to 2020. In those years, the Oakland Police Department \"sustained\" complaints at an average rate of 11.3%, the data shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2018 and 2020, the department sustained more than 15.2% of complaints, double the state average.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think we’re doing a much more thorough evaluation,” said Oakland Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong. “I also think when you have a community with very low trust in law enforcement, it means that law enforcement has to make sure that they have legitimate and professional processes so we can build trust.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe src=\"https://e.infogram.com/9d7a218a-38b0-4d06-b912-8e91e348d2c0?src=embed\" title=\"Oakland Police sustained complaints\" width=\"800\" height=\"837\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state's DOJ has collected the number of complaints and those sustained since 2016, the result of a bill that ordered agencies to establish a procedure to investigate complaints by the public against officers and publish the results.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Oakland police complaint process is now handled by both its internal affairs division and a civilian panel that oversees the department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And among the rank and file, there has been fallout.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, officers are leaving the department in higher numbers, from an average of about four per month late last year to 10 or 15 a month since then, according to Armstrong.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We haven’t seen these type of numbers since I’ve been at the department, and that’s been over two decades,” he said. “When you work in a big city that’s under the microscope like Oakland, I’m sure that can be challenging to some officers.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been pushing the same message to officers, that you can’t escape the calls for reform,” he added. “No matter where you go, you’re going to see more community involvement, the community paying more attention to the actions of officers.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The website \u003ca href=\"https://oaklandside.org/2022/03/09/police-officers-leaving-oakland-attrition-diversity/\">Oaklandside reported that\u003c/a>, in a sample of 30 exit interviews with Oakland police officers, half were leaving because of dissatisfaction with leadership at the police department or city, and seven cited “heavy discipline.” Others cited family reasons, low morale and better jobs, among other factors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been doing some exit interviews with officers that are choosing to go to other departments, and what I tell them is the Oakland way is going to be the American way any minute now,” Schaaf told CalMatters.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"h-the-oakland-riders-legacy\">The Oakland Riders' legacy\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Before the Oakland rookie police officer blew the whistle on the Riders, he was told that beating, kidnapping and planting drugs on people was simply how police work was done, he later testified in court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/OAKLAND-Riders-lied-brutalized-man-2629441.php\">trial in 2004\u003c/a>, the former rookie, Keith Batts, testified that he didn’t immediately report what he saw. He was new to the department and feared repercussions for reporting excessive use of force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Three members of the Riders would eventually be fired, but juries would later acquit them of some criminal charges and deadlock on many others. A fourth member, Riders leader Frank Vazquez, fled the city in November 2000, and prosecutors have said they \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2012/12/12/oakland-where-the-riders-are-today/\">believe he’s in hiding in Mexico\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than 100 people sued the police department in federal court. The cases were combined into a negotiated settlement agreement, in which the police department consented to reforms and accepted a federal monitoring team. The team would oversee dozens of proposed reforms at the department, especially concerning its use-of-force policy and the process by which complaints are treated.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The original monitoring team and its successor, appointed in 2010, have both praised and condemned the Oakland police for their conduct since 2003. But in the ensuing two decades, one fundamental change has made the biggest difference: Oakland residents have garnered a lot more power over their police department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>First, in \u003ca href=\"https://www.oaklandca.gov/resources/learn-more-about-measure-ll\">a 2016 ballot measure\u003c/a>, the city’s voters put the whole department under civilian oversight. Then, in 2020, the civilian police commission fired the city’s police chief.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In December, the city hired its first inspector general for the police department, a civilian position overseen by the civilian board.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rocky Lucia, an attorney for the Oakland Police Officers’ Association and several other Bay Area police department unions, said the level of oversight in Oakland exceeds what he’s seen anywhere else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They pay a lot more attention to police conduct in Oakland,” Lucia said. “There’s more eyes on people. There’s policies, software programs, there’s resources committed. It’s more than I’ve ever seen anywhere else in the state.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lucia wonders if Oakland should be spending the amount of money it does on oversight, given \u003ca href=\"https://www.oaklandca.gov/news/2021/opd-addresses-a-challenging-year-in-crime-with-year-end-data\">rising crime rates\u003c/a> that began during the pandemic and the city’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.oaklandca.gov/news/2020/city-of-oakland-faces-possible-62m-shortfall#:~:text=The%20report%20shows%20that%20the,indicates%20this%20shortfall%20is%20widening.\">always-muddy financial situation\u003c/a>, only 18 months removed from a $62 million budget shortfall. But he also acknowledges that the department is identifying potentially problematic officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They’re catching these things early,” Lucia said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"h-a-tale-of-two-scandals\">A tale of two scandals\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Two years before the beating of Delphine Allen, a different and more infamous gang task force controversy erupted 350 miles south: the Los Angeles Police Department’s Rampart scandal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums — or CRASH — unit was to Los Angeles what the Riders were to Oakland: an elite group of cops on a special detail that made big busts in the LAPD’s Rampart Division.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CRASH unit officers also were accused of robbing a bank, stealing cocaine from the evidence room and replacing it with Bisquick, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/lapd/scandal/cron.html\">beating a suspect until he vomited blood\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result, in 1998 the LAPD instituted a new policy: Any complaints against an officer would trigger an investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Complaints against officers piled up, major crimes arrests dropped, and officers started to complain that the system treated them unfairly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Complaints against officers soared,” wrote University of Chicago economics professor Canice Prendergast in \u003ca href=\"https://bfi.uchicago.edu/insight/research-summary/drive-and-wave-the-response-to-lapd-police-reforms-after-rampart/\">a 2021 paper analyzing the scandal’s fallout\u003c/a>. “These were sustained at high rates, resulting in suspensions, resignations and terminations at levels far higher than before.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Any complaint tied up officers’ promotions and transfers. Prendergast found that the level of sustained complaints was even more damaging to police morale.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In response, the officers radically reduced their engagement with the public, according to Prendergast’s paper, “Drive and Wave,” which is named after the practice of nonengagement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Arrests plummeted. The LAPD accepted a federal monitor from the U.S. Department of Justice in 2000 and nearly 90% of LAPD officers interviewed by the monitor in 2001 said a fear of discipline stopped them from “proactively” doing their jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, the LAPD was handed a big win by, of all things, the federal monitor itself, which encouraged the department to clear up its backlog of complaints.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prendergast found the police department’s solution in long-buried LAPD archives, a decision that was put out among the department’s employees but never publicized: The LAPD gave its commanding officers the power to dismiss complaints against their subordinates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That meant complaints could be dismissed moments after they were filed by an officer’s superior.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result, sustained complaints fell dramatically, beginning in 2003, and penalties for sustained complaints were much more rare, Prendergast found.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From 2016 to 2020, the last year for which statistics are available, the LAPD sustained complaints at a rate of 5.2%, below the statewide average for that period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Disciplinary measures across the board became less likely,” Prendergast wrote, “even when an investigation ruled against the officer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"h-some-officers-just-tired\">Some officers 'just tired'\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Under California law, there are four outcomes for \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-crime-numbers/\">a complaint against a police officer\u003c/a>:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>— Complaints can be sustained, meaning the investigation proved the allegation to be true by a preponderance of evidence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>— An officer can be exonerated, meaning the officer did what was described, but that action didn’t violate department law or policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>— Complaints can be ruled “unsustained,” meaning the investigation failed to clearly prove or disprove the allegation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>— Complaints can be determined “unfounded,” meaning the investigation clearly showed the allegation was untrue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For much of the Oakland Police Department’s time under a federal monitor, most complaints were relegated to the “unfounded” bin, said John Burris, one of two lead plaintiff attorneys in the settlement agreement between the police department and the city following the Riders scandal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But with increased civilian oversight since 2016, he said far fewer complaints were dismissed as unfounded.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris said cases dismissed as “unfounded” were the ones that bothered him the most.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[Complainants are] not lying. I may not be able to prove it, but something happened,” Burris said, and noted that unfounded complaints also disappear from officers’ personnel files.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, when a complaint is filed, the Oakland police and the Civilian Police Review Agency launch parallel investigations. Each draws its own conclusions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When there’s a difference of opinion, the question goes to another set of civilian monitors — the civilian Police Commission — which holds final authority on questions of officer misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tyfahra Milele, chair of the commission, said she can empathize with officers who feel they are over-policed by their civilian overseers. She said that officers tell her they’re more afraid to engage residents because they’re worried about a complaint, which can tie up their promotions and damage their careers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the recent police-related killings of Ahmaud Arbery in Atlanta, Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky, and George Floyd in Minneapolis, “there’s much more of a vigilance around police and accountability,” Milele said. “Some officers are like, ‘OK, I’m gonna go to work and ride this wave. Some [officers say], this isn’t the role for me, all these other factors are making it difficult.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And then “we have some officers that are just tired,” she added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite what Burris, the attorney, described as widespread opposition among the department’s rank and file to civilian oversight, it has resulted in a higher level of scrutiny of officer behavior, according to lawyers on both sides of the city’s 2003 negotiated settlement agreement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Attorneys representing Allen, who originally brought the lawsuit in Oakland, expect the settlement agreement with the police department to end in 2023 or 2024.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A hearing before a U.S. District Court in San Francisco to determine the department’s progress is set for April 27.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s taken a long time, but we’re finally getting traction,” said Burris. “Our hope is we’ll fundamentally ingrain things in the culture.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He added, “It’s my worst nightmare about the case, that it’s all for naught. That it goes back to the way it was.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "a-blame-game-criminal-justice-experts-debate-effort-to-recall-sf-da-chesa-boudin",
"title": "A 'Blame Game'? Criminal Justice Experts Debate Effort to Recall SF DA Chesa Boudin",
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"headTitle": "A ‘Blame Game’? Criminal Justice Experts Debate Effort to Recall SF DA Chesa Boudin | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Arguing about San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin’s performance in office is practically the city’s pastime these days. Is “Chesa” the root cause of the city’s assaults, its thefts, its \u003cem>anarchy\u003c/em>, as some publicly put it?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Those are the salvos launched by keyboard warriors on social media every day, but Monday night, those experienced in criminal justice took the debate to center stage.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">San Francisco’s United Democratic Club, Eastern Neighborhoods Democratic Club, Edwin M. Lee Asian Pacific Democratic Club, and Willie B. Kennedy Democratic Club hosted a virtual debate among professionals who have seen different sides of the criminal justice system, to get at the heart of Boudin’s time in office.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The evening’s talks were moderated over Zoom by KQED politics correspondent \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/mlagos\">Marisa Lagos\u003c/a> and San Francisco Chronicle criminal justice reporter \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/meganrcassidy?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor\">Megan Cassidy\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While many in virtual attendance seemed dug in on either side — for, or against, the upcoming recall election against Boudin — organizers hoped the night’s discussions could illuminate Boudin’s career for those finding themselves on the electoral fence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s been a particularly rough few weeks for Boudin’s political prospects, \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/criminal-justice/da-chesa-boudin-recall-campaign-poll-crime/\">as a recent poll, paid for by proponents of his recall\u003c/a>, found that 68% of San Franciscans would remove him from office if the recall election were today. (The recall is set for June.) In another public blow, his office recently lost a case against San Francisco Police Department officer Terrance Stangel, in what may be the city’s first trial against an officer for excessive force allegations in the line of duty, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11907396/san-francisco-officer-not-guilty-of-using-excessive-force\">KQED previously reported\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Monday’s debate, two prosecuting attorneys formerly with Boudin’s office, Brooke Jenkins and Don du Bain, argued Boudin needed to be recalled in light of the fear of crime pervading San Francisco. Jenkins was assigned to the homicide unit in the DA’s office and has been a sex crimes prosecutor. Du Bain is a 30-year prosecutor and also has served as Solano County district attorney.[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Brooke Jenkins, attorney\"]‘The issue for us is Chesa creates the landscape where criminals think this is OK behavior.’[/pullquote]Those arguing against the recall characterized crime statistics used against Boudin as cherry-picked, with fear-mongering used to drive a wedge between Boudin and the public. The debaters against the recall included Tinisch Hollins, who is a crime survivor and also executive director of \u003ca href=\"https://safeandjust.org/staff/tinisch-hollins/\">Californians for Safety and Justice\u003c/a>, and Richard Corriea, a retired San Francisco police commander who is now the director of the International Institute of Criminal Justice Leadership at the University of San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The role of people who prosecute was not viewed as something people who look like me do,” said Jenkins, the former prosecutor for Boudin, speaking of people of color. She joined the San Francisco District Attorney’s office specifically to serve former DA George Gascón, whom she described as “leading the way” on alternative forms of incarceration.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He was able to help us balance reform with making sure we kept the community safe,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Boudin, she said, is “failing to keep San Franciscans safe.”[aside label=\"Boudin comes to KQED on May 3\" link1=\"https://www.kqed.org/event/1814,San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin with Political Breakdown\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Speaking against the recall, Richard Corriea said his family has been in the San Francisco Police Department since the 1906 earthquake. He’s a fourth-generation San Franciscan who attended George Washington High School.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I did not support Chesa Boudin in his race for district attorney,” Corriea said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So what is he doing opposing the Boudin recall? Corriea said he’s seen half-truths and “lies” take hold of crime statistics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s been disturbing, and seems bent on fomenting fear,” he said. “I object to the recall because the promoters said San Francisco would be safer if we’d just dump the district attorney, which is absurd.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Throughout the night, the criminal justice experts tackled homicide rates, shoplifters, and the records of previous district attorneys.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In response to the first question, Jenkins suggested that diversion, a procedure by which defendants avoid criminal conviction if they agree to rehabilitation and a period of probation, is overused by DA Boudin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>MEGAN CASSIDY: Why is it we should blame the DA for increases in property crimes, but not credit his policies, let’s say, for the relatively low murder rate? If the murder rate goes up somewhat here, but is consistent with the rest of the country, why should we blame the DA’s office for this?\u003c/strong>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Richard Correia, retired San Francisco police commander\"]‘The idea that a DA is going to change property crime in the city? I just don’t see it.’[/pullquote]\u003cstrong>JENKINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For the most part I think everyone agrees, even in the street, murder is wrong and it won’t go unpunished, but when the DA creates an environment where property crime, where assault, where burglary is acceptable, where there is no consequence, where even if you are arrested, you are released within hours, at most a day or two, and you’re back out into the street, it doesn’t matter if you commit five more burglaries, you’re going to be released each time and at most get probation. At best you get diversion regardless of how many offenses you pick up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He’s creating a landscape where criminal offenders desire to come here and commit crimes. They know that there’s no penalty.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’d just like to say, after 35 years of police work, I don’t believe criminals in their calculation are thinking about what Chesa Boudin is going to do or not do to them.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What they think about is, “What are the chances of getting maybe a tourist car with valuable items in it? What are their chances of getting caught?” Those factors weigh in. What are their chances of blending into the surroundings? How many ways can they escape? But honestly, they’re not sitting there going, “Well, in the marketplace of the Hall of Justice, how will I do?”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11908889\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11908889\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1.jpg\" alt=\"A zoom call with nine windows featuring various experts on criminal justice, two journalists, and community members. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1081\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1-1536x865.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Criminal justice experts gathered Monday night for a debate on San Francisco DA Chesa Boudin’s recall. Top row, left to right: Megan Cassidy (San Francisco Chronicle), Marisa Lagos (KQED), Richard Corriea (retired San Francisco police commander). Middle row, left to right: Don du Bain (attorney), Brooke Jenkins (attorney), Tinisch Hollins (Californians for Safety and Justice). Bottom row, left to right: Kristen Webb (United Democratic Club); Bruce Agid (Eastern Neighborhoods Democratic Club). \u003ccite>(Courtesy United Democratic Club)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>MARISA LAGOS: Even if you support this district attorney, there’s no question that people feel unsafe. \u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>So why shouldn’t the DA be held accountable for some of the really horrific or just upsetting things we’ve seen, particularly around property crimes?\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Property crimes are changing because of the pandemic. The issue of poverty, drug addiction, mental illness, failed public policy, mass incarceration, discrimination, all those factors come into play.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So to say, hmm, someone is here shoplifting, it’s the DA’s fault … What about retailers that have gone from stopping people and holding them and arresting them, to not using security and passing on the cost to the consumer?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I can tell you that I never made a shoplifting arrest, ever, because they were done by private security in the stores who would call the police and sign a citizen’s arrest card, and we would take them down and book them.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The idea that a DA is going to change property crime in the city? I just don’t see it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>HOLLINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s also important to mention that property crime closure rates have been sadly low in San Francisco for a very long time. That did not just start. That’s not really related to who the DA is.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CASSIDY: The DA’s office is just one arm of the criminal justice system. We’ve seen police clearance rates, particularly with property crimes, drop significantly. A lot of these crimes are not getting arrested in the first place. Do the police also share the blame for crime rates? Particularly with property crimes?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>JENKINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The issue for us is Chesa creates the landscape where criminals think this is OK behavior.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We can talk about examples where we’ve heard from the police that they will make an arrest and somebody will tell them, “That’s fine because I’ll be out in a few hours. The DA’s office isn’t going to do anything about it.” Or jail calls where they’re saying, you know what, pretty much theft is legal in San Francisco. These are the stories that we are hearing. It doesn’t take the responsibility off of the police to make arrests, of course.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think we have to understand we are in a universe now where morale is low, I think in law enforcement, period. We keep hearing, “The DA’s office isn’t going to do anything about it, so why should I risk my safety to make an arrest?”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cstrong>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Point of fact, Chesa has reached out to the unions and department, over and over again. What people don’t know about city government is, it’s a large blame game, and now Chesa is being blamed.\u003c/span>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>LAGOS: What is criminal justice reform, if not what Chesa is doing? \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>DU BAIN\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like Mr. Corriea, I’ve been in law enforcement myself for 30 years as a prosecutor, in various counties in California. I recognize the complexity of what we do in criminal justice. I’ve known plenty of progressive district attorneys in my time, [such as] Nancy O’Malley in Alameda County. Here in San Francisco, we had both Kamala Harris and George Gascón, who were very progressive district attorneys.\u003c/span>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Brooke Jenkins, attorney\"]‘Boudin is failing to keep San Francisco safe.’[/pullquote]\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They were progressive because they created new, innovative programs to try to keep our young people out of the criminal justice system in the first place and to rehabilitate those criminal offenders who ended up in the system.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kamala Harris created Back on Track, which was a successful program to keep kids out of the criminal justice system, employed and in a productive lifestyle. George Gascón expanded that program into young adult court. He also created a mental health court called Behavioral Health Court … and Intensive Supervision Court for adult offenders who are recidivists.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Those are true progressive prosecutors. Chesa hasn’t developed a single rehabilitative program.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cstrong>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I’m looking at five pages of accomplishments that would hurt your eyes to look at. My brother was murdered in 1988 and my worst memories are dealing with the criminal justice system. The rest of it has faded for me, over time.\u003c/span>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CASSIDY: Including crime, one of the things polls show people are worried about [is] drug overdoses, open-air drug use on the streets, particularly in the Tenderloin. What role should the DA’s office be playing to stem this tide?\u003c/strong>[aside postID=news_11907396 label='Related Coverage']\u003cstrong>JENKINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The DA’s office plays a huge role in that. We make the decisions on what to do with drug-dealing offenses. We have the ability to use the consequence for that … to incentivize them to engage in drug treatment, or go to drug court where they can engage in substance abuse counseling or treatment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it’s imperative the chief law enforcement officer, the district attorney, use that office to compel people who need treatment into treatment, and to hold drug dealers accountable for taking advantage of this vulnerable population.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That, again, does not necessarily mean sending people to prison. It means you have to use the consequence as an incentive. It could be an incentive for vocational training.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>HOLLINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’re having a conversation about a public health issue with a criminal justice lens. We know we don’t have enough treatment beds. I had a brother who struggled with addiction and later lost his life. Both of my brothers were on probation when they passed away. That’s a sad failure of the systems.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The DA should focus on crime, I agree. But the drug crisis is much bigger than the DA’s office.\u003c/span>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Richard Correia, retired San Francisco police commander\"]‘We’ve seen in these high-charging, hard-on-crime jurisdictions increases in crime when some folks would suggest it should be the opposite.’[/pullquote]\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t think it’s been any better under any of the previous DAs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just to reference the programs that had been implemented under District Attorney Harris and Gascón, I worked very closely with people who implemented those programs. Again it is a national crisis, not one that’s just focused here in San Francisco. It’s a public health issue that needs to be dealt with with a public health lens.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CASSIDY: Diversion rates are up, conviction rates are down. What should voters take away from that?\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think that the statistics, if you read them, are really mind-numbing, you know? How many cases came in the door and where they went, and which had action and which didn’t.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What equates to safety?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ve seen in these high-charging, hard-on-crime jurisdictions increases in crime when some folks would suggest it should be the opposite.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What I want to say about statistics, this is the most telling: The burglary rates in some neighborhoods in San Francisco grew during the pandemic as crime patterns changed. I noticed that they were up in the Richmond and people were very upset about that, and I noticed they were down in other parts of town.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Folks tore into that the day after: “Look at burglaries out of control.” I always wondered, “Well, what about where it’s dropped?” Shouldn’t you get an offsetting penalty there? I think statistics are not ultimately very helpful.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you look at the chat [of viewer comments in the Zoom debate], it’s almost scary how worried people are and the level of hostility. I would love to see more conversations like this.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Two former prosecutors, a criminal justice reformer and a former SFPD commander took to a virtual stage to talk property crime, criminal justice reform, and the records of former district attorneys, to help inform voters before the June recall election of Chesa Boudin. ",
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"title": "A 'Blame Game'? Criminal Justice Experts Debate Effort to Recall SF DA Chesa Boudin | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Arguing about San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin’s performance in office is practically the city’s pastime these days. Is “Chesa” the root cause of the city’s assaults, its thefts, its \u003cem>anarchy\u003c/em>, as some publicly put it?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Those are the salvos launched by keyboard warriors on social media every day, but Monday night, those experienced in criminal justice took the debate to center stage.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">San Francisco’s United Democratic Club, Eastern Neighborhoods Democratic Club, Edwin M. Lee Asian Pacific Democratic Club, and Willie B. Kennedy Democratic Club hosted a virtual debate among professionals who have seen different sides of the criminal justice system, to get at the heart of Boudin’s time in office.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The evening’s talks were moderated over Zoom by KQED politics correspondent \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/mlagos\">Marisa Lagos\u003c/a> and San Francisco Chronicle criminal justice reporter \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/meganrcassidy?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor\">Megan Cassidy\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While many in virtual attendance seemed dug in on either side — for, or against, the upcoming recall election against Boudin — organizers hoped the night’s discussions could illuminate Boudin’s career for those finding themselves on the electoral fence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s been a particularly rough few weeks for Boudin’s political prospects, \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/criminal-justice/da-chesa-boudin-recall-campaign-poll-crime/\">as a recent poll, paid for by proponents of his recall\u003c/a>, found that 68% of San Franciscans would remove him from office if the recall election were today. (The recall is set for June.) In another public blow, his office recently lost a case against San Francisco Police Department officer Terrance Stangel, in what may be the city’s first trial against an officer for excessive force allegations in the line of duty, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11907396/san-francisco-officer-not-guilty-of-using-excessive-force\">KQED previously reported\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Monday’s debate, two prosecuting attorneys formerly with Boudin’s office, Brooke Jenkins and Don du Bain, argued Boudin needed to be recalled in light of the fear of crime pervading San Francisco. Jenkins was assigned to the homicide unit in the DA’s office and has been a sex crimes prosecutor. Du Bain is a 30-year prosecutor and also has served as Solano County district attorney.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Those arguing against the recall characterized crime statistics used against Boudin as cherry-picked, with fear-mongering used to drive a wedge between Boudin and the public. The debaters against the recall included Tinisch Hollins, who is a crime survivor and also executive director of \u003ca href=\"https://safeandjust.org/staff/tinisch-hollins/\">Californians for Safety and Justice\u003c/a>, and Richard Corriea, a retired San Francisco police commander who is now the director of the International Institute of Criminal Justice Leadership at the University of San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The role of people who prosecute was not viewed as something people who look like me do,” said Jenkins, the former prosecutor for Boudin, speaking of people of color. She joined the San Francisco District Attorney’s office specifically to serve former DA George Gascón, whom she described as “leading the way” on alternative forms of incarceration.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He was able to help us balance reform with making sure we kept the community safe,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Boudin, she said, is “failing to keep San Franciscans safe.”\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Speaking against the recall, Richard Corriea said his family has been in the San Francisco Police Department since the 1906 earthquake. He’s a fourth-generation San Franciscan who attended George Washington High School.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I did not support Chesa Boudin in his race for district attorney,” Corriea said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So what is he doing opposing the Boudin recall? Corriea said he’s seen half-truths and “lies” take hold of crime statistics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s been disturbing, and seems bent on fomenting fear,” he said. “I object to the recall because the promoters said San Francisco would be safer if we’d just dump the district attorney, which is absurd.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Throughout the night, the criminal justice experts tackled homicide rates, shoplifters, and the records of previous district attorneys.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In response to the first question, Jenkins suggested that diversion, a procedure by which defendants avoid criminal conviction if they agree to rehabilitation and a period of probation, is overused by DA Boudin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>MEGAN CASSIDY: Why is it we should blame the DA for increases in property crimes, but not credit his policies, let’s say, for the relatively low murder rate? If the murder rate goes up somewhat here, but is consistent with the rest of the country, why should we blame the DA’s office for this?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘The idea that a DA is going to change property crime in the city? I just don’t see it.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cstrong>JENKINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For the most part I think everyone agrees, even in the street, murder is wrong and it won’t go unpunished, but when the DA creates an environment where property crime, where assault, where burglary is acceptable, where there is no consequence, where even if you are arrested, you are released within hours, at most a day or two, and you’re back out into the street, it doesn’t matter if you commit five more burglaries, you’re going to be released each time and at most get probation. At best you get diversion regardless of how many offenses you pick up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He’s creating a landscape where criminal offenders desire to come here and commit crimes. They know that there’s no penalty.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’d just like to say, after 35 years of police work, I don’t believe criminals in their calculation are thinking about what Chesa Boudin is going to do or not do to them.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What they think about is, “What are the chances of getting maybe a tourist car with valuable items in it? What are their chances of getting caught?” Those factors weigh in. What are their chances of blending into the surroundings? How many ways can they escape? But honestly, they’re not sitting there going, “Well, in the marketplace of the Hall of Justice, how will I do?”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11908889\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11908889\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1.jpg\" alt=\"A zoom call with nine windows featuring various experts on criminal justice, two journalists, and community members. \" width=\"1920\" height=\"1081\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/Screenshot-2022-03-21-192521-1-1536x865.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Criminal justice experts gathered Monday night for a debate on San Francisco DA Chesa Boudin’s recall. Top row, left to right: Megan Cassidy (San Francisco Chronicle), Marisa Lagos (KQED), Richard Corriea (retired San Francisco police commander). Middle row, left to right: Don du Bain (attorney), Brooke Jenkins (attorney), Tinisch Hollins (Californians for Safety and Justice). Bottom row, left to right: Kristen Webb (United Democratic Club); Bruce Agid (Eastern Neighborhoods Democratic Club). \u003ccite>(Courtesy United Democratic Club)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>MARISA LAGOS: Even if you support this district attorney, there’s no question that people feel unsafe. \u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>So why shouldn’t the DA be held accountable for some of the really horrific or just upsetting things we’ve seen, particularly around property crimes?\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Property crimes are changing because of the pandemic. The issue of poverty, drug addiction, mental illness, failed public policy, mass incarceration, discrimination, all those factors come into play.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So to say, hmm, someone is here shoplifting, it’s the DA’s fault … What about retailers that have gone from stopping people and holding them and arresting them, to not using security and passing on the cost to the consumer?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I can tell you that I never made a shoplifting arrest, ever, because they were done by private security in the stores who would call the police and sign a citizen’s arrest card, and we would take them down and book them.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The idea that a DA is going to change property crime in the city? I just don’t see it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>HOLLINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s also important to mention that property crime closure rates have been sadly low in San Francisco for a very long time. That did not just start. That’s not really related to who the DA is.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CASSIDY: The DA’s office is just one arm of the criminal justice system. We’ve seen police clearance rates, particularly with property crimes, drop significantly. A lot of these crimes are not getting arrested in the first place. Do the police also share the blame for crime rates? Particularly with property crimes?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>JENKINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The issue for us is Chesa creates the landscape where criminals think this is OK behavior.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We can talk about examples where we’ve heard from the police that they will make an arrest and somebody will tell them, “That’s fine because I’ll be out in a few hours. The DA’s office isn’t going to do anything about it.” Or jail calls where they’re saying, you know what, pretty much theft is legal in San Francisco. These are the stories that we are hearing. It doesn’t take the responsibility off of the police to make arrests, of course.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think we have to understand we are in a universe now where morale is low, I think in law enforcement, period. We keep hearing, “The DA’s office isn’t going to do anything about it, so why should I risk my safety to make an arrest?”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cstrong>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Point of fact, Chesa has reached out to the unions and department, over and over again. What people don’t know about city government is, it’s a large blame game, and now Chesa is being blamed.\u003c/span>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>LAGOS: What is criminal justice reform, if not what Chesa is doing? \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>DU BAIN\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Like Mr. Corriea, I’ve been in law enforcement myself for 30 years as a prosecutor, in various counties in California. I recognize the complexity of what we do in criminal justice. I’ve known plenty of progressive district attorneys in my time, [such as] Nancy O’Malley in Alameda County. Here in San Francisco, we had both Kamala Harris and George Gascón, who were very progressive district attorneys.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They were progressive because they created new, innovative programs to try to keep our young people out of the criminal justice system in the first place and to rehabilitate those criminal offenders who ended up in the system.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kamala Harris created Back on Track, which was a successful program to keep kids out of the criminal justice system, employed and in a productive lifestyle. George Gascón expanded that program into young adult court. He also created a mental health court called Behavioral Health Court … and Intensive Supervision Court for adult offenders who are recidivists.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Those are true progressive prosecutors. Chesa hasn’t developed a single rehabilitative program.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cstrong>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I’m looking at five pages of accomplishments that would hurt your eyes to look at. My brother was murdered in 1988 and my worst memories are dealing with the criminal justice system. The rest of it has faded for me, over time.\u003c/span>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CASSIDY: Including crime, one of the things polls show people are worried about [is] drug overdoses, open-air drug use on the streets, particularly in the Tenderloin. What role should the DA’s office be playing to stem this tide?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cstrong>JENKINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The DA’s office plays a huge role in that. We make the decisions on what to do with drug-dealing offenses. We have the ability to use the consequence for that … to incentivize them to engage in drug treatment, or go to drug court where they can engage in substance abuse counseling or treatment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it’s imperative the chief law enforcement officer, the district attorney, use that office to compel people who need treatment into treatment, and to hold drug dealers accountable for taking advantage of this vulnerable population.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That, again, does not necessarily mean sending people to prison. It means you have to use the consequence as an incentive. It could be an incentive for vocational training.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>HOLLINS\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’re having a conversation about a public health issue with a criminal justice lens. We know we don’t have enough treatment beds. I had a brother who struggled with addiction and later lost his life. Both of my brothers were on probation when they passed away. That’s a sad failure of the systems.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The DA should focus on crime, I agree. But the drug crisis is much bigger than the DA’s office.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t think it’s been any better under any of the previous DAs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just to reference the programs that had been implemented under District Attorney Harris and Gascón, I worked very closely with people who implemented those programs. Again it is a national crisis, not one that’s just focused here in San Francisco. It’s a public health issue that needs to be dealt with with a public health lens.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CASSIDY: Diversion rates are up, conviction rates are down. What should voters take away from that?\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>CORRIEA\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think that the statistics, if you read them, are really mind-numbing, you know? How many cases came in the door and where they went, and which had action and which didn’t.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What equates to safety?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ve seen in these high-charging, hard-on-crime jurisdictions increases in crime when some folks would suggest it should be the opposite.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What I want to say about statistics, this is the most telling: The burglary rates in some neighborhoods in San Francisco grew during the pandemic as crime patterns changed. I noticed that they were up in the Richmond and people were very upset about that, and I noticed they were down in other parts of town.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Folks tore into that the day after: “Look at burglaries out of control.” I always wondered, “Well, what about where it’s dropped?” Shouldn’t you get an offsetting penalty there? I think statistics are not ultimately very helpful.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>The new year brings a raft of new laws for Californians. They’re likely to affect what your neighborhood looks like, how safe you feel, what recourse you have against discrimination — even how you take out your trash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2021 the Legislature’s supermajority of Democrats sent Gov. Gavin Newsom hundreds of bills that he signed into law, including \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-legislature-bills-passed-2021/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">several with major consequences\u003c/a> for Californians. Here’s a breakdown of 11 of those new laws taking effect in 2022, most of which lawmakers approved in the last session (a few videos cover more than one new law on the same subject).\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Stripping some cops of their badges\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pFBqBh2ehc\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For decades, \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/justice/2021/07/decertify-police-california/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">cops could skirt discipline\u003c/a> by jumping from one California police force to another.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s about to change. Soon, being convicted of offenses like sexual assault and using excessive force will be enough to kick officers out of the profession in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Limiting single-family zoning\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asOuWlEV6-I\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California has a critical housing shortage: The median home price broke $800,000 in 2021, and some experts say California needs about 3 million new homes for the growing population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But for decades, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11840548/the-racist-history-of-single-family-home-zoning\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">strict zoning laws\u003c/a> have allowed developers to build mostly single-family homes. With these two new laws, \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/housing/2021/08/california-housing-crisis-zoning-bill/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">housing construction is going to look different\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Ban on even more secret settlements\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_dzKisTVmY&t=1s\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11860458/new-california-bill-takes-aim-at-non-disclosure-agreements-that-block-talk-of-harassment\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Nondisclosure agreements\u003c/a> — also called NDAs — are everywhere. They’re used in Hollywood; they’re used in tech. Sometimes, they’re used to settle claims of discrimination and harassment secretly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Starting in 2022, that will be illegal in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Requiring composting — and limiting ‘recyclable’ labels\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqeKXrEemls\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Let’s talk trash, California. This state has long fashioned itself as a “planet protector” — but in 2022 it’s taking it \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11898577/heres-how-california-plans-to-convert-food-waste-into-energy-and-reduce-harmful-emissions\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">to a new level\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two new laws aim to stop you from throwing food away in your regular garbage, and to stop products from carrying the \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/politics/2021/08/california-recycling-single-use-plastic/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">chasing-arrow recycling symbol\u003c/a> when they aren’t really recyclable.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Quicker mental health care follow-up\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ5Xi4gI17k\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even before the pandemic, Californians were increasingly \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/projects/california-mental-health-care-parity/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">concerned about mental health care\u003c/a>: Surveys showed people thought such care was \u003ca href=\"https://www.chcf.org/publication/2019-california-health-policy-survey/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">too hard to access\u003c/a>, and that they had to wait too long for it. The recent surge in demand brought on by the pandemic has made this even worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By law, health plans must offer initial mental health appointments within 10 business days. But some advocates say that’s not good enough if patients are then forced to wait weeks or months for follow-up care. This law aims to change that.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Cracking down on condom ‘stealthing’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89eQyCon2yA\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Consent is paramount during any sexual act, and California law now gives victims of sexual battery more power to hold perpetrators accountable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This first-in-the-nation law \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11891525/california-first-state-to-make-nonconsensual-condom-removal-or-stealthing-a-civil-offense\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tightens the definition of sexual battery\u003c/a> to include nonconsensual condom removal — a practice colloquially known as “\u003ca href=\"https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2954726\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">stealthing.\u003c/a>”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Minimum wage for garment workers\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiYbPEVKwXw\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The people who shape and sew raw fabric into clothing \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/08/garment-manufacturers-los-angeles-california-bill-threatens-jobs/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">used to get paid by the amount they produced\u003c/a>. That system worked well for the fashion industry, but meant garment workers were getting paid as little as $3 per hour.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This year lawmakers ended that practice.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Restricting what police can do to control protests\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfa_M3vfpBQ\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California is going to do more to protect protestors seeking police reform, and the reporters covering their demonstrations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both new laws come in response to chaotic scenes from protests in California and elsewhere following the murder of George Floyd in Minnesota.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The new year brings a raft of new laws for Californians. They’re likely to affect what your neighborhood looks like, how safe you feel, what recourse you have against discrimination — even how you take out your trash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2021 the Legislature’s supermajority of Democrats sent Gov. Gavin Newsom hundreds of bills that he signed into law, including \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/explainers/california-legislature-bills-passed-2021/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">several with major consequences\u003c/a> for Californians. Here’s a breakdown of 11 of those new laws taking effect in 2022, most of which lawmakers approved in the last session (a few videos cover more than one new law on the same subject).\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Stripping some cops of their badges\u003c/h3>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/4pFBqBh2ehc'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/4pFBqBh2ehc'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>For decades, \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/justice/2021/07/decertify-police-california/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">cops could skirt discipline\u003c/a> by jumping from one California police force to another.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s about to change. Soon, being convicted of offenses like sexual assault and using excessive force will be enough to kick officers out of the profession in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Limiting single-family zoning\u003c/h3>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/asOuWlEV6-I'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/asOuWlEV6-I'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>California has a critical housing shortage: The median home price broke $800,000 in 2021, and some experts say California needs about 3 million new homes for the growing population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But for decades, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11840548/the-racist-history-of-single-family-home-zoning\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">strict zoning laws\u003c/a> have allowed developers to build mostly single-family homes. With these two new laws, \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/housing/2021/08/california-housing-crisis-zoning-bill/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">housing construction is going to look different\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Ban on even more secret settlements\u003c/h3>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/A_dzKisTVmY'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/A_dzKisTVmY'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11860458/new-california-bill-takes-aim-at-non-disclosure-agreements-that-block-talk-of-harassment\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Nondisclosure agreements\u003c/a> — also called NDAs — are everywhere. They’re used in Hollywood; they’re used in tech. Sometimes, they’re used to settle claims of discrimination and harassment secretly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Starting in 2022, that will be illegal in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Requiring composting — and limiting ‘recyclable’ labels\u003c/h3>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/oqeKXrEemls'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/oqeKXrEemls'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Let’s talk trash, California. This state has long fashioned itself as a “planet protector” — but in 2022 it’s taking it \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11898577/heres-how-california-plans-to-convert-food-waste-into-energy-and-reduce-harmful-emissions\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">to a new level\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two new laws aim to stop you from throwing food away in your regular garbage, and to stop products from carrying the \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/politics/2021/08/california-recycling-single-use-plastic/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">chasing-arrow recycling symbol\u003c/a> when they aren’t really recyclable.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Quicker mental health care follow-up\u003c/h3>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/dQ5Xi4gI17k'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/dQ5Xi4gI17k'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Even before the pandemic, Californians were increasingly \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/projects/california-mental-health-care-parity/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">concerned about mental health care\u003c/a>: Surveys showed people thought such care was \u003ca href=\"https://www.chcf.org/publication/2019-california-health-policy-survey/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">too hard to access\u003c/a>, and that they had to wait too long for it. The recent surge in demand brought on by the pandemic has made this even worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By law, health plans must offer initial mental health appointments within 10 business days. But some advocates say that’s not good enough if patients are then forced to wait weeks or months for follow-up care. This law aims to change that.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Cracking down on condom ‘stealthing’\u003c/h3>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/89eQyCon2yA'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/89eQyCon2yA'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Consent is paramount during any sexual act, and California law now gives victims of sexual battery more power to hold perpetrators accountable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This first-in-the-nation law \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11891525/california-first-state-to-make-nonconsensual-condom-removal-or-stealthing-a-civil-offense\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tightens the definition of sexual battery\u003c/a> to include nonconsensual condom removal — a practice colloquially known as “\u003ca href=\"https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2954726\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">stealthing.\u003c/a>”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Minimum wage for garment workers\u003c/h3>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/wiYbPEVKwXw'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/wiYbPEVKwXw'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>The people who shape and sew raw fabric into clothing \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/08/garment-manufacturers-los-angeles-california-bill-threatens-jobs/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">used to get paid by the amount they produced\u003c/a>. That system worked well for the fashion industry, but meant garment workers were getting paid as little as $3 per hour.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This year lawmakers ended that practice.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Restricting what police can do to control protests\u003c/h3>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/wfa_M3vfpBQ'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/wfa_M3vfpBQ'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>California is going to do more to protect protestors seeking police reform, and the reporters covering their demonstrations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both new laws come in response to chaotic scenes from protests in California and elsewhere following the murder of George Floyd in Minnesota.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"headTitle": "What the Recent Supreme Court Ruling in Favor of Police Officers Means for Qualified Immunity | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of police officers in two cases involving qualified immunity, the controversial legal doctrine that protects police officers accused of misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In both cases — one involving a police officer from Union City and the other three cops from Oklahoma — the officers have been accused of using excessive force when responding to domestic disturbances. In the case from Union City, officers used beanbag rounds and a knee on the suspect’s back to subdue him; in the second, officers shot and killed the suspect after he approached them while raising a hammer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both decisions \u003ca href=\"https://www.supremecourt.gov/orders/courtorders/101821zor_4f14.pdf\">the court issued Monday were unsigned\u003c/a>. No justices dissented.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Qualified immunity refers to a series of legal precedents that protect government officials — including police officers — accused of violating constitutional rights.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To win a civil suit against a police officer, complainants must show that the officer violated “clearly established law,” most often by pointing to factually similar previous cases. Otherwise, officers are protected from liability.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size='large' align='right']In practice, the doctrine has shielded officers from liability in hundreds of civil cases, even when accused of destroying property, killing innocent people they mistook for suspects or stealing thousands of dollars.[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Police advocates say that qualified immunity is necessary so that police officers can do their often-dangerous jobs without fear of frivolous lawsuits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But those in favor of criminal justice reform say the doctrine has essentially created a catch-22, where officers are shielded from liability even in cases where it appears they violated civil rights — yet because no identical previous case already exists, the officers are protected.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In practice, the doctrine has shielded officers from liability in hundreds of civil cases, even when accused of destroying property, killing innocent people they mistook for suspects or stealing thousands of dollars.\u003cbr>\n[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Overturning the lower courts\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>In November 2016, Daniel Rivas-Villegas, a police officer in Union City, responded to a 911 call from a 12-year-old girl who, along with her mother and 15-year-old sister, had barricaded herself inside a room to hide from her mother’s boyfriend, Ramon Cortesluna, who was reportedly using a chain saw to destroy things in the house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When officers arrived and confronted Cortesluna, they discovered he was carrying a knife. Another officer fired two nonlethal beanbag rounds at Cortesluna, after which he followed police orders to lie down. Rivas-Villegas knelt on Cortesluna’s back and held up his arms as another officer retrieved the knife. After the incident, Cortesluna sued over use of excessive force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found that Rivas-Villegas was not entitled to qualified immunity, citing similarities to a previous case called LaLonde v. the County of Riverside, in which two police officers were denied qualified immunity after kneeling on a facedown unresisting suspect named John LaLonde.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in reversing the appeals court’s decision, the Supreme Court said several other factors set the two incidents apart: The officers in LaLonde were responding to a noise complaint, not a domestic violence emergency; LaLonde was unarmed, while Cortesluna was carrying a knife; and Rivas-Villegas had knelt on Cortesluna for only eight seconds as officers retrieved the knife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label ='Related Coverage' tag='police-reform']In the second case, three police officers in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, responded to an emergency call from a woman whose ex-husband, Dominic Rollice, was drunk and refusing to leave her home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The officers confronted Rollice in the garage, where he grabbed a hammer. The officers drew their guns and yelled for Rollice to drop it. Instead, Rollice moved toward them and raised the hammer higher; two officers shot and killed him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A lower court found that the Tahlequah officers had violated Rollice’s Fourth Amendment rights when they “recklessly created the situation that led to the fatal shooting.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Supreme Court reversed the court’s decision, saying “not one” of the cases cited by the lower court “comes close to establishing that the officers’ conduct was unlawful.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>For progressive legislators, an uphill battle\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Clarence Thomas — among the court’s most liberal and most conservative members, respectively — previously have criticized qualified immunity, though neither issued a dissent Monday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Congressional Democrats have made multiple attempts in recent years to limit qualified immunity, though none has yet been successful. The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which passed the House, would have restricted the defense, but negotiations over a compromise bill petered out earlier this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“By shielding police officers from accountability, qualified immunity encourages more police violence against Black and Brown people,” said Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts, a co-sponsor of a stand-alone Senate bill that would end qualified immunity, on Twitter after Monday’s ruling.\u003cbr>\nhttps://twitter.com/SenMarkey/status/1450127109196816388\u003cbr>\n[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "On Monday, the Supreme Court sided with officers in two cases, one in the Bay Area and the other in Oklahoma. The justices agreed that these cops were entitled to qualified immunity.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of police officers in two cases involving qualified immunity, the controversial legal doctrine that protects police officers accused of misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In both cases — one involving a police officer from Union City and the other three cops from Oklahoma — the officers have been accused of using excessive force when responding to domestic disturbances. In the case from Union City, officers used beanbag rounds and a knee on the suspect’s back to subdue him; in the second, officers shot and killed the suspect after he approached them while raising a hammer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both decisions \u003ca href=\"https://www.supremecourt.gov/orders/courtorders/101821zor_4f14.pdf\">the court issued Monday were unsigned\u003c/a>. No justices dissented.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Qualified immunity refers to a series of legal precedents that protect government officials — including police officers — accused of violating constitutional rights.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To win a civil suit against a police officer, complainants must show that the officer violated “clearly established law,” most often by pointing to factually similar previous cases. Otherwise, officers are protected from liability.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Overturning the lower courts\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>In November 2016, Daniel Rivas-Villegas, a police officer in Union City, responded to a 911 call from a 12-year-old girl who, along with her mother and 15-year-old sister, had barricaded herself inside a room to hide from her mother’s boyfriend, Ramon Cortesluna, who was reportedly using a chain saw to destroy things in the house.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When officers arrived and confronted Cortesluna, they discovered he was carrying a knife. Another officer fired two nonlethal beanbag rounds at Cortesluna, after which he followed police orders to lie down. Rivas-Villegas knelt on Cortesluna’s back and held up his arms as another officer retrieved the knife. After the incident, Cortesluna sued over use of excessive force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found that Rivas-Villegas was not entitled to qualified immunity, citing similarities to a previous case called LaLonde v. the County of Riverside, in which two police officers were denied qualified immunity after kneeling on a facedown unresisting suspect named John LaLonde.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But in reversing the appeals court’s decision, the Supreme Court said several other factors set the two incidents apart: The officers in LaLonde were responding to a noise complaint, not a domestic violence emergency; LaLonde was unarmed, while Cortesluna was carrying a knife; and Rivas-Villegas had knelt on Cortesluna for only eight seconds as officers retrieved the knife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In the second case, three police officers in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, responded to an emergency call from a woman whose ex-husband, Dominic Rollice, was drunk and refusing to leave her home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The officers confronted Rollice in the garage, where he grabbed a hammer. The officers drew their guns and yelled for Rollice to drop it. Instead, Rollice moved toward them and raised the hammer higher; two officers shot and killed him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A lower court found that the Tahlequah officers had violated Rollice’s Fourth Amendment rights when they “recklessly created the situation that led to the fatal shooting.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Supreme Court reversed the court’s decision, saying “not one” of the cases cited by the lower court “comes close to establishing that the officers’ conduct was unlawful.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>\u003cstrong>For progressive legislators, an uphill battle\u003c/strong>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Clarence Thomas — among the court’s most liberal and most conservative members, respectively — previously have criticized qualified immunity, though neither issued a dissent Monday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Congressional Democrats have made multiple attempts in recent years to limit qualified immunity, though none has yet been successful. The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which passed the House, would have restricted the defense, but negotiations over a compromise bill petered out earlier this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“By shielding police officers from accountability, qualified immunity encourages more police violence against Black and Brown people,” said Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts, a co-sponsor of a stand-alone Senate bill that would end qualified immunity, on Twitter after Monday’s ruling.\u003cbr>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
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"soldout": {
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