Tag Archives: Police Commission Use of Force Subcommittee

Brown Act Pragmatics, Los Angeles County Government

Prosecutor Sean Hassett — Who Is Such A Bumbling Doofus That He Was Publicly Rebuked In 2016 By Judge Kathleen Kennedy — Who Accused Him On The Record Of Metaphorically “Tripping Over His Feet And Falling On His Face” — Is Putatively Progressive Prosecutor George Gascón’s Choice To Head The Public Integrity Unit — Where He Continues His Dangerous Bumbling — By Mishandling A Brown Act Complaint Vs. The City Of Los Angeles — Contrary To His Division’s Policy Manual He Seems To Have Passed It Along To Mike Feuer’s Office For “Review And Comment” — Which Is Like Letting The Accused Control The Investigation — Not Due Process In Any Way — At Least In This Narrow Sense Gascón Is No Better Than Lacey

June 8, 2021 Mike Leave a comment

The Los Angeles County District Attorney‘s Public Integrity Division is responsible for, among other things, investigating and prosecuting complaints from the public about Brown Act violations. The procedure for doing so is found in Chapter 5 of the Division Manual. This office did a really terrible job under Jackie Lacey which — as you can imagine — is no surprise. People who won’t prosecute actual killers just because they’re cops can’t really be expected to care about protecting the rule of law.

But, sadly, it turns out that things aren’t better under putatively progressive prosecutor George Gascón and Sean Hassett, Gascón’s choice to head up the PID. Hassett, whose moronic blundering performance in a recent corruption case was so incredibly, blindingly, idiotically, amateurish that Judge Kathleen Kennedy publicly rebuked him, stating that he was “just tripping over [his] feet and falling on [his face].” And this is a reasonably accurate description of the incredibly messed-up manner in which Hassett is handling my recent complaint about the Police Commission’s Brown Act violations in relation to their Use of Force Committee.
Continue reading Prosecutor Sean Hassett — Who Is Such A Bumbling Doofus That He Was Publicly Rebuked In 2016 By Judge Kathleen Kennedy — Who Accused Him On The Record Of Metaphorically “Tripping Over His Feet And Falling On His Face” — Is Putatively Progressive Prosecutor George Gascón’s Choice To Head The Public Integrity Unit — Where He Continues His Dangerous Bumbling — By Mishandling A Brown Act Complaint Vs. The City Of Los Angeles — Contrary To His Division’s Policy Manual He Seems To Have Passed It Along To Mike Feuer’s Office For “Review And Comment” — Which Is Like Letting The Accused Control The Investigation — Not Due Process In Any Way — At Least In This Narrow Sense Gascón Is No Better Than Lacey →

Brown Act Pragmatics, LAPD

The Los Angeles Police Commission Has A Use Of Force Committee — Which Meets In Secret — Which Is Against The Law Since It’s Pretty Clearly Subject To The Brown Act — So Today I Sent A Complaint To The Public Integrity Division Of The Los Angeles County District Attorney — Which Meant Essentially Nothing When Jackie Lacey Was In Charge — But Conceivably Things Are Different Now — Maybe?

April 21, 2021 Mike Leave a comment

This post is about a complaint I sent to the Public Integrity Division of the Los Angeles County District Attorney alleging that the Use of Force Committee of the Los Angeles City Police Commission violates the Brown Act by meeting in secret. If you want a copy of the complaint without having to wade through my nonsense, here it is!

The Los Angeles Police Commission does not hold its meetings in a public-friendly manner. They severely limit comment time, for instance, and they also, at least pre-COVID, regularly have members of the public arrested. But as bad as they are they mostly don’t violate the Brown Act while doing it.¹

However, it turns out that they have a bunch of committees, and it really looks like at least one of them, the Use of Force Committee, is itself subject to the Brown Act. But it meets in secret, and has done at least since 2011. This is against the law, of course, so today I sent this complaint about it to the Public Integrity Division of the LA County District Attorney’s Office.

Under Jackie Lacey these Public Integrity jokers didn’t do much,² but perhaps things are different now? I guess we’ll find out! Read on for an html version of the complaint, although you’ll have to look at the PDF to see the evidence.
Continue reading The Los Angeles Police Commission Has A Use Of Force Committee — Which Meets In Secret — Which Is Against The Law Since It’s Pretty Clearly Subject To The Brown Act — So Today I Sent A Complaint To The Public Integrity Division Of The Los Angeles County District Attorney — Which Meant Essentially Nothing When Jackie Lacey Was In Charge — But Conceivably Things Are Different Now — Maybe? →

LAPD

LAPPL and LAPD have been negotiating a revision of the department’s use of force policy as applied to police dog bites in secret at least since November 2020 — Police Commissioners are involved in the discussions via the LAPC’s Use of Force Subcommittee — which does not meet in public — and is only one of multiple secret subcommittees — none of which comply with the Brown act — used by the Commission to evade public oversight

April 12, 2021 Mike Leave a comment

LAPD, often acting through the Los Angeles Police Protective League, warps just about every aspect of municipal politics to serve its own twisted ends. They’re famous for their blackmail files on local politicians and all sorts of other intimidation tactics in order to strongarm them into supporting every aspect of the cop-first agenda. But it turns out that I had no idea of how deeply the LAPPL has insinuated itself into the terms and conditions of policing in this City until I read this October 2020 memo from LAPD sergeant Joseph Fransen to Chief Bea Girmala.

The context is a meet-and-confer process involving LAPPL and LAPD brass about when police dog bites are counted as a “use of force.” This is an official label, and its application has consequences for the officer. Per Fransen “the LAPPL views something being a use of force as de facto ‘bad'” and therefore they want it made harder to rule that a police dog bite counts as such.³ A November 6, 2020 update, part of the same memo linked to above, reveals that Girmala recommended that LAPD partially address LAPPL’s concerns.

The proposal was discussed by the Police Commission’s Use of Force Subcommittee on November 10, 2020 and again on March 9, 2021. As far as I can see it has not yet been considered by the full Commission.⁴ In other words, LAPPL, high-ranking LAPD officers, the Inspector General, and two members of the Police Commission have spent more than six months holding secret discussions of the rules under which police dog handlers operate.
Continue reading LAPPL and LAPD have been negotiating a revision of the department’s use of force policy as applied to police dog bites in secret at least since November 2020 — Police Commissioners are involved in the discussions via the LAPC’s Use of Force Subcommittee — which does not meet in public — and is only one of multiple secret subcommittees — none of which comply with the Brown act — used by the Commission to evade public oversight →