A proposed audit of the San Diego Police Department should be wide-ranging and could take 18 months to complete, interim San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria said Thursday.
Police Chief William Lansdowne said Thursday on KPBS Midday Edition he wants an audit of his agency in the wake of new allegations of sexual impropriety by two officers.
Christopher Hays, 30, pleaded not guilty on Tuesday to a pair of felony false imprisonment counts and three misdemeanor sexual battery allegations.
Hays, who has resigned, faces up to three years and eight months in prison if convicted.
A woman alleges a second officer, whose name has not been released because he hasn't been charged, groped her and exposed himself, Lansdowne said.
He said the woman at first thought it was Hays, but a subsequent investigation discovered that it was another officer who patrols South Bay neighborhoods.
At his weekly media briefing, Gloria said the proposed audit will go to the City Council for authorization. Council members will want to evaluate the various options and costs before selecting an auditor, he said.
"This audit will be thorough, it will be substantial and it will be transparent," Gloria said. "This, of course, will come at some cost. No matter the cost, there is no price too high to pay to ensure the public's trust in our police department."
The interim mayor, who will be succeeded by Mayor-elect Kevin Faulconer on March 3, reiterated that the SDPD has more than 1,700 "dedicated, hard-working men and women who care deeply about our city," and only a few bad apples.
He said he wants the officers to know he stands behind them as long as they follow the law. He said he strongly supports Lansdowne as chief.
The audit will show if the actions of the two police officers demonstrates a "systemic" problem in the SDPD, which suffers from chronic under-staffing, Gloria said.
The recent allegations come a couple of years after another officer, Anthony Arevalos, was convicted of demanding sexual favors from female drunken driving suspects he pulled over in the Gaslamp Quarter. Arevalos is now behind bars, and the city has been coughing up hundreds of thousands of dollars to his victims to settle civil lawsuits.
Lansdowne announced a policy change Wednesday that will require two officers to take women to jail.
