San Diego Leaders Discuss The Future Of Policing

Speaker 1: 00:01 This is KPBS mid day edition. I'm Maureen Kavanaugh with Mark Sauer for the first time an on-duty San Diego law enforcement officer has been arraigned on charges of murder in connection with an officer involved shooting former San Diego County Sheriff's deputy Aaron Russell faces. Second degree murder charges for the shooting death of Nicholas bills. Last may. The district attorney's office says Bill's escape custody and was running away at the time of the shooting. Aaron Russell was arraigned in superior court this morning. He pleaded not guilty. Here's deputy district attorney Steven market. Speaker 2: 00:37 The defendant fired five rounds when they're close to Bill's, who's running not toward, but away from the officers on scene. No other officer on scene, as much as unholstered a firearm to stop Phil's from running those officers either assess the situation called for backup and or pursued Nicholas bills on foot Speaker 1: 00:56 And it's complaint. The district attorney cited a law that went into effect in January authored by San Diego assembly woman, Shirley Webber that allows police to use lethal force only when necessary to defend against an imminent threat of death or serious injury to officers or bystanders. Russell's bail was reduced to half a million dollars. He will be back in court on July 24th. Speaker 3: 01:20 These charges against a white former Sheriff's deputy for killing an unarmed white suspect. Come as demonstrators in San Diego and across the nation call for police reform in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd, a black man in Minneapolis in recent weeks, the San Diego police department took action. It banned the controversial carotid restraint neck hold, and more recently it introduced a standalone deescalation policy as well as a new requirement that police officers intervene. When a fellow officer uses excessive force, San Diego voters will weigh in on a ballot measure this fall to grade an independent panel that would investigate officer misconduct, but can these policies create the change that some in the community are looking for? And where does the movement to change policing? Go from here, we'll explore those questions and a special broadcast of KPBS and the national conflict resolution centers, community conversation on the future of policing in San Diego, San Diego city, council, woman, Monica, Montgomery, Khalida, Alexander founder, and president of pillars of the community, a social justice organization, and detective Jack Schafer, president of the San Diego police officers association. The union that represents officers within the San Diego police department joined the conversation led by KPBS investigative reporter, Claire Traeger, sir. Speaker 1: 02:44 So I wanted to start with a question for all of you. There have been some recent attempts at reforming the San Diego police department. Um, as I mentioned for each of you say, whether those changes are enough and if not, Speaker 4: 03:00 What is another specific change you think should be made? And we can start with you council, woman. Speaker 5: 03:06 Um, thank you for the question, Claire. Um, I know, I don't think that they are enough. I think that we are making progress. And when I say, I don't think there are enough, that's not to say that I'm, um, I am happy about the progress that we may, but we have so much time to make up for, we have to, um, exhibit a cultural change within the department within the city and, you know, we cannot be stagnant with this type of movement. So I would say, no, I acknowledge the progress, but I would say we definitely have a lot more to do. Speaker 4: 03:43 Is there a specific thing that, that you would like to see changed going forward? Speaker 5: 03:49 Uh, quite a few. Um, we'll be looking at, um, a surveillance ordinance on Wednesday at the public safety livable neighborhoods committee in the fall. We're going to take up, um, uh, another, uh, ordinance that has to do with how we control, um, the stops that are heading and, uh, contacts, how we be do those, um, well while keeping the public safe. And so there are quite a few things, but I think overall, um, this is my work is to change policy, but also to, uh, change hearts, to change minds, to change how we interact with each other. Just generally speaking, I can put all the policies in the world, uh, on paper and we can get them passed. But if, uh, interactions do not change, it really doesn't matter if we reward the same behavior, even though those policies are there, then it won't matter. So it's, we need to do all of those things. Speaker 4: 04:42 How about you, um, mr. Alexander, are there, have there reforms been enough and if not, what's a specific thing that you would want to change going forward? Speaker 6: 04:51 Absolutely not. I mean, in fact, the so-called reforms, if you actually read them, don't sound much like reforms to me at all. Um, if anything, it sounds like, um, a statement saying that they're already doing things correctly. They'll continue to do things correctly. And then it's filled with a bunch of legal jargon that can be used as loopholes for, uh, almost like a blueprint for police to be able to explain why they did what they did without getting in trouble. So they said, you know, uh, reforms that they're talking about about DSG, supposedly deescalation policies, um, and, um, encouraging police to turn on one another when they do, uh, when they violate people's rights, um, you know, is, is, is, is, you know, doesn't even approach lip service for me. Um, if I was going to say that, you know, what needs to be done, I mean, first of all, there needs to be an acknowledgement that racial profiling even exists. Speaker 6: 05:48 Like I don't think up until now, uh, the police chief, um, or, you know, some or Stephens or any of kind of law enforcement representatives have come out and acknowledge that racial profiling exists. This is despite, you know, the overwhelming feeling from the community, as well as a San Diego state university report, uh, ACL documentation, uh, tons of documentation. And so unless we can begin to have a, a shared foundation to have the conversation, I'm not sure, uh, what type of reforms they seen having. And then the last thing that I'll say is even the conversation around reforms needs to change. So for example, um, NCRC mentioned kind of their attempts to create an environment that's helps navigate through cultural differences. We're not talking about cultural drift differences here. When we talk about racial profiling, when we talk about the abuse of everyday people walking down the street by law enforcement, that's not a cultural difference. Speaker 6: 06:45 Um, if, if, if people in LA Jolla, if people in largely white and affluent communities were treated the same way that community members in Southeast San Diego were treated treated, um, I don't think anybody would dismiss it as a cultural difference. Nobody likes being molested by police. Nobody likes being misspoken to by police. Nobody likes being disrespected by police. Nobody likes being hassled by police. So it's not a cultural conversation it's that there has to be a stop to the culture of law enforcement to take advantage of and disrespect black and Brown people in our communities. Speaker 4: 07:16 Mr. Shaffer, I don't know. Do you want to first just start by saying, if you feel like these changes have been enough, and if there are changes that you see that you want to be made or that the police officers you represent want to be made Speaker 6: 07:31 Well, um, I don't think it's ever really enough. I think if we're not striving to get better, um, you know, we're, we're going to end up falling behind. So, um, I agree with what both the previous speakers, um, that we need to look at things, look at things that can actually work, um, try to implement the things that have been, um, successful in other places. Um, but you know, my, my opinion is, um, that if we're not always trying to find a better way to do things, um, that we'll be stuck back in 1950s and we don't want to be there. You know what I mean? So, um, I feel I'm fortunate that to be a member of the San Diego police department, cause we have been pretty progressive and doing a lot of things, probably leading the country in a lot of things, but that doesn't mean that we're, um, by any means perfect. And, and we do have a lot of work to do. Um, and I think having some of these discussions, um, can lead to some of those, um, revelations that might lead to maybe the next best way of doing things. Speaker 4: 08:27 Is there a specific thing that you think of that, you know, you would like to see changed? Speaker 6: 08:32 Yeah. I can't think of one thing off the top of my head, but I haven't heard a lot of really good ideas from community members and others weeks. Speaker 4: 08:39 Councilman Montgomery, the move to defund policing is continuing to spread across the country. And recently you were criticized by some community members for voting in favor of a city budget that did not include a hundred million dollar cut to police funding, but you've asked for an independent analysis of police funding. So what specifically do you think could be cut from the police budget? And do you think you could get those cuts passed by the council and the mayor? Speaker 5: 09:06 Um, Claire, that's exactly why I asked for that deep dive into the police budget, which is something that the city has not done. Um, and so I believe in diverting, um, the Alec V allocating resources, uh, to, to further causes that really keep us that keep us safe. I do believe in the law enforcement component, um, in exactly the way that it serves now. Um, but I also believe that we do spend too much on this type of public safety. And I think there are so many other mechanisms that can keep us safe. I had a, I have a constituent that is having some issues in our neighborhood, but she doesn't want her son to be profiled. So she doesn't want to call the police. And so we have community members that can step in in situations like that that will keep everyone safe. Um, and so those are the types of things we're looking into developing the plan for that, um, asked for the deep dive into the police department, because really I still don't know where everything goes. And in order for me to make the decisions, the thoughtful decisions that I think my community deserves, I need to have that information on top of that. Uh, council did recently, um, when we passed the appropriations order, this, we did set aside about $29 million to be reviewed at the mid year. Um, and so that gives us an opportunity and some time, um, to, to get the information that we need so we can have an impactful, um, make an impactful decision. Speaker 4: 10:38 Mr. Alexander, I know you and other activists have called for abolishing the police department entirely, fully and starting over hiring new officers with new policies. So when smaller cuts to the department, um, would that satisfy you? Speaker 6: 10:54 It wouldn't satisfy me, but it would be a nice appetizer. I mean, I'm not at all opposed to reform on the road towards abolition. Um, if you look at the amount of money that the police are getting, I think it's San Diego city alone is something close to $600 million. Um, I have no problem with taking some of that $600 million and putting it into programs that will actually, um, work towards preventing crime as opposed to putting it into a police department whose basically sole responsibility is reacting to crime. So unless we take a more proactive approach by investing into communities, um, you know, I don't think we'll ever get to the area of abolition. And I think the more that we invest, um, in communities, the less crime we'll have and the less crime we have, the less, the majority of people will see, um, a need or a use for police officers. Speaker 4: 11:42 Mr. Schaefer, the analysis that we referenced at the start of this, um, that I did, uh, was a local police department records. And it showed that police when use force on a suspect, if the suspect is a person of color, they're more likely to shoot than if the suspect is white. How would you explain this disparity? Speaker 7: 12:04 Well, it's pretty complex, but, um, mostly, um, uses of force are not dictated. Usually by the officers are dictated by the person that's, that's being contacted with the subject. Um, we react to whatever is done in front of us. Um, and I think that, um, you know, I think they mentioned it earlier, but it's pretty rare that any ports at all is used, um, especially using a firearm, um, especially, you know, when you compare it to how many contacts we have per year of people. Um, but again, you know, the officers can only react to whatever's put in front of them. Um, everybody, you know, we have the, uh, we give commands, we tell people what to do to, to not make us need to use force. Um, but sometimes they don't do that. And then we have to do what we need to do to, to affect an arrest or do whatever else we needed to do. Speaker 4: 12:52 Council member Montgomery. Does that explanation satisfy you? Speaker 5: 12:57 Here's what I know. I know that officers, uh, tell me, uh, that they are told to treat people that are in, uh, North of the different than South of VA. That's, that's what I know. And those are for people who are on the ground. And so it goes back to what I said, which is how do we interact with each other? We live in America, the, you know, law enforcement started off as slave patrol. So when, uh, mr. Alexander talks about an acknowledgement of racism, this is what we are talking about, that, you know, people of color are treated differently, even when those commands are made. Um, even when there is, um, you know, a behavior shift in the contact, you know, I am not satisfied with it. Um, Jack and I have had these conversations, I've seen it, I lived it. And I also been told by officers that this is what goes on on the inside. So I think that, that, that definitely needs to change that everyone should be treated the same. And that's, you know, again, we have 400, 400 years to make up for, and we have, um, a foundation of our law enforcement that is rooted in that type of racism. And so we do have to talk about that, um, for sure. And there needs to be an admission of that Speaker 4: 14:21 When you have those conversations, is it about, is it a training issue? Is it, what, what are the things that, that you're looking for, or to address that disparity? Speaker 5: 14:34 I am looking for resolution and understand understanding the training. I'm never going to say we don't need training, but this is a, this really is a matter of the heart and the way we see each other, when we do talk about like a place like Camden, who dismantled their, uh, department and built it back up over a period of time, um, probably what they were doing when they were building it back up as assessing these types of things, these types of bias, um, uh, biases. And so we, um, we do need to do that. I don't, I don't know, it's, it's really deep, so I don't know if just training will, uh, we'll fall back, you know? Um, so mr. Alexander, are there things that, that you would be looking for specifically? Speaker 6: 15:17 Well, I mean, with all due respect to Jack, I mean, just the language that he's saying to, to put the onus on the victim of police violence, that, that violence that has been perpetrated against them, um, is somehow this, their fault is again, is, is exactly why there's such a disconnect between the community itself and, and police officers, somebody with a gun, somebody with taser, somebody with pepper spray, somebody who has absolute power to do whatever they want to, to you. That's the person who needs to be held accountable, uh, for the violence, not the person who the violence is being perpetrated against. And I think it's just an example that, you know, the police aren't interested in form in reform. What they're interested in is, um, the freedom to act with impunity, to be able to do whatever they want to, to our community members and have nobody questioned it. Speaker 6: 16:05 Um, you know, uh, the, the, the, the misnomer of police unions or the fact that you have police unions, whose job is to represent, uh, uh, police officers and, and to fight for police officers who molest people in searches, who abused people, physically who abused people, mentally, who abused people verbally, and their job is to advocate for them to stay in the police department, um, is a perfect example of, of, of how severe and how prop, how problematic the entire system is. And so that's when people like me and other people look at the police department, we say, look, how can we even begin to have a conversation if our humanity and our, uh, ability to say, Hey, we're being victimized here. Isn't even recognized by the people who are perpetrating that violence. Speaker 5: 16:50 Shaffer. Do you want to respond to that? Speaker 6: 16:51 I think that, um, the issue is I, and I, and I've heard the narrative basically that the unions are bad because we're trying to protect people. Um, and I don't see it really, as I think I, people like me and, and unions can actually be part of the solution and that we're, you know, nobody wants to get rid of, um, people that aren't doing the right thing more than people that are doing the right thing, right. As far as police officers. Um, but you know, our, our job is just to make sure that they have due process just like anybody else. It doesn't mean that we're trying to save them on the job. Um, it's very different. Um, um, the reality is very different than that. Um, I have a job to do, and, uh, but all it is is to make sure that just like any American that people would get their due process. Um, but, but that said, I think that when there is, uh, a problem officer, um, they need to be dealt with absolutely. Speaker 5: 17:38 But what do you think about the, the idea of, you know, asking police to recognize and sort of apologize for, you know, some of the racial Speaker 4: 17:50 That we've seen in the past as a way to build trust with the community going forward? Speaker 7: 17:55 I don't think I know enough about, um, that whole picture to really respond to it. Well, I'm not sure about apologizing and all that. Speaker 4: 18:06 Some police officers have said they didn't sign up to be social workers or mental health professionals. So are there some responsibilities that could be shifted to other city workers who may be better equipped to handle those tasks? Speaker 7: 18:17 Gosh, for at least four years. Um, but that we get a lot of stuff as police officers get a lot of stuff thrown on our laps, um, things that aren't necessarily what we're, um, best at. Um, and part of that is like, there's just been a huge, um, you know, homelessness problem, mental health problems within San Diego, um, that there are probably other people that could probably do as good or better of a job. Um, now of course, you know, they need to be safe also. So there's probably a law enforcement element to it, but it seems like whenever there's something going on in society, it always ends up giving, you know, being given to the police officers. And I think some of that should be diverted, um, you know, to, to people that might be like in social workers or clinicians and things like that for, for special issues. Speaker 4: 19:02 What do you think could happen? It seems like there's such a vast gap between, um, people, activists, people on the ground and the police department. Are there, are there things that we can do to try and repair that? Speaker 5: 19:19 Yeah. I think this, this community conversation is a start, but again, it goes back to the core. This is, um, when there is not an admission that not, we're not even dealing with individual racism yet. We're not even dealing with that, but when there is not an admission of, um, a structure being a part of a racist system and perpetuating that system, then it's hard to start anywhere. Um, whenever we are trying to repair relationships, you can go from your own life one-on-one relationships. There always has to be an admission of wrongdoing. There always has to be that. And if it's not there, then we don't have anywhere to really start. So I'm gonna continue to do what I do at the city and push, push these reforms, um, and push these conversations and get more understanding around it. Just knowing that that's the starting point right there, because everything builds off of that understanding. And if that understanding is not there, then what we build on it, as far as Speaker 4: 20:23 Mr. Alexander pillars of the community is part of a coalition that's pushing to end pretext stops and consent searches. Can you explain what those are and why you feel like those should be banned? Speaker 7: 20:36 Yeah. I mean, a Jack Shaffer might be able to give a better definition of what peak textual startups are because police are very sophisticated in using them as a reason for pulling police over people over and Speaker 6: 20:48 Harassing them. My understanding is, uh, you know, uh, black people are, I think it's up to three times more likely to be pulled over by pretextual stops. So that's for example, saying, Oh, you didn't change lanes or you didn't, uh, you have, uh, a light out in the back. Um, and then in the process of that stop, what they do is they try to become more intrusive, um, into the individual's personal life. They'll ask to search the car, they'll ask where you're going. They'll ask a number of different questions, um, which, uh, you know, the majority of times, uh, w which African Americans are less likely to actually have a crime, um, that has actually been committed from those pretextual stops. So, yeah, I mean, one of our demands is all pretextual stops immediately in, uh, the district attorney of San Francisco. He's gone so far as to say, Hey, when we look at the numbers that show that black people are pulled over and harassed by police pretextual stops more than, than anybody else, more than white people, more than others. Speaker 6: 21:43 And then Latinos are also, uh, being, being targeted by these things. You can't look at those systems and not say that it's racist and because of its racist, he said that I'm not going to prosecute crime things that were found based off of a pretextual stop. Um, because unless from the top up, unless we have district attorneys that refuse to prosecute people that are based off of racist, uh, practices, um, it's going to continue to be, uh, an issue. So for us protects fuel stops mean coming up with an excuse to pull people over and harass them. Uh, Jack was a part of a notorious. Uh, my understanding was a part of the, kind of a notorious, uh, department of the police, the gang suppression unit gang suppression unit are the ones who are most kind of subject to that things where they pull people over and then they ask them, are you a documented gang member? Speaker 6: 22:27 Are you a gang member? Do you have any tattoos? Um, so the reason for being pulled over in the first place, although you can come, it's kind of like let's make up an excuse to pull them over and then use that to be intrusive into a kind of, uh, violate them and, and, uh, uh, target them as, as, as, as minorities. And the reason they're able to get away with that is because there's no accountability. There's no accountability from the district attorney. There's no accountability from elected officials. There's no accountability from, from the community. So, uh, ceasing pretextual stops would be a good way to move towards and admitting that, uh, racial profiling and racism exists apologizing for the harm has done. Those are both good steps towards, uh, creating an environment where a dialogue can begin until those things happen. How can, how can we even have a conversation when Jack says he doesn't have enough information to apologize for the racist policies and practices of the police, Speaker 4: 23:21 Mr. Shaver, do you want to, is that an accurate description of, of what those stops are or how do you want to respond to that? Speaker 6: 23:30 Well, I mean, that's an accurate description of the perception of some people in the public. It's not accurate as far as factually, what pretext stop is a pretext stop would be finding probable cause somebody does wrong in a vehicle. Speaker 7: 23:47 Um, maybe that vehicle matches the description of something like a violent crime, and you find out who's in the vehicle besides stopping them. You know, when I was working as a detective in the, in the gang unit is, um, mr. Alexander, uh, mentioned, um, you know, part of what we did was we would get a violent crime and we'd have a suspect description. Um, if somebody made a stop, um, it's seems to be prudent as a police officer that you'd want to find out if that, if that car or that, or the people inside it, um, match the description of a, of a violent crime. That's how a lot of crimes gets get to get, uh, solved. Um, you know, San Diego police department solves about 90% of our murders. You compare that to most big cities. Um, and you know, some of the big cities in America are solving about 20%, 25% of their, of their murders. Um, but that means there's a lot of people who are very violent out on the street that probably shouldn't be in the end. And, uh, you know, perhaps, you know, that probably makes a lot of, a lot of people, a lot safer. Speaker 5: 24:45 It sounds like that's not something you'd be willing to, to stop doing. Speaker 7: 24:50 Let's be clear because a lot of times people mix it up with racial profiling. Okay, it's stopping. I had a, you know, I'm part of the cab cab commission, and I have people talking about it, like it was stopping somebody for being a race, you know, stopping somebody from being black. That's not a pretext stop that's racism. Um, if that is happening, that shouldn't be happening. And that, that needs to be taken care of, um, and handled. But, uh, but a pretext stop has very little, the only thing that race has to do with the pretext stop is this is a description of a, you know, of a crime. Speaker 5: 25:22 I wanted to read a quote from the former New Jersey police chief. And he was quoted as saying within a police department, culture eats policy for breakfast. You can have a perfectly worded policy, but it's meaningless if it just exists on paper. So this is a question for all of you, and we can start with you again, uh, council member Montgomery, how do we begin to change attitudes and culture within the department, uh, specifically around use of force? So I, I agree with that quote, I think I've said it in one way or the other while we've just been in this conversation. Um, I do want to go back and say this though, in every area, in, in, uh, city politics, we, um, use the data to make our decisions and that's never questioned, but when it comes to this particular subject, the data is, is question. Speaker 5: 26:16 So when the data tells us that black and Brown people are more likely to be stopped, but less likely to have contraband in their white counterparts that tells us that there is racial profiling going on, and many of those stuff were pretext stops. So, you know, we, there again, there, there's a big gap in what we are defining as racist and what is not. We know that it is a very hard to prove intent and the way policies are written allow for a lot of work arounds, um, an explanation from officers that kind of get them off the hook when it comes to these stops. So, um, we, again, it's a, it's a culture change. It's a culture shift. It does have to start from the top, um, because we are so conditioned oftentimes, and we don't even realize that we are stopping someone because they're a person of color we've been conditioned to believe we should be, uh, in our education in this country or on TV or whatever it is that, uh, black people commit crimes. So if you stop at a black person more than likely they're guilty. So that's in our, you know, our minds and we have to work to, to, uh, get ourselves away from that conditioning. And so if there's, no, again, it goes back to this. If there's no admission there that we start from there. Um, and then it's really, really hard to change a culture, and that has to start from the top. And there has to be that admission from the top. Speaker 4: 27:45 Mr. Alexander, did you want to say anything about changing attitudes, changing culture, um, uh, specific specifically around use of force? Speaker 6: 27:55 Yeah. I mean, the only thing that I would say, and I know it sounds like I'm beating up on Jack, but you know, um, it's not, it's not Jack fault or anything. I mean, that's his job. His job is to defend the police no matter what. Um, and if, if, if that wasn't his job, then perhaps they could be the ones who were finding the bad apples in the bunch and, and removing them. But I don't expect that to happen because that's not in the job description, but if we're going to talk about stops, if we're going to talk about violence against people, if we're going to talk about kind of, how can we change that culture? I think there's really, there's two, two, two ways of doing that. One is we have to address the racism that, uh, Councilwoman Montgomery did a very good job at, um, breaking down and explaining. Speaker 6: 28:36 That's a long process. It takes a long time to get rid of the preconceived notions in our minds that black people are dangerous, that black people are criminals, um, that black people are gang members that black people deserve to be pulled over because you know, more than likely they're guilty of something that's going to take a long time. Um, but the second reason why these things are able to happen is because they can get away with it. And, and that's not necessarily their fault either. Like if they've been trained to do something, if they've been trained to pull people over in a certain area, if they've been trained to pull people over who match a description, if they've been trained to do all the things, that's not necessarily their fault. So we have to begin to look to see, well, who are the people who allow these things to happen? Speaker 6: 29:17 Who are the people who, despite the communities cries of racial profiling, despite the statistics and the studies that, that say, uh, racial profiling exists, um, despite all of those things have yet to actually be able to stop in and reign in the police departments, that they, they are the ones who fund. So when, when I say that the elected officials fund police departments, that's also kind of disingenuous. It's my money, it's our tax paying money. It's the money from overtime that police are doing for policing our neighborhoods without living in our neighborhoods. It's the money, uh, that, that, that I'm paying. That's going to fund the oppression that's happening on the people that I love and that I care about. Um, and so we have to begin to talk about accountability. Um, the measures that we talked about that the, the police, uh, came out with recently, um, there's nothing in there about accountability. Speaker 6: 30:07 Uh, there's nothing in there about, okay, well, when this doesn't happen, what is going, what are the consequences going to be? So there need to be consequences for bad policing. There need to be consequences for a lack of customer service, for lack of a better idea. If someone from Starbucks or someone from subway, uh, were to treat me the way that the police officers treat, uh, people every day in Southeast San Diego, that there would be so many complaints and that person would be fired immediately. But because we have unions because we have people who, uh, fight strongly, um, for police to be able to act with impunity, it's very difficult to hold them accountable, but that has to change that culture of not holding police accountable has to change. And so accountability, I think, is the number one thing to do in order to stop that Speaker 1: 30:52 That was colored Alexander of pillars of the community. We also heard from San Diego city council member, Monica, Montgomery, and police union leader, Jack Schafer speaking as part of a community conversation project from KPBS and the national conflict resolution center KPBS invited the San Diego police department to be part of this conversation. But a department spokesman declined our invitation.