Police Video Shows One Officer Fatally Shooting El Cerrito Man While Partner Uses Taser And More Local News

Speaker 1: 00:00 It's Thursday, October 10th I'm Deb Welsh and you're listening to San Diego news matters from KPBS coming up. We now know what happened during an officer involved shooting in August and his Turkish forces attack Kurds in Northern Syria. The Kurdish community of San Diego is gripped with fear and outrage. Speaker 2: 00:19 I'm being glued to the news hub for glimmer of good news, so haven't been at work even even when I'm at work. I'm up myself Speaker 1: 00:25 that more coming up right after the break. Speaker 1: 00:33 Thank you for joining us for San Diego news matters. I'm Deb Welsh, newly released body camera video shows what happened during an officer involved shooting by San Diego police in August. As KPBS reporter Claire triggers or explains the video shows an officer shooting and killing a man who's charging at him with a shovel. A warning. The story includes sound of the shooting and may be disturbing. The aunt. A 52 year old Dennis Carolino called nine one one to say he was having a mental health crisis and had thrown a brick at her. Officers arrived at her home and body camera footage shows them telling the aunt a clinician would, the psychiatric emergency response team will come help, but the officers did not wait for the psychiatric team to arrive before encountering Carolino. They walked to the side of the house and shine a flashlight on the room. Caroline knows aren't says he's in. Speaker 3: 01:29 Let me see your hands. Let me see your hands. Drop it. Drop it. Speaker 1: 01:33 KPBS confirmed that the officers called for the psychiatric team, but the team had not yet arrived when the shooting happened. A police spokesman says, even if the team had arrived, department policy forbids them from being the first to speak to Carolino. Claire Tyga, sir KPBS news 30,000 San Diego gas and electric customers could temporarily lose power this week. KPBS science and technology reporter Shalina Chet Lonnie says it's part of the utilities efforts to prevent wildfires as hot winds flow across the region. Speaker 4: 02:06 The national weather service has already issued a red flag. Warning for many parts of San Diego, including rural East County. Brian D'Agostino, the director of fire science for SDG, and he says, the team is expecting to see the highest risks on Friday. Speaker 2: 02:21 After that, we'll have to do an assessment if we do experience any power outages, so we certainly would like to be prepared and folks to be prepared into the day. Saturday. Speaker 4: 02:32 D'Agostino says, utility officials consider these hot Santa Ana winds to be a moderate event and the company doesn't know exactly how many people are going to experience a power outage. D'Agostino says it could be more or less than that. Thousands of people notified depending on conditions in a chat. KPBS news, there's Speaker 1: 02:50 an update in the case of Earl McNeil. He died in police custody after a prolonged encounter with law enforcement in may of 2018 KPBS reporter Prius Schreder has the story. The San Diego County citizens law enforcement review board voted to sustain a finding that a San Diego Sheriff's deputy violated the department's use of force policy during the arrest of Earl McNeil. McNeil died in the hospital 16 days after the encounter. Investigators found a deputy improperly placed a shirt over McNeil's face that may have contributed to his death. The district attorney's office cleared all officers and deputies from criminal liability. McNeil's family is suing officers involved in the death. Prius are either K PBS news. The city of San Diego and SDSU are at loggerheads over how much the city's mission Valley's stadium property is worth. KPBS Metro reporter Andrew Bowen says this comes after a draft appraisal was released. Tuesday, Speaker 5: 03:51 the appraisal values decide at just over $68 million. That includes about 18 million in discounts for tearing down the old chargers stadium and constructing a river park. City staffers say the price is too low and those discounts mean taxpayers would be footing the bill for those costs. SDSU says it's a fair price. Gina Jacobs is the university's lead staffer on the mission Valley. Right. Speaker 4: 04:14 We don't agree that having those things considered as part of the appraisal means that the city is in any way paying for those. We just believe that some of them should be considered in determining fair market value. Speaker 5: 04:26 The city has yet to receive a formal offer from SDSU. The university is still aiming to present a final deal to the CSU board of trustees. By January, Andrew Bowen, KPBS news, Speaker 1: 04:37 governor Gavin Newsome is signing a number of bills into law that he hopes will slow rent increases and spur more affordable housing. KPBS reporter Matt Hoffman was there as Newsome inc to bill in San Diego Wednesday providing more than $300 million to protect renters and homeowners. Speaker 5: 04:56 Newsome says the bill aims to help cash trap renters and homeowners avoid evictions and foreclosures. Speaker 6: 05:00 Roughly 8 million of us in the state of California, renters that have deep anxiety every first and 15th of the month. Speaker 5: 05:07 This coming just after the governor signed the strictest rent capital in the nation, Newsome says these are necessary measures to deal with an extreme crisis. Speaker 6: 05:14 Over 30% of Californians, um, are spending, or roughly 30% are spending 50% of their income, 50% of their income on rent, which is an extraordinary number. Speaker 5: 05:28 The governor says, spending that much on housing is a recipe for disaster. Speaker 6: 05:32 That means they have no money to set aside for uncertainty. Uh, and that's why so many people I end up out on the streets. We wonder what the hell is going on in the state as it relates to homelessness. It's about affordability. Speaker 5: 05:43 Matt Hoffman, K PBS news. Speaker 1: 05:45 On Wednesday, Turkish military forces entered Syria Syrian territory attacking us back to Kurdish militias who've been fighting ISIS across the world. And here in San Diego, the Kurdish community was gripped with fear and outrage. KPBS reporter max [inaudible] Adler spoke with members of the tight knit community. Speaker 5: 06:05 On Sunday, the white house announced after a call between the Turkish and American presidents that American troops would be withdrawing from Syria. Turkey has long considered the Kurdish minority in Syria, a source of terrorism. And on Wednesday its troops began to roll in and fire on Curtis cities. Amada is occurred, born in Syria. He immigrated to the U S in the 1980s and still has family and friends there. To him, the withdrawal of American forces from the region in anticipation of the Turkish invasion is a deep portrayal after the Kurds fought for years against ISIS. I have not met a single American who did not appreciate the sacrifices the courts made fighting ISIS. The courts lost 11,000 people fighting ISIS to protect United States to protect the West. They lost their lives over there to protect, protect humanity. He hasn't been able to turn away from the news all week. I'm just so upset to have it not been at work since Monday. I went yesterday for a couple of hours. I, I came back to it. They haven't been at work yet. It's I'm being glued to the newest hope for glimmer of good news, so I haven't been at work even even when I'm at work. I'm not myself. Ahmed's daughter. Shereen was born in the U S she's planning to return next year to Iraqi Kurdistan to start an educational nonprofit and is active in the local Kurdish community Speaker 4: 07:21 as a Kurdish steering [inaudible]. It's a mixture of anger and confusion. Anger at the lack of a reaction from the international community. I would, I expected more reaction from the UN right from from NATO because these are international bodies that were created to protect minorities from this exact situation. Speaker 5: 07:37 The Kurdish population in America is relatively small, but has seen a serious uptick since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011 along with Dallas and Nashville. San Diego is one of the largest centers for Kurdish American life. Many Kurds are also part of the larger Syrian community in San Diego, which has come together during the eight year long civil war, yada, yada. She is the director of operations at the Syrian community network in San Diego. A nonprofit that helps asylum seekers and refugees resettle in the U S there are over 1000 Syrian refugees in San Diego. Speaker 4: 08:09 It's a collectivist community, so they really rely on each other. Um, they lean on each other a lot. Speaker 5: 08:15 The Trump administration has announced it plans to slash the number of refugees admitted into the U S next year, leaving many Kurdish asylum applicants in an increasingly volatile situation without a path to safety. Speaker 4: 08:26 With the new resettlement numbers at 18,000, which is extremely low for the U S a lot of them are here, but a lot of them still have families back home. We have sisters that are here and their entire families are still overseas, so the stress really comes from the fact that they don't know if they're going to see their family again and they're worried and they're just hoping that they make it through. Speaker 5: 08:49 Trump said that America had spent enough money protecting the Kurdish minority. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have criticized the move. Ahmad says that residents of San Diego can help support the Kurdish community by getting in touch with their elected representatives. I do plea to people in San Diego. I've been living here for 14 years. I consider myself not to be from San Diego to go and bright with their congressman's right to their senators. On Friday, a modern Shereen will be protesting alongside other Kurdish Americans outside of the federal building in downtown San Diego. In an effort to stop what is quickly becoming a desperate situation for the Kurdish people in Syria, max with Adler K PBS news Speaker 1: 09:30 for years, a volunteer group called women occupy San Diego has pushed for stronger civilian oversight of police officers. It wants a new commission with the power to investigate alleged officer misconduct separately from SDPD internal affairs city council member Monica Montgomery is leading the effort to put that idea on the 2020 ballot over the objections of the police officer's union. KPBS Metro reporter Andrew Bowen spoke to Montgomery about where the debate is heading. Speaker 7: 10:01 Last year we saw this idea of a new independent police review commission die before it ever got a vote at the city council on whether to place it on the ballot. What's the status of your idea now and how are you going to ensure that that doesn't happen again? Speaker 8: 10:13 So, uh, we have seen, um, and um, have been monitoring the women occupy ballot measure proposal and it came to committee, our last committee meeting, which I believe was September 18th. So at that, that committee, it passed through unanimously, but it is coming back to committee with a legal analysis from the city attorney. And it was really important for me coming into office that we don't get caught in the procedural loopholes of this, that my colleagues are able to, uh, judge the proposal based on the merits of it and make a decision from there. Speaker 7: 10:51 Supporters of this measure say that it's really about the process, they want a more independent process. Uh, but there are also some out there who are unhappy with the current outcomes of the current community review board. For you, what is most important to you? Is it, and do you think that this new model with the, an independent investigation will actually lead to different outcomes? Speaker 8: 11:13 I think it will. Um, there were four major things that I was dedicated to since inauguration day, um, based on, um, civilian oversight of the police department. And those are the investigative powers, subpoena power, independent commission and independent counsel. And this proposal has all of those, um, factors in it. And so I think that we've been working really hard to ensure that it is an effective commission, um, in word and indeed. And so that's what the, all the going back and forth is about. But I believe it will be effective and it will be sort of like a hybrid model where there'll be, there will be review mechanisms there, but the investigative powers is the most important. Speaker 7: 11:58 I spoke with the head of the police officers association last year, the last time around and something that he told me was that he felt like no matter how robust or independent a civilian review board is overseeing the police, that they're always going to be some people in the community that simply don't trust the police. What's your response to that? Speaker 8: 12:19 First of all, it's no excuse for us not to do better. We have to do better. There will always be folks just as you mentioned, folks that maybe want me to go a little bit further or don't want me to do this. I'm doing what I believe is right. I think the police officers should do what they believe is right. I think that every entity should have a check and a balance. That is what this is about. It's there will always be folks either based on their own personal experience with officers or other influence. Is that, do not trust police officers. That probably will never change. But it doesn't mean that we shouldn't have strong oversight over entity, any entity, including the police department. Speaker 7: 12:59 This is an issue that you ran on during your campaign. One, possibly something that actually helped you get elected in your district. Uh, but now that we're seeing the real policymaking, uh, happen some of the details, some of the people who originally supported you are actually kind of pushing you to go further than what you might otherwise do. What has that been like for you? Speaker 8: 13:23 Um, it's, it's politics. It's government. Um, I'm dedicated to a good policy. The four factors are what I ran on subpoena power, which that was the only thing at issue when I ran really, uh, all of the rest of this was, you know, it's something that we've developed along, uh, over time. But the independent commission, independent counsel, investigative powers and subpoena power are all wrapped up into the policy that I support. So in my view, I'm doing what I said I would do for those who are not supporting or wanting it to go further. Have that right and I understand why, but I'm doing what I believe is right for the city. Speaker 7: 14:00 Monica Montgomery, thank you for speaking with us. Speaker 1: 14:02 Thank you. Thanks for listening to San Diego news matters. If you're not already a subscriber, take a minute to become one. You can find San Diego news matters on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.