By Dan McKay and Jeff Proctor
Albuquerque Journal
ALBUQUERQUE — For months, tearful families, neighbors and activists have filed up to the City Council podium, demanding a formal response to Albuquerque’s spike in police shootings.
That testimony came to a head in a raucous meeting just before midnight Monday, when councilors narrowly agreed to the residents’ demands and adopted a proposal directing their staff to request a U.S. Department of Justice investigation into “whether there have been incidents or patterns of civil rights violations by the Albuquerque Police Department.”
Mayor Richard Berry’s administration was critical of the bill on Monday but stopped short of saying it would be vetoed.
Berry on Tuesday said he would review the bill, but he made it clear he believes the “next logical step” is to give the Police Department a chance to show whether recent changes in training and other policies will have a positive impact.
The police administration and a private firm hired to analyze the shootings developed 58 recommendations, he said.
“Anytime someone loses a family member, it’s a tragedy,” Berry said in an interview. “We would want the families to know that last September, I took decisive action to get an outside, expert firm to come to Albuquerque to do a thorough review of each and every officer-involved shooting.”
Officers already are undergoing more training and simulations, Berry said.
But relatives and activists have been critical of the report, which they contend was superficial and amounted to “cops reporting on cops.” The report was done by the Police Executive Research Forum, which is made up of police executives from around the country.
APD officers have shot 19 men since January 2010; 13 of them have died. The majority have been Hispanic men in their 20s and 30s.
In addition to the shootings, APD has struggled with officers posting offensive comments on social media websites.
The council approved the DOJ resolution on a 5-4 vote, with Republican Dan Lewis joining the council’s four Democrats in favor. It would take six votes to override a veto from Berry, a Republican.
Not ‘friendly’ probe
Chief Administrative Officer Rob Perry, the top executive under Berry, on Monday urged councilors to consider the scope of what they would be asking for. It’s not necessarily a “friendly” investigation to help out local police, he said.
“The significance and magnitude of this is far sweeping as it relates to the indictment this could cause on the Albuquerque Police Department,” Perry said. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, its “Special Litigation Section of the Civil Rights Division is charged with reviewing and investigating allegations of a pattern or practice of police misconduct, in coordination with the U.S. Attorneys’ offices.”
The Justice Department receives police misconduct complaints from advocacy groups, private citizens, news accounts and cities themselves. Federal officials decide whether to start a full investigation by determining whether a “pattern or practice” violation has occurred, meaning “police misconduct is the agency’s ‘standard operating procedure - the regular, rather than the unusual practice.’”
The investigations can take up to a year and a half and includes analysis of procedures and interviews with the police command staff.
If it finds there has been a violation, the Justice Department will work with the city to develop a plan of action. If that doesn’t work, the department can sue the city for courtordered changes.
During the past several years, the Justice Department has conducted investigations in Ohio, Washington state, Pennsylvania, the District of Columbia, Louisiana and California. An inquiry is ongoing in Portland, Ore.
Councilor Rey Garduño sponsored the amendment. He and other supporters said the request for federal intervention comes from residents, not lawmakers.
“There used to be a time when we would run to the police,” Garduño said. “Now we run away from them. They’ve been coming to us more and more in the past six months or so - people from the community - and they want to know what has changed, why this is happening. No one has been able to answer that question to the satisfaction of the community. We believe DOJ can help answer those questions.”
The legislation asks the Justice Department to investigate whether APD has committed “civil rights violations.”
Another supporter, Debbie O’Malley, said the language is intentionally broad, for now. She characterized it as the first step in a process to get the Justice Department involved.
“I think Justice would send a representative out here for us to work with,” O’Malley said. “We have a department in turmoil: There’s a lot of mistrust among the rank and file and the leadership. And the citizens are also feeling like they can’t trust the department. It remains to be seen whether we would broaden or narrow the focus of the DOJ investigation, but we have to do something.”
Lewis and others said the bill wasn’t aimed at the majority of officers who do their jobs well.
“For that trust and honor to be restored, this is absolutely necessary,” Lewis said when he announced his position on the DOJ resolution.
Copyright 2011 Albuquerque Journal