The council also referenced Senate Bill 2 which will allow the state to decertify police officers who commit serious misconduct, and will establish a statewide oversight board as a reason not to pursue a locally-controlled oversight body. WebCurrent Announcements for Positions. I think they mean new black faces, 21-year-old Willy Daniels said. The car owner arrived two days later to pick up his Hyundai at the yard and found the back bumper was spray painted white, a side mirror also was painted and a swastika and smiley face were drawn on the upholstered seats. Gascn praised Torrance Police Chief Jeremiah Hart for moving quickly to provide information to prosecutors, noting he met resistance from police leaders when investigating similar scandals involving racist text messages among San Francisco officers. in communication and M.S. I dont know that we can take anything theyve said at face value.. Torrance police vehicles outside the Gable House Bowl after a shooting in 2019. And several jurors laid blame for an above-the-law attitude on then-Chief Donald E. Nash, who resigned a year and a half later, six months before his planned retirement. All the while, the city contended officers were innocent and that all the allegations were fabricated, including one that officers had squeezed the testicles of three teenage Latino detainees. Mitchell, who was Black, was suspected of driving a stolen vehicle when he pulled into a Ralphs parking lot in Torrance in December 2018, according to a district attorneys office memo clearing the officers of wrongdoing. Saavedra has covered the Los Angeles riots, the O.J. First, three officers were suspended, and now face firing, for allegedly socializing--in uniform and on duty--with strippers at a private Torrance residence. Prosecutors are reviewing dozens of additional cases linked to the officers, said Diana Teran, a special advisor to Los Angeles County Dist. According to a Times review of public records, Concannon has shot only one person during his career: Christopher DeAndre Mitchell. Torrance did indicate it would comply with most recommendations made by the grand jury though, including: Five of the police departments surveyed Torrance was not one of them did not use complaints to identify potential problems, which the grand jury concluded was the entire point of an effective complaint system. Out of hundreds of pages of documents, the judge allowed the Rastello familys attorneys to present 14 cases of alleged misconduct that resulted in little or no punishment, including an off-duty officer who fired 22 shots at a car, many of them out the window of his personal vehicle; a lieutenant who allegedly molested several children; evidence of rapes and beatings by officers, and officers driving drunk while on duty. His stories have led to the closure of a chain of badly-run group homes, the end of a state program that placed criminals in inappropriate public jobs and the creation of a civilian oversight office for the Orange County Sheriff's Department, among other things. Newly disclosed text messages in which a trio of San Francisco Police Department officers referred to minorities as barbarians, cockroaches and other slurs should trigger an even larger review of past criminal cases for signs of racial bias, according to the citys public defender. To assist us in achieving this goal, you, as a citizen, can help by letting us know if you have a complaint. At certain levels noises are What got them pulled over, the three allege in their suit, was not erratic driving or outstanding warrants. The city prevailed. MuckRock is a non-profit collaborative news site that gives you the tools to keep our government transparent and accountable. When the jury returned with its massive award to the Rastello family, it said the department had a pattern and practice of whitewashing incidents of officer misconduct. If your department logs complaints in a database, spreadsheet, or other log, a copy of those logs is fine instead. Torrance recorded fewer violent crimes in 1993 than many neighboring cities of comparable size, according to the FBI. On July 2, the Torrance City Attorneys Office filed a criminal complaint charging Lena Hernandez, with battery, a violation of California Penal Code Section 242. Admonitions/warnings on complaint forms that may intimidate or discourage persons from completing complaints should not be used. A survey of records at Police Watch, a nonprofit Los Angeles group that monitors Southern California police agencies, revealed numerous complaints by minorities alleging that they were pulled over by Torrance police for no reason. Improving the availability of complaint forms to the public by making them available in multiple locations with clear signage indicating where they specifically can be found. If you wish to file a formal The exact number of officers involved in the scandal is unclear. Whenever it appears that somebodys chipping away at that crust, were going to rise to the occasion.. Then, twice in three months, came federal civil rights lawsuits by citizens claiming that they were wrongfully stopped. Lopez had been fleeing police in a truck, and the officers said he attempted to ram them when they opened fire, according to a district attorneys office memo that determined the fatal shooting was justified. In a four-page letter written earlier this month to Superior Court Presiding Judge Daniel J. Buckley, City Manager LeRoy Jackson said the city had complied with the grand jurys recommendation and removed such warnings from its complaint forms and related materials.. Morgan Ricketts, the attorney for Pesikov and White, said the councils vote was deeply disappointing., The city of Torrance doesnt even want to know what its own residents think about this issue, she said, and I think that was a fair compromise between the parties.. Please include the number of officer-involved shootings resulting in discipline. The picture above it showed several Black men who had been lynched. Some supervisors point out to new officers during their probation periods the difference between street niggers and upstanding black citizens, one former officer said. Rollo Green--who, according to testimony, had a history of alcohol abuse--caused the death of Kelly Rastello, 19, of Long Beach, by making an illegal left-hand turn in front of the motorcyclist, jurors said. After one officer shared a news article about someone being arrested for urinating on a Black child and calling them the N-word, Satterfield replied, whats the crime? according to district attorneys records reviewed by The Times. SB 2 is far reaching and it is another model towards police accountability that we didnt have before in the state, Hart said. You would want to consult them, figure out what their values and viewpoints are, then legislate and implement their values not yours.. Chavez and Concannon were cleared of wrongdoing by former Dist. 1. Hutchings holds a B.A. In the texts, the officers showed little concern about getting caught and even less about the citizens they were assigned to protect, routinely joking about using force and mocking internal affairs. Critics of the department have a different term for the line of demarcation: the Great White Wall, they call it, a racial boundary that they believe is patrolled with apartheid vengeance by the overwhelmingly white Torrance Police Department. We dont have the money to do it at the level they (California) do, Ashcraft said. In total, Torrance police have confirmed 15 officers were placed on administrative leave as a result of the scandal. Tomsic filled out a California Highway Patrol form attesting that the vehicle had not been vandalized, and had it towed by driver Chris Dunn to the impound yard at Van Lingen Towing. In another message reviewed by The Times, Alonso complained about the idea of having to work with a gay officer, and said hed straight punch a member of the LGBTQ community, using a common slur for gay men. Although the Rastello case shocked much of Southern California, equally startling was a string of other cases--long kept in private police files and brought up at the trial--that offered a rare peek into disciplinary procedures at the department. 3. Non-Emergency Police Response: (310) 618-5641 3300 Civic Center Drive, Torrance CA 90503 Animal Control: 310-618-3850 Community Affairs : 310-618-6392 According to their attorney, they were not cited. Grand jury investigation spurs Torrance to, Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window), Grand jury investigation spurs Torrance to change police-complaint forms, Hermosa Beach Police arrest 2 men suspected in shooting attempt, LAPD union wants to hand nonviolent calls over to to unarmed responders, Lunafest returns as a live event in Redondo Beach on March 5, Retired LA Kings star Dustin Brown honored in Hermosa Beach, grand jury report titled Policing the Police, Alpine Village, for decades a German American hub, faces unknown future, Real snow falls at Disneyland not the fake soapy stuff, Is there a problem with paying cash for a car? Torrance, CA 90503-5056. And De Ladurantey said complaints and litigation are an inherent part of modern policing--even in suburban Torrance. . We catch em (criminals), and the community likes that.. The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes. Civil rights activists and police watchdog groups claim that the department is among the most racially biased and militaristic in Southern California. Attorneys for Weldin and Tomsic did not return messages seeking comment. And he wrote De Ladurantey a letter after the incident. WebThe Torrance Police Department is happy to assist you in obtaining or reviewing any records, documents, or reports to which you are legally entitled. Three years into De Laduranteys tenure, though, critics question whether much has changed. When Gascn charged Officer David Chandler with assault in late August for allegedly shooting an armed man in the back, sources told The Times that Chandler was also under investigation as part of the scandal. like this one. Jose Esparza, 19, Luis Ortiz, 20, and Jose Rodriguez, 21, described similar comments by police in a federal civil rights lawsuit filed against the department last month. Atty. Atty. . The Records Division is a service support unit within the Services Bureau. The result: citations for a defective turn signal and a passenger not wearing a seat belt, both of which were later dismissed, the suit said. A Torrance police officer has been charged with assault for his role in a 2018 shooting. TheCalifornia Public Records Actdoes not regulate the use of records obtained from public agencies. Before and after photos from space show storms effect on California reservoirs, Dramatic before and after photos from space show epic snow blanketing SoCal mountains, The chance of a lifetime: Five friends ski the tallest mountain in Los Angeles, Best coffee city in the world? A report to the city council estimated the potential cost being anywhere from $233,000 to $711,000. Collecting this information is very important to our research, so we would like to emphasize, if you have questions about my request or suggestions, we would be happy to discuss them with you. The text messages might have remained hidden if not for the alleged bizarre actions of Tomsic and Weldin in January 2020. One should allow 10 days for an agency to comply with a records request. Los Angeles, Randall Emmett, Ambyr Childers settle domestic violence restraining order dispute, Column: Supreme Court conservatives may want to block student loan forgiveness. Torrance Police Chief Joe De Ladurantey calls the boundary a geographic crust and freely acknowledges that his 249 officers patrol it aggressively.. Shootings resulting in discipline attorneys for Weldin and Tomsic did not return messages seeking comment rights activists and police torrance police department complaints... The community likes that ) do, Ashcraft said Services Bureau do it at the level (... 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