Manifesto lists Enid OK as troubled cop's home

[Conan71]

Well that didn't take long.  As predicted, he will be martyred by the left.
http://www.salon.com/2013/02/14/understanding_christopher_dorner_partner/

Think he will be posthumously charged with a hate crime?  His first two victims were black.

[Vashta Nerada]

What Tulsa Police could learn from the recent LAPD fiasco:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/after-christopher-dorners-rampage-how-to-build-community-trust-in-police/2013/02/15/7a6f8482-76c8-11e2-8f84-3e4b513b1a13_story.html

I worked as an internal affairs investigator in the LAPD for about three years. When I visited police divisions to look into complaints against officers, I was usually greeted by the same question: "Who are you going to burn today?" Officers often believed that internal affairs was out to get them on flimsy charges.

At the same time, when I interviewed community members who had filed complaints against officers, I was disappointed to learn that, despite my reassurances and best efforts to conduct impartial inquiries, many complainants believed that a fair investigation was simply not possible. Nor do misconduct investigations satisfy a skeptical public. If an officer is exonerated, the community often believes that malfeasance is being covered up.

Police serve the community — any concerns about their integrity must be transparently, expeditiously and judiciously resolved. Relying on cops to police cops is neither efficient nor confidence-inspiring.

The solution? Abolish internal affairs units and outsource their work to external civilian agencies.

Police have slowly started to incorporate civilian oversight in their misconduct investigations. For example, the LAPD's office of inspector general has oversight over the department's internal discipline. Yet, while the inspector general's staff receives copies of every personnel complaint filed and tracks and audits selected cases, it does not have the authority to impose discipline. Nor do most civilian review boards, which are not empowered to conduct independent investigations. This leads detractors to say that such boards are ineffectual.

Police have long resisted external oversight. Some of us say that those who aren't in uniform do not understand the intricacies of law enforcement. Won't civilian investigators be harsher toward officers — unsympathetic to the challenges faced by beat cops battling armed bad guys?

These self-serving arguments perpetuate archaic policies. Outsourcing misconduct investigations to civilians would directly address community concerns about the "blue wall of silence." Officers who fear retaliation for reporting misconduct would feel more comfortable working with an external agency. In this system, complaints such as Dorner's about the vindictiveness of superiors would all but disappear.

Using sergeants and detectives as internal affairs investigators costs police departments a lot. These supervisors are paid more and have more seniority. Assigning seasoned officers to internal affairs also depletes the number of field personnel who could prevent mistakes and misconduct by patrol officers in the first place. Outsourcing misconduct investigations would be far less expensive and would let veteran supervisors do the jobs they should be doing.

And why shouldn't every police contact with the community — every traffic stop, every interrogation — be recorded on video? If Dorner and his partner had had a cop-cam, his claim that his partner used excessive force might have been resolved the same day. There's just no excuse for not recording police contacts with the public. Technology has made cameras effective and affordable. Some officers already record their arrests to protect themselves against false allegations of misconduct. This should be standard operating procedure.

The only answer to those worried about police conspiracies is transparency. Only by opening our doors can we build trust, and truly serve and protect.

Sunil Dutta is an officer in the Los Angeles Police Department. The views expressed here do not represent the LAPD.

[patric]

The mother and daughter newspaper carriers injured when police mistakenly fired on them during the manhunt for ex-cop Christopher Dorner would receive $4.2 million under a settlement announced by city officials.
The settlement was remarkably speedy compared with other LAPD civil lawsuits, which can take years to be resolved.

City Atty. Carmen Trutanich was blunt Tuesday in saying the city wanted to get the case, which has been a black eye for the LAPD, behind it as quickly as possible.
"Hopefully this will put an end to the Dorner saga once and for all," Trutanich said. He said the agreement was a "no brainer because the costs were going to skyrocket," if negotiations dragged on and the case ended up in court.
"We got out of this thing pretty cheaply, all things considered," he added.
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-women-shot-by-lapd-during-dorner-manhunt-get-big-payout-20130423,0,3871391.story