Last month, the Feds criticized the Los Angeles Police Department for not doing enough to root out racial profiling. Now a new report by inspector general Nicole Bershon suggests that, while improvements have been made, the department has still more to do when it comes to investigating citizen complaints of profiling.
C.J. Lin of the Daily News has the story:
A report by Nicole Bershon, the inspector general for the civilian Police Commission, expressed concern at how officers handled complaints. She also found fault with how the Los Angeles Police Department’s new Constitutional Policing Unit investigated its first 10 cases in which officers were accused of detaining a suspect based on appearance, race or ethnicity.
“(P)olice officers are human beings who come from varied backgrounds and life experiences, and there may be individual instances of biased policing within the department,” Bershon wrote. “We also recognize that … one complaint is too many, especially for those who believe they have been the victim of biased policing.”According to the report, some supervisors or sergeants improperly tried to dissuade members of the public from making complaints, suggesting they were simply trying to get out of paying tickets.
The LA Times’ Joel Rubin has further analysis and reports that Bershon also had positive things to say about the department for progress it had made in the area of profiling:
In her report, Bershon generally praised the work of the Constitutional Policing Unit, a team formed this year in the LAPD’s Internal Affairs Group to investigate profiling cases.
Bershon has been eager to demonstrate to federal officials that her office can keep close tabs on the investigations. Much of the report focused on the unit’s missteps in carrying out investigations, as well as other problems in how supervisors and officers deal with racial profiling.
“We believe that the process of effective civilian oversight by the Commission through the Office of the Inspector General … is working,” Bershon wrote.
Since her selection last year, Nicole Bershon is clearly working to distinguish herself as a proactive inspector general, which is heartening to see.