Citizen Review Plan Works for Phoenix; S.D. Police Dislike It

Three years ago, police officials in this conservative desert city were accused of covering up misconduct by their own officers.

Minority leaders were outraged by three highly publicized police shootings in early 1984 that left one black and one Latino man dead and one black youth crippled. Each of the victims had been unarmed and had offered no resistance--and in each case police concluded that the shooting was warranted.

“All three shootings had questions,” recalled Frank Fairbanks, executive assistant to the Phoenix city manager. “They were not blatant police abuse, but they clearly were not justified, either. . . . There was a sense of distrust of police in the minority community.”

Black leaders, who claimed that the police investigations amounted to a whitewash, demanded that the city appoint an independent civilian review board to ensure that police were conducting fair and impartial investigations.

As in most other cities, the Phoenix police administration believed that its internal affairs unit conducted fair and thorough investigations. When police initially refused to accept any form of civilian review, the Phoenix City Council formed a citizens’ advisory committee to hammer out a compromise.

They settled on one of the weakest civilian review panels in the nation--one citizen and one officer joined a board of three police commanders to review cases privately and recommend discipline to the police chief.

Today, San Diego police administrators, the police union and a citizens’ task force are struggling with the same sensitive issues that confronted Phoenix three years ago. In the wake of several recent allegations of brutality and racial misconduct involving San Diego police, many black and Latino leaders are calling for a civilian panel to independently investigate police.

On Wednesday, the City Council-appointed Citizens’ Task Force on Police-Community Relations is expected to respond to a police proposal to use county grand jurors to periodically audit police investigations. A subcommittee decided Friday to recommend to the full task force that police adopt some form of civilian participation.

Phoenix Model

If any civilian review panel appeared palatable to San Diego police officials, it was the Phoenix model. Police administrators, who expressed interest in the concept of allowing one citizen to participate in reviews, arranged earlier this month for representatives from the Police Department, the police union, the city manager’s office and the citizens’ advisory task force to visit Phoenix.

Many people in Phoenix, including minority leaders and citizen volunteers named to the review board, agree that the system has fostered better police-community relations.

“We looked at models like Detroit’s and other very strong models,” Fairbanks said. “The Police Department said they were not needed. Police management and the union would not buy in.”

Fairbanks said that adopting a powerful civilian review board was “kind of like using an A-bomb to kill an ant. It was just too heavy-handed for the problem in Phoenix.”

Even the limited citizen involvement used in Phoenix, however, is unacceptable to San Diego police, who oppose any public intrusion into confidential police files and investigations. They say that any form of a full-fledged citizens’ review panel, such as those adopted in San Francisco or Berkeley, violates the city charter.

Assistant Police Chief Bob Burgreen said that police may be willing to consider “a hybrid of the Phoenix system” if recommended by the citizens’ advisory task force.

“The question is how far do you go how fast?” Burgreen said. “Is this more than we actually need in San Diego? Do the perceptions of the problems call for something which is that drastic at this time?”

For Burgreen, the answer is no.

“Police officers are very concerned about their files being opened up to civilians and allowing people to make decisions on their careers who are appointed and perhaps well-intentioned but are basically uninformed,” he said.

Burgreen said police would prefer to try something short of civilian review, such as the proposal that county grand jurors audit police investigations at random.

That plan has come under attack from community leaders and some members of the citizens’ task force because it does not provide for timely, independent review of controversial cases.

POA Stance

The San Diego Police Officers Assn. also rejects civilian review, including the model used in Phoenix, according to Officer Vince Krolikowski. He said there is “absolutely no way” that POA members--who also are against grand jury involvement--would accept any form of citizen involvement in the police review process.

“We have worked for years to establish a system that is fair to the police officer and, if that happens, it turns out to be fair to the citizen,” Krolikowski said. “To have untrained, inexperienced people coming in would go against everything we’ve been fighting for years.”

The police union in Phoenix supported the addition of one civilian and one officer to a police review board, Krolikowski said, because officers in Arizona are not protected by a peace officer bill of rights. In California, such a law for peace officers includes the right to legal representation and the right to keep internal investigations confidential.

“If they had that, there is no way in the world they would sit there and say they want a citizen in there to get a fair shake,” Krolikowski said. “In California, we could not conceive of that. We would have to take so many step backs if we accepted that.”

However, officers in other California cities, such as San Francisco and Oakland, routinely attend review hearings at which civilians are given confidential police records to help them judge misconduct allegations.

The Phoenix model--the only one of its kind in the nation--was designed to give selected citizens access to secret review hearings while at the same time allowing the chief of police to retain control over the investigation of citizen complaints.

“From the citizens’ viewpoint, they get an eye on the Police Department and the suspicion that the Police Department protects their own,” said Detective Royce Beydler, one of 40 sworn officers who volunteered to sit on the review board.

A pool of 32 citizens was selected by the city manager to fill the one civilian position on a rotating basis. Community leaders reacted positively when half of the appointments to the board were black or Latino. The minority population in Phoenix is about 20%.

The addition of one civilian to the review board has muffled police criticism in the minority community and has received the strong endorsement of the citizens who are assigned to hear disciplinary cases.

In the three years since the string of police shootings, there have been no controversial test cases under the new system. The board last year conducted reviews of 19 police shootings, ranging from the killing of two suspects to an off-duty officer who accidentally shot his wife. In seven of the shootings, discipline was recommended for the officers.

How Board Operates

The review board meets about twice a week to recommend discipline for officers who have had complaints sustained against them by internal police investigations. After discussing the case, the panel listens to a presentation by a police supervisor. The accused officer and a union representative then make statements and answer any questions. After further discussion, the panel votes on discipline and sends its secret recommendation to the chief of police.

The breakdown of the votes are never revealed by police, and all records and notes of the hearings are destroyed. The process is so secretive that the Police Department refused to release a list of the citizens appointed to the board.

“We don’t want them to talk to the press in detail,” said Major Jerry Oliver, who runs the review board. “Some of these are juicy cases.”

What little criticism is directed at the review system in Phoenix concerns the control of the process by the chief of police, who decides what cases will be heard by the board and retains the right to reject the recommended discipline.

Attorney Gary Peter Klahr, a former Phoenix city councilman who sits on the board, said he would like to review complaints that are not sustained by the department.

“Unless the administration decides to discipline, we don’t get the case,” Klahr said. “There’s no way we can do anything for the civilian” whose complaint is not sustained by police.

As part of its original package to improve police-community relations, the Phoenix City Council approved the hiring of a civilian investigator to audit police investigations. But the position was never filled because of budget cuts.

“What (the investigator) would be most effective for is when people go through the entire police process and are dissatisfied,” Fairbanks said. “It would be good to let this sort of independent outsider take a good, hard look at the case. In many cases, we think it would substantiate the police investigation.”

Klahr acknowledged that the police decision to involve citizens in the review process--even for limited purposes--represents a substantial improvement for Phoenix.

“This is a conservative town. You take what you can get,” he said. “The police feel there is great peace in the minority community. This is the greatest public relations thing for them since sliced bread.”

Klahr’s appointment to the board created some concern among police officers who didn’t want a liberal criminal defense attorney judging police misconduct cases. Police officials say they have been pleased with the caliber of citizens selected to the board.

“It’s turned out to be excellent for us in more ways than we anticipated,” said Phoenix Police Chief Ruben Ortega. “None of our fears materialized. We found citizens were very adaptable to understanding our internal workings and have made excellent recommendations.”

Ortega said he has approved all but one or two of the discipline recommendations by the review board.

Some Phoenix police officers said they support having a mixture of police administrators, officers and citizens decide discipline.

“If somebody is going to decide how I do my job, I’m not as concerned about whether they are a police officer or a civilian, but what kind of person they are,” said Officer Walter Olson. “I’m not opposed to civilian review as long as they are responsible people who understand what we’re doing.”

But Mike Petchel, president of the Phoenix Law Enforcement Assn., said that including one civilian in the police review process has achieved little reform.

“It’s become a non-issue,” Petchel said. “I still don’t believe it’s worth having. It’s a politically expedient solution to a public misconception to what our work entails.”

Krolikowski, the San Diego police union official, said he was chagrined by the lack of protection extended to officers during the two review board hearings he recently saw in Phoenix. (Police refused to let a Times reporter monitor a review session.)

“The hearing begins with the panel discussing the issue,” Krolikowski said. “Then at one point a supervisor comes in and discusses the officer and the issue and everything else in the world about that officer--opinions, innuendo, statements from other people.”

After the officer and union representative made their statements and left the room, Krolikowski said, “the supervisors stayed there with the panel and fully continued to discuss that issue and everything about the officer’s background, what he dressed like, what he looked like. Then they made a decision based on that.

“That would never be accepted here. I don’t think any citizen would tolerate being evaluated under those kinds of conditions.”

Krolikowski said San Diego police officers feel that the current system of investigating officers should not be tampered with. Rather, police officials should deal with perception problems within the community by educating citizens on how to use the current system, he said.

The police internal affairs unit accepts complaints in person or by telephone and, after conducting an investigation, sends its findings to a panel of three commanding officers. If the panel votes to sustain a complaint, it is forwarded to the officer’s supervisor who recommends discipline. That recommendation is then sent through the police chain of command for approval.

Police officers say that, if anything, they are disciplined too harshly by the department and are frequently forced to appeal arbitrary decisions to the Civil Service Commission.

“The consensus is that the system we have works, but people don’t believe it does,” Krolikowski said. “They don’t know what system they have. If a citizen is not happy, he can go to the grand jury, the district attorney, the Civil Service Commission or the FBI. They conduct totally separate investigations.

“If someone doesn’t have faith in all of those, then we’ve got real problems.”

OTHER CITIES’ CIVILIAN REVIEW BOARDS SAN FRANCISCO

Office of Citizen Complaints

Created in 1983 by City Charter amendment to replace the police internal affairs bureau. The office has a staff of eight full-time civilian investigators and an annual budget of $780,000 to investigate all citizen complaints.

The civilian investigators have the authority to hold hearings and require officers to attend. When a complaint is substantiated, the office sends its findings and recommends discipline to the police chief.

Records and hearings are confidential. OAKLAND

Citizens’ Complaint Board

Formed in 1980, the board of seven appointed citizens conducts parallel investigations with the Police Department into complaints of excessive force. In cases other than excessive force, the board will review a citizen’s appeal of the police chief’s handling of the complaint.

The board has power to subpoena witnesses, but cannot require a police officer to attend its hearings. Its findings and recommendations are sent to the city manager, who reviews both the board and police investigation results before making a decision.

Police records are kept confidential, but hearings are open to the public. BERKELEY

Police Review Commission

Approved by voters in 1973, the review commission consists of nine civilian members, each selected to a two-year term by a City Council member. The commission reviews all citizen complaints against police officers or police employees.

The commission’s investigative reports and recommendations for discipline go to the city manager. The board, which has a five-member staff and an annual $150,000 budget, possesses subpoena power to require witnesses and police officers to testify.

Police records are kept confidential, but hearings are open to the public. DADE COUNTY, FLA.

Independent Review Panel

Formed in 1980, the panel has six civilian members appointed by the Dade County Commission (county supervisors). All citizen complaints are referred to police internal affairs unit for investigation. The internal affairs report is reviewed by the panel and, if necessary, referred back to police for further investigation.

The panel decides by a majority vote whether the complaint warrants “a major investigation.” If it does, the County Commission selects three additional panel members to hear the complaint. The nine-member panel then selects an independent investigator to conduct the inquiry, and officers are not required to cooperate. After a hearing, the panel publishes a public report recommending any disciplinary action to the police chief.

All records and hearings are open to the public. PHOENIX

Discipline Review Board

Created in 1984 by the City Council, the board consists of three police commanders, one police officer and one civilian. The civilian position is filled from a pool of 32 citizens selected by the city manager. The board hears disciplinary cases referred by the Police Department and all cases involving use of firearms.

The board decides whether to recommend discipline by a majority vote. The recommendation is then sent to the police chief. Officers are required to attend hearings, but may bring a police union representative.

Records and hearings are confidential.