Tougher Monitoring Vowed as New Police Panel Is Established

Pledging a stronger and more independent monitoring of police misconduct, the San Diego city manager’s office announced Tuesday the creation of the Citizens’ Review Board on Police Practices.

The panel, which will be chaired by longtime civic activist Murray L. Galinson, is being established under the guidelines approved by voters in November when they passed Proposition G.

The 20-member board replaces the outgoing Civilian Advisory Panel on Police Practices, which was created with the police chief’s blessing and, during its one-year existence, was sharply censured by critics who said it rubber-stamped actions by the Police Department.

Lack of Communication

“We need to do everything we can to make sure the public is properly informed about our work,” Galinson said in explaining that the new board hopes to garner the support of the community.

“Half of the problems in the past have been because of a lack of communication.”

However, the new board, when it becomes active July 1, will be primarily different only in that the police chief has been removed from the process of selecting its members.

And, like the outgoing board, the panel will be precluded from conducting any independent review of police complaints and instead will analyze only how well the police police themselves.

In addition, the new board will not release any data or reports on individual cases and will not disclose how individual complaints are resolved.

But George Penn, assistant to the city manager, said eliminating the police chief’s involvement in itself makes the board stronger than its predecessor.

Rules to Be Announced

“That was the main issue with the people,” he said. “The people said, ‘You can’t have the fox guarding the chicken house,’ and that’s what Proposition G cleared up. These are independent people the city manager has appointed.”

Penn also said that new rules and regulations governing the board’s functions will be announced soon. They will show even more autonomy for the board, such as the panel’s authority to “look at” but not impose discipline for errant officers.

Galinson said the board hopes to hold open forums to share some of the panel’s work with the public, as well as to receive suggestions on how it could be improved.

It was a lack of public confidence that led to the downfall of the outgoing board. In November, two separate review board proposals were presented to voters: the Proposition G board and a second, tougher panel under Proposition F. Both proposals received approval from a majority of voters.

A San Diego Superior Court judge has since ruled that only the Proposition G board should be established, because G received a few more votes than F.

However, Betty Wheeler, legal director of the San Diego chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said Tuesday that her organization will appeal the ruling. She said the ACLU believes both boards should be created. Under Proposition F, the board would have subpoena powers, gather evidence and hold hearings on individual citizen compliants.

‘Not in Conflict’

“The two proposals, which both passed, are not in conflict,” she said. “Both can be implemented, and therefore both should be implemented.”

Galinson, asked if his review board under Proposition G could work alongside a stronger review board under Proposition F, said:

“If there were two, it could cause a lot of duplication in time and effort. But, if that was the final determination, I certainly would have no problems with it.”

City Councilman Wes Pratt, who strongly supported Proposition F over G, said he hopes Galinson’s panel is at least stronger than the outgoing board.

“That previous body confirmed or agreed with the Police Department’s position on all of the cases it looked at,” he said. “And the reality was that the city was settling police-brutality cases and police officers were being fired.

“So there’s some room for flexibility. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a carbon copy of the ineffective process we had before.”

Recent Shootings

Pratt and Wheeler also suggested that the new board immediately review two recent police shootings in the 4900 block of Logan Avenue, in which one man was shot six times and died and a 14-year-boy was wounded in the back of the head.

“Those are just the kinds of cases the review board should tackle,” Pratt said.

Galinson made no commitment to have his board study those shootings. But he did say “there would be no reason why” the board could not go back and study cases after it is impaneled July 1.

The new board includes, among its 20 members, five blacks, four Latinos, one Southeast Asian and one Filipino. There are six women on the board and one member of the San Diego gay and lesbian community.

Galinson, president and chief executive officer of San Diego National Bank, has also served as chairman of the San Diego Police-Community Relations Board.

Vice chairman of the board will be Arthur L. Ellis, an associate professor at the School of Social Work at San Diego State University.

List of Members

The other members are:

The Rev. Robert C. Ard, pastor of Christ Church of San Diego; Dennis E. Borlek, a financial consultant; the Rev. Ellis Casson, senior pastor of Bethel A. M. E. Church; Rodolfo L. David, president of the South Bay Filipino-American Community Assn.; William L. Dick, a retired Marine Corps colonel; Scott D. Fulkerson, executive director of the Center for Social Services.

Richard Garcia, executive director of Centro de Asuntos Migratorios; Carol Hollstrom, program director of the San Diego Law Center and an ACLU board member; Donald McEvoy, consultant with the San Diego Chapter of the National Conference of Christians and Jews; Irene Raymundo, a parole representative at the R. J. Donovan Correctional Facility; Paul Pfingst, a former deputy district attorney who successfully prosecuted California Highway Patrolman Craig Peyer; Barbara Jean Riley, a San Diego County social worker;

Jeanette Roache, director of community affairs for the San Diego County Building Industry Assn.; Daniel Salazar, an official with the Chicano Federation; Lupe Edna Sandoval, a community activist; Barbara Ann Schutze, an education consultant; Cleo Thompson Jr., project supervisor of the Regional Employment and Training Consortium, and Pham Quang Tuan, a leader in the Vietnamese community.