Sensitivity of Deputies’ Supervisors Criticized : Discrimination: An affirmative action officer recommends a black deputy’s charges of racism be heard by the Civil Service Commission.

Ventura County Sheriff’s Department supervisors should undergo sensitivity training, a county affirmative action officer recommended after investigating a black deputy’s charges of racial discrimination.

Maria Diaz also recommended that Deputy Greg Jones’ charges be explored by the county Civil Service Commission. A hearing has been scheduled for Tuesday.

Diaz said that she did not believe the department promoted racism but that supervisory personnel needed to be more sensitive and open.

Jones, who was hired by the department in 1986, alleges that he was ordered to be retrained in March because he is black, not because his job skills are lacking.

“They just happened to say, ‘We don’t like you because you’re black,’ ” said Jones, who filed a complaint with the Civil Service Commission in April. “The next thing you know, I’m in the spotlight for no reason.”

Jones, who is on a leave of absence and has been stripped of authority to carry a gun, said he believed that the retraining was a step leading to his termination.

Undersheriff Larry Carpenter, who said he was unable to discuss the specifics of Jones’ case, said retraining is not unusual and can occur for a variety of reasons. He said it is not a precursor to firing.

Jones, 28, charged that his supervisors made racist remarks to him, that he heard other deputies make racist statements over the police radio and that department supervisors support racism.

He said deputies in the department had found photos of black inmates with minstrel faces painted on them and told Diaz that a sergeant had called him “Mr. Brown.”

In addition, Jones said, incident reports written by black deputies are scrutinized more than white deputies’ reports.

“It almost seems like, when they get a black deputy who is qualified, they haze them and try to get rid of them,” Jones said.

Of the department’s 585 sworn deputies, 12 are black, and the highest ranking black is a sergeant, said Sgt. Mark Ball.

Blacks make up about 2.1% of Ventura County’s population, according to 1980 census figures, and also 2.1% of the Sheriff’s Department, Diaz said. The county’s affirmative action plan states that the department’s goal is to raise the percentage of black deputies to 4.3%, she said.

Carpenter said that he had not yet heard Jones’ specific complaints, but that he has not heard of discrimination in the department. He said the department is against any discrimination.

“We firmly believe a deputy sheriff is a deputy sheriff,” Carpenter said. “If there’s a problem, we’ll fix it.”

According to Diaz’s report, supervisors said Jones’ police reports lacked sufficient detail and did not follow department format and style.

In addition, supervisors questioned Jones’ judgment on patrol, she said. She concluded that the department seemed to have job-related justification for placing Jones back in retraining.

But Diaz, who investigated the case to determine whether a Civil Service Commission hearing was needed, said her findings did not prove or disprove Jones’ claims. She said it was up to him to prove the department’s actions were discriminatory.

Diaz, who interviewed nine black deputies, said some supervisors could benefit from sensitivity training.

“For instance, it is assumed by some supervisory personnel that individuals who are black or Hispanic attended substandard educational systems, and as a result, an assumption is made that writing skills are substandard and require additional correction,” she wrote in her report.

In addition, she said the department needs an affirmative action officer to investigate and mediate informal complaints of discrimination.

The Civil Service Commission will make a recommendation after the hearing about whether the department was justified in assigning Jones to retraining.