Advertisement

Redondo Beach Police Hoping to Round Up a Video Posse : Crime: Authorities want to equip 20 volunteers to help officers with stakeouts. Critics say the program smacks of Big Brother and doesn’t ensure the participants’ safety.

Share
TIMES STAFF WRITER

Redondo Beach police are looking for 20 residents with a passion for seeing crooks brought to justice to assist undercover officers on criminal stakeouts.

Authorities say the program, which will outfit volunteers with video cameras and binoculars, will help soothe citizens’ frustration about rising crime rates. But critics fear the citizen observers will operate as neighborhood spies and may run roughshod over residents’ civil rights.

The program, “Operation Eye on Redondo Beach,” will become effective by late September or early October, police said.

Advertisement

“We’re merely offering an opportunity for people to work with their Police Department and have a positive impact,” said Lt. Kenneth Kauffman, commander of the department’s investigations bureau.

“They watch the TV news every night and see the results of the day’s crime and feel kind of helpless,” Kauffman said. “I think this is an opportunity from their standpoint to get some self-satisfaction.”

About 80 residents, including an insurance agent and several aerospace engineers, have volunteered so far, officials said.

To qualify, the volunteers must be at least 18, have good eyesight and undergo a criminal-background check. The 20 who are selected by police will receive basic training in surveillance techniques and radio procedures before they will be allowed to participate in any stakeouts, Kauffman said.

“They’re going to be utilized as our eyes and ears, and in no way would be they placed in a position where they would be seen or recognized or in harm’s way,” he said.

The program was designed to encourage community participation in crime-busting efforts. Kauffman said it has the added benefit of cutting costs because it will free officers from time-consuming surveillance duties.

Advertisement

The volunteers will help on a range of cases, from vehicle-theft rings to drug dealing and prostitution. Kauffman said they will work for free on operations that do not interfere with their regular work schedules, perhaps donating several hours a month.

In some instances, a volunteer with a pair of binoculars may be posted on the roof of a commercial building to help officers track suspects, Kauffman said. Volunteers may also be asked to videotape suspected criminal activity or to record license numbers of vehicles visiting a home where police suspect drug dealing, he said.

Although the volunteers may occasionally be accompanied by police officers, there may be times they would work a lookout post alone. Police, however, insist that the volunteers’ safety would be ensured when they are stationed.

Redondo Beach Mayor Brad Parton was enthusiastic about the plan. He said it would “put some blood back into the Neighborhood Watch program” and encourage more community involvement with local authorities.

But Councilman Stevan Colin, an attorney, said he thinks surveillance should be left to the professionals, not ordinary citizens. He said he fears that police would not be able to guarantee the volunteers’ safety and that the program would divide the community.

“I think neighbors are not going to like the idea of their own neighbor spying on them and reporting them to the Police Department,” he said. “I don’t think you’re going to want to have neighbor pitted against neighbor, accusing each other of crime.”

Advertisement

In its attempt to recruit volunteers, the Police Department issued a press release this week that solicited people who enjoy watching TV shows such as “Cops,” “Top Cops” and “American Detective” and who would get a kick out of “watching crooks get caught in the act of stealing a car, selling drugs or snatching a purse.”

But Colin said the implication that Redondo Beach residents watch such TV shows is downright insulting: “Those shows are directed to the lower classes, for people who live in the backwoods of Georgia or Alabama, people who sit around and listen to police scanners. Those shows are not really directed at professionals and people who, I think, reflect what Redondo Beach is really like.”

Redondo Beach is not the first community to expand the meaning of “neighborhood watch.”

Manhattan Beach and San Clemente are among cities that provide volunteers with radar guns to track down suspected speeders. And the Los Angeles Police Department has a program in North Hills in the San Fernando Valley in which volunteers keep records of vehicles they have seen frequenting suspected drug locales.

The North Hills program “smacks of Big Brotherism at its worst,” said Robin Toma, a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California.

He also expressed concern about Redondo Beach’s plan, saying there is no guarantee that the information provided by the volunteers would be reliable. Nevertheless, he and others at the organization stopped short of condemning the program outright.

Said ACLU spokesman Allan Parachini: “We’re concerned about this kind of program because of the potential of abuse, but we’re not assuming abuses will happen.”

Advertisement

Kauffman bristled at the suggestion that the program would have neighbors spying on one another and insisted that the volunteers would aim their attention at criminals, not law-abiding citizens.

“We’re not creating a Big Brother system,” Kauffman said. “We’re interested in criminal activity. The only people who should fear this program are those involved in criminal activity on a consistent basis.

“If you’re in that group, then I’m sure you will object.”

Advertisement