Racial Slurs Uttered on Police Line

The Huntington Beach and Westminster police departments launched separate investigations Wednesday into complaints that racial slurs were spoken over a police radio frequency as officers hunted for suspects in a bank robbery.

Investigators will examine tapes from the radio transmission, trying to match the voices that uttered the slur with officers from both agencies who responded to the Huntington Beach heist, spokesmen for both departments said.

“Everybody is hoping it’s not their officer--if it’s indeed an officer,” Westminster Police Capt. Andrew Hall said. “We were appalled by it when we heard. We’re going to do everything we can to get to the bottom of this.”

The frequency--known by police as Orange South--was being used by both agencies as well as the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, Orange County district attorney’s office and the FBI. But experts said the frequency could have been penetrated by any other law enforcement officer in the county or by an amateur scanner operator intent on causing a disruption.

The latest complaints of slurs come less than a year after racial insults were heard over a police scanner during the Little Saigon protests in Westminster. Investigators later blamed the slurs on an amateur radio operator but acknowledged they did not have enough evidence to charge him.

About 35 police officers from Westminster and Huntington Beach rushed to the corner of Bolsa Avenue and Goldenwest Street about 11:30 a.m. after a 911 call alerted them to a heist at a Wells Fargo bank.

Three men armed with handguns had taken over the building and struck a female bank clerk over the head with the butt of a pistol. As police arrived, the men fled, leaving at least some of the money they had taken behind, Huntington Beach Lt. Luis Ochoa said.

One suspect was caught outside the bank, but two others managed to escape, forcing police to seal off a half-square-mile area and hunt for the men, both of whom are African American.

Trying to Match Voices

During the manhunt, about 1:22 p.m., a voice on the scanner said “What, are they gonna check every nigger in the city?” Moments later, a dispatcher came on the frequency, instructing officers to “check for an open mike.” Ten minutes later, a different male voice was heard saying “I’ve got two niggers over here.”

Investigators will spend the next few days trying to match the voices on the tapes with officers at the scene.

“We’re listening to the tape, we are listening for recognizable voices,” said Lt. Chuck Thomas. “Any derogatory comment will not be tolerated and therefore, we will be investigating this as thoroughly as possible.”

Hall said Westminster police investigators will do the same.

“We will get a copy of the tape,” he said, “and play it to every supervisor, ask every one, ‘Do you recognize this voice?’ We’ll ask the dispatcher.”

The possibility that a Huntington Beach officer might have uttered the slur would prove a bitter disappointment because the agency has tried to preserve an atmosphere of racial sensitivity, according to Councilman Tom Harman.

Harman said he hoped an investigation exonerates the Police Department but insisted that guilty officers should face stiff punishment.

“It’s unacceptable and simply cannot be tolerated in our department,” he said.

Determining who delivered the insults will be very difficult, according to Michael Obermeier, a Santa Ana College engineer designated by the Amateur Radio Relay League to monitor airwaves for violations of FCC regulations and league standards.

Although the technology exists to track people who deliberately penetrate police frequencies, authorities must on most occasions be ready to trace the interference while it happens.

Obermeier, who helped Westminster investigators earlier this year trace the source of the Little Saigon slurs, said officers are usually aware that they are being listened to and for that reason doubted that an officer made the remarks.

“I would say that most likely it was an individual who is not a police officer who used that opportunity to make a jab knowing that they probably won’t get caught,” he said.

In the Little Saigon case, police accused an amateur radio operator of making racial slurs as thousands of people gathered outside a video store displaying the flag of Vietnam and a photo of Communist leader Ho Chi Minh.

One particular person has recently invaded the police frequency on numerous occasions, hurling abuse at officers, according to Orange County Sheriff’s Lt. Collin Murphy, who is in charge of radio and dispatch.

“Every so often you’ll get unauthorized communication, sporadic,” he said. “They switch around on the frequencies. Every agency gets it.”

Murphy added that new radio equipment for law enforcement agencies countywide will be launched in February. He said the new multimillion-dollar digital equipment, replacing the 30-year-old system, will be encrypted to prevent “radio hackers” from breaking into transmissions.