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news
Lockyer
will monitor Inglewood police probes
By Luis Peña
Summer On-line Forty-Niner
INGLEWOOD — Attorney
General Bill Lockyer and Assemblymember Jerome E. Horton of
the 51st Assembly District held a joint press conference at
the Inglewood City Hall Tuesday concerning the Inglewood police
incident.
“I am extremely disturbed by the contents of the video,” Horton
said. “I have a young son… and a daughter... and they too
could be the victim of police aggression.”
According to Lockyer, there are already too many investigations
in progress, including local and federal ones and adding another
investigation would only impede the resolution of the incident.
“The point of it being, you have so many cooks, no meal gets
out of the kitchen,” Lockyer said.
Lockyer’s office will instead focus on monitoring the investigations
that are in progress.
“Our principle responsibility is to monitor, watch all of
the investigations to make sure that they are fair, timely
and complete,” Lockyer said.
Lockyer also said that he has some suggestions based on work
that his office did in the 1998 Tyisha Miller shooting death,
which involved the Riverside Police Department. The suggestions
include deploying audio and video recording devices on police
vehicles and use of force policy.
“We in the city of Inglewood and the police department are
conducting an internal investigation,” said Joseph T. Rouzan,
Jr., Inglewood City administrator. “I can report to you that
a great majority of the witnesses that we want to interview
have either contacted us, talked to us or refused to talk
to us.”
“We have about 100,000 sworn police officers in the state
of California who provide public safety for 34 million people,”
Lockyer said. “They need support when they do their job well
and I think they understand when there are problems it shatters
the public’s trust and it makes it harder for them to do their
job well.”
Mitchell Crooks, the man who videotaped the beating, was arrested
on outstanding warrants, one of which was for hit and run.
There are 2.2 million outstanding arrest warrants in the state,
according to Lockyer.
“Law enforcement officials have a duty if they encounter those
individuals to notify the courts that have issued orders to
them to arrest those people if they come into contact,” Lockyer
said.
Lieutenant police officer, Alexander Perez, said that the
Inglewood Police Department has applied for accreditation
with Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies
(CALEA) and that it has gone through their review process.
According to CALEA’s website their “accreditation program
is to improve delivery of law enforcement service by offering
a body of standards, developed by law enforcement practitioners.”
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Luis Pena/Summer
On-line Forty-Niner
State Attorney General Bill Lockyer speaks out
on Inglewood police beating at a Tuesday press conference.
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