[HN Gopher] Court blocks Inglewood from destroying police discip...
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Court blocks Inglewood from destroying police disciplinary records
Author : alphabettsy
Score : 81 points
Date : 2021-12-30 16:44 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.latimes.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.latimes.com)
| MisterBastahrd wrote:
| What is the cost of storing public records versus destroying
| them? I'm betting there isn't really that much of a difference
| given the main consideration is digital, not space.
| sergers wrote:
| As others have stated for legal liability purposes.
|
| If you werent legally required to store documents or there is a
| limitation on length, you wouldn't want to continue to store
| those records.
|
| I work alongside hospital radiology systems.
|
| Large organizations only keep what's required and are looking
| to purge all else (like deleting mammos after 15 years,
| pediatrics after 21... Requirements vary state to state in
| USA).
|
| So if a patient comes suing you with a malpractice in the
| future, they can say they no longer have the records (as they
| only kept till legally required).
|
| I doubt they would win a case solely on this but would
| definately help them.
|
| A vendor created a cloud archive solution for reports/images,
| with unlimited retention.
|
| Customers (hospital organizations) are demanding features for
| purging data aka "retention management".
|
| So I bet this happens in all industries/businesses
| zaphar wrote:
| There is more to the liability than just the threat of
| malpractice. Holding data of a sensitive nature means you
| might accidentally leak that data. The more you hold the
| worse the leak is. Being able to delete that data enables you
| to somewhat control the blast radius of a leak.
| zepto wrote:
| Is it? The records date back to 1991. Possibly a lot of them
| were still paper at that time.
| kingcharles wrote:
| It's not the physical cost, it's the PR cost. A lot of the time
| the public body doesn't know what is in its files until someone
| makes a request, then they read the record and realize how many
| skeletons they have in their closet.
|
| No records = no skeletons; no bad PR. Better to destroy
| everything all of the time.
| ssklash wrote:
| The key attribute of these records is _disciplinary_. Which
| just so happen to be subject to an unfulfilled freedom of
| information request.
|
| This is called police corruption.
| alphabettsy wrote:
| The cost is likely PR and Legal. Appeals and investigations as
| a result of what the public might find could be very expensive
| and/or embarrassing.
| decebalus1 wrote:
| There are three costs basically:
|
| - storage, which is pretty darn cheap, easy to predict, easy to
| budget for, etc..
|
| - retrieval for FOIA, which is easily quantified in workhours
| and sometimes deferred via fees.
|
| - liability, which is very hard to quantify, considering you
| never know what skeleton a nosy citizen would be able to
| uncover.
|
| The latter is mainly the reason public records disappear.
|
| I'm glad most parts of the US are still in the 'let's take this
| to court' territory. We should be very afraid if we go into the
| 'an unfortunate accident destroyed all the records' area of
| dealing with this stuff.
| kingcharles wrote:
| Having police disciplinary records is important for criminal
| defendants. Sometimes prosecutors keep what is called "Brady
| Lists" of all the cops who are known liars who should be kept
| away from the witness stand or else their credibility will be
| ruined and the prosecutor will lose their case. So prosecutors
| have tried to keep these lists secret because they need bogus
| cops as these cops will go to any lengths to convict a person,
| just like the prosecutor's office.
|
| If the disciplinary records can be destroyed then this is a huge
| bonus for the government as without them the cops are totally
| clean.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brady_v._Maryland#Aftermath
|
| In my criminal case, of the two officers that indicted me, one
| badly beat an unarmed Mexican man who had committed no crime and
| then lied about it to the investigators saying that the man "ran
| into the front of the squad car" (luckily the investigators
| believed the passers-by who testified); the other cop was caught
| making up fake search warrants to go through people's houses, but
| managed to wriggle out of the charges and quit the force to avoid
| anything further. [in the first case the prosecutors have never
| disclosed the misconduct; in the second they were very proactive
| in disclosure]
| user982 wrote:
| Here's a recent example of this in action:
| ...the racist exchanges have led to the dismissal of at least
| 85 criminal cases involving the officers implicated in the
| scandal. It's possible this hatred and misconduct
| would never have been exposed. But two officers apparently felt
| untouchable enough that they felt comfortable spray-painting a
| swastika on a vehicle they towed following a report of mail
| theft. Several of those officers have been
| investigated for deploying excessive force or killing citizens.
| In almost every case, they've been cleared of wrongdoing.
|
| https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20211212/15551548112/calif...
| dundarious wrote:
| Excerpt from another article on the same events, https://www.
| latimes.com/california/story/2021-12-08/torrance...
|
| > In the Mitchell case, that could be especially concerning.
| According to district attorney's records reviewed by The
| Times, Concannon once sent a troubling text message referring
| to a deposition he gave in an "officer-involved shooting."
|
| > "They believed our lies. Good job sticking to the script,"
| he wrote. "LMAO, that's what they call a W."
|
| > According to a Times review of public records, Concannon
| has shot only one person during his career: Christopher
| DeAndre Mitchell.
|
| Referring to this case, where it was found to be "lawful
| self-defense": https://da.lacounty.gov/sites/default/files/pd
| f/JSID_OIS_10_...
|
| Obviously this is totally inconclusive and in no way proves
| Concannon's guilt, but note the obstruction of the bodycam
| for the crucial moments:
|
| > In the body worn footage, Concannon appeared to move
| slightly back along the side of the car as he put away his
| flashlight. Concannon's left hand can be seen coming up to
| brace his firing hand on the service weapon. After the shift
| to a two-handed firing position, the body worn camera's view
| of Mitchell was obstructed by Concannon's hands. As a result,
| Mitchell is not visible on the body worn footage during the
| three seconds preceding the first shot. Concannon can be
| heard on the video repeating the command, "Get out of the
| car!" more forcefully during this interval. About one second
| after repeating that command, the first shot was fired.
| kingcharles wrote:
| Trying to get a prosecution against a cop is almost
| impossible. For starters, the primary body you must report a
| crime by a cop to is the police station where he works, as
| generally they will have jurisdiction over the issue. And
| they are going to laugh you out of the station. What's your
| next move? Go to the prosecutor and complain? ROFL.
|
| Believe me, I've tried all of these avenues. I should scan
| the letters I've received from these agencies, they're
| hilarious. Basically they'll come back and say that they have
| a policy of not investigating crimes by their officers and
| officers from other jurisdictions. I've even taken this
| through the courts. If the crime was committed as part of an
| investigation into a suspected crime, then the courts ruled
| that it is acceptable and not actionable.
|
| The news articles you see where the cops actually got
| indicted are the million-to-ones. Even Kim Foxx (State's
| Attorney for Cook County - i.e. Chicago) has stated in
| interviews that even if she gets an indictment against a cop,
| getting a conviction is almost impossible.
| jcrawfordor wrote:
| While this is only a partial solution, a number of cities
| throughout the US have adopted or are adopting a model
| usually called "civilian oversight" in which complaints of
| misconduct by police officers can be directed to a
| separate, independent police oversight body. The police
| oversight body is separated from law enforcement by an
| administrative firewall and usually restricts any of its
| staff being former law enforcement officers to further
| improve separation (common sources of staff are insurance,
| personnel security, and litigation investigators). While
| criminal enforcement is a judicial matter and not one of
| administrative oversight, there's usually a perception that
| civilian oversight helps to bring information to light that
| might motivate a DA or other prosecutor to pursue the case.
|
| This is only a half-measure at best but it's something that
| is gaining traction, and you might be able to push for it
| in your area.
| bmitc wrote:
| > "This premise that there was an intent to beat the clock is
| ridiculous," Inglewood Mayor James T. Butts Jr. said at the time.
|
| It has become surreal that public officials can get away with
| blatantly lying these days.
|
| Edit: Interestingly enough, the mayor is not white, which
| surprised me at first given this stance, but then I found that
| the mayor came up through law enforcement, was deputy chief in
| Inglewood, and chief of police in Santa Monica. This is what
| people talk about when police are viewed as the state-sanctioned
| gang.
| vmception wrote:
| its ACAB spray painted everywhere, not AWCAB, for a reason
|
| the incentive model is broken part, and that incentive model is
| highly correlated with attracting recruits of different
| extremes, but its the incentive model under focus
| kingcharles wrote:
| Most states have zero or minimal statutes requiring document
| retention by public bodies. I know several times I have requested
| documents from public bodies only to have them immediately throw
| them in the garbage so that they do not have to disclose them.
|
| I even took this to the appellate courts at one point as the
| argument was whether documents in the garbage are still in the
| possession of the public body. They said they weren't, I said
| they were. Courts ruled with the public body.
|
| (One of my arguments was also that they can put them in the
| garbage at the time of the request, write the denial letter, and
| then pull them back out of the garbage)
| sumthinprofound wrote:
| most states absolutely do have document retention schedules for
| state/municipal agencies.
| swlp21 wrote:
| I think there is an important word missing from the title, it is
| Police /Disciplinary/ Records that are being referenced. That is
| a significant difference and there is a very strong case that
| these should be retained in exactly the same way criminal records
| are retained (essentially forever) and for the same purpose - so
| they can be looked up and referenced should any officer come to
| attention and a fuller picture of their character is required.
| alphabettsy wrote:
| Good point. Done.
| onphonenow wrote:
| Is this the case with criminal records?
|
| There was a rumor that in the Rittenhouse case, one of the
| other folks involved had a much much larger actual criminal
| history then the one they released, but that a lot of the
| history was hidden in various ways?
|
| This was supposedly misinformation but the details were pretty
| specific, and they seemed to indicate that there might be a
| method to basically hide past convictions so a full picture
| would not be available.
|
| Has anyone heard of something called "Expungement"?
|
| Google got me to these guys: https://www.record-clear.com/
|
| They claim even felonies can be removed, even if there are
| probation violations etc.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| >There was a rumor that in the Rittenhouse case, one of the
| other folks involved had a much much larger actual criminal
| history then the one they released, but that a lot of the
| history was hidden in various ways?
|
| As an aside, there's a ~2hr video floating around the
| internet of bodycam footage from arm guy's DUI arrest between
| the shooting and the trail. They dropped it, presumably
| because an active DUI case makes for a crappy prosecution
| witness. Police officers don't even get treatment that good.
| If they get as far as being cited (vs a free ride home, which
| is what they often get) the prosecution typically makes them
| plead down and spend thousands doing so rather than just
| dropping it.
|
| That said, the DUI in question is an example of a lot of
| things that are wrong with policing (the cops in the video
| are professional and civil the whole time) and I think it's
| worth watching just for that.
| netizen-936824 wrote:
| Looks like those guys only handle California. Seems like it's
| a CA specific law, unsure if available in other states
| alphabettsy wrote:
| Expungement is a thing, but even more importantly in court
| it's usually at a judges discretion whether or not evidence
| is allowed and criminal history is a type of evidence.
|
| Sometimes evidence is not allowed because it is considered
| prejudicial.
|
| The purpose of a criminal trial is to determine guilt on a
| specific crime rather than character. That excluded evidence
| is sometimes allowed at sentencing.
|
| There was controversy in the Rittenhouse case about his prior
| comments and actions not being allowed into evidence.
|
| https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/crime/2021/09/17/kenosha.
| ..
| jcrawfordor wrote:
| Most US states have some form of expungement law which allows
| past criminal records to be cleared. It's mostly intended to
| help ex-cons with reintegration, because it can be so
| difficult to get employment (and in many cases voting rights,
| public services, housing, etc) with a criminal history.
| Basically criminal records are a major part of the "cycle of
| criminality" that causes recidivism because former criminals
| are unable to support themselves by means other than crime
| (can't get a job, etc), and so expungement policies are
| expected to have a positive impact on both crime and social
| welfare. The details all vary from state to state, often
| there's a limit on how severe of an offense can be expunged,
| it has to be a certain time in the past, and typically the
| records are not really "expunged" but removed from public
| reports---law enforcement and judges can often still see
| them, as well as federal background checks, and sometimes
| anyone can ask for a court order to unseal. The expungement
| itself usually requires a court order, so the court makes a
| judgment whether or not expungement serves the public
| interest (i.e. will allow the person to contribute more fully
| to society). There are a lot of law firms like that that
| specialize in expungement because there are many people with
| criminal records and in most cases the process is a pretty
| straightforward paperwork exercise, so you can make a steady
| profit stream with a few paralegals preparing form letters.
|
| It becomes a different matter for people who are charged with
| crimes and otherwise in court, as courts have rules about
| what criminal history can or cannot be introduced in the
| court. There's a general principle that a jury shouldn't know
| about a person's unrelated previous convictions, since it
| will bias them towards the person being a criminal despite
| not actually being evidence relevant to the case in question.
| But I think there are plenty of exceptions, i.e. if the
| person has been convicted for pretty much the same crime
| before it can usually be introduced by the prosecution as
| circumstantial evidence that they apparently have the
| skills/means/motivation to commit such a crime. But you can't
| just tell the jury that they have a rap sheet a mile long.
| I'm not a lawyer and only know so much about this but I
| believe that usually pretty much the same rules apply to
| witnesses. You can bring up that a witness has a criminal
| record if it's somehow directly relevant to their testimony
| (i.e. they have lied to a court in the past) but you can't
| just tell the jury that they have a criminal record to try to
| ruin their reputation. Although it usually fails in practice,
| the justice system is at least theoretically built around the
| principle that people can and do change, and so prior
| criminality shouldn't be held against them if it isn't
| somehow contributory to the current situation.
| hguant wrote:
| The accused's criminal history comes up more in sentencing
| than it does in actual criminal cases - in the US system
| you're being tried on the crime before the court, not
| anything from your past. There are obvious exceptions -
| someone who is suspected of murdering their spouse who has
| prior domestic violence charges is one you see a lot - but
| in general, that comes up during the sentencing, where the
| judge has a lot of leeway to tailor the sentence to the
| circumstances.
| rak wrote:
| To add to this, a lot of times expungement isn't very
| useful because there are a ton of private companies that
| scrape these records (including arrest records) constantly.
| Some of these companies have business models built around
| conducting background checks and an unfortunate number of
| them have business models that rely solely on getting
| people to pay them to "remove" these records.
| jcrawfordor wrote:
| Yes, this is a big issue! Part of the reason why e.g.
| California and other states have introduced "ban the box"
| legislation to restrict employers asking about criminal
| history, when they already have an expungement process,
| is because of this issue exactly. Most pre-employment
| background checks are done through vendors like
| LexisNexis that pull records at the time of the incident
| and then retain them permanently, so expungement doesn't
| do anything. The whole private background check and
| criminal records industry can be surprisingly sketchy,
| including behavior that looks to reasonable people like
| extortion, but it's resisted almost any regulation or
| oversight. Some of this comes from an inherent tension
| between public records and personal privacy (are the
| actions of law enforcement a matter of public interest or
| a matter of personal privacy? the line can be very
| blurry), but a lot of it is also just because this
| industry is politically and financially powerful and any
| action against it tends to look "soft on crime."
| [deleted]
| alphabettsy wrote:
| Meanwhile, police departments around NY state are just ignoring
| the requests.
|
| https://www.democratandchronicle.com/story/news/2021/12/06/n...
| ashtonkem wrote:
| It's long been a trope that Police aren't responsive to the
| citizens they nominally serve, but nowadays they aren't even
| controlled by the political leaders of their municipalities.
| Heck, it's not _that_ uncommon to see cops threatening
| politicians and just ... getting away with it.
| craftinator wrote:
| It's a rough time when the 2nd Amendment gun nuts start to
| look prescient.
| ViViDboarder wrote:
| The article states that this is an issue because they are
| planning to destroy documents that are part of a request and
| haven't released anything since 2019. So same thing in LA it
| seems.
| xbar wrote:
| US municipal police departments require a lot more change before
| they are going to start achieving their stated missions.
| ssklash wrote:
| Depending on your perspective, they a _re_ achieving their
| stated missions, quite successfully. They do not specify who
| they are protecting and serving, but there is certainly a class
| of people who are quite well protected and served by police.
| gnud wrote:
| Hmm. Are they straight up lying here, or am I missing something?
|
| First, "The attached records are no longer required to be
| retained by law and are not needed for any pending litigation."
|
| Then, later, "The city of Inglewood said in court declarations
| that some records requested by the ACLU should be temporarily
| withheld pending ongoing investigations."
| some_furry wrote:
| https://archive.md/rAgI0
| notyourwork wrote:
| A police force without transparency is as good as a politician
| who doesn't want equal opportunity voting. These are not people
| that represent my best interests. It is being irritating that the
| bodies of our country that are intended to support, represent and
| carry us are the same ones that try to tear us down and hold us
| back from prospering.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| As a general rule, the truth of moral-institutional
| declarations by public figures is inversely proportional to
| their frequency and fervency.
| notyourwork wrote:
| As I've gotten older, my conclusion is all people are just
| people. Not all Doctors are best in class, some are shit. Not
| all politicians want to be there for the good of people, and
| maybe some do.
|
| Overall everyone is on a spectrum of really extremes with
| most falling in the middle. It does seem the outliers are the
| ones that society props up and puts in the lime light. Idk,
| maybe I'm jaded but sometimes I look at this and sort of
| laugh that we have not blown this planet up yet.
| literallyaduck wrote:
| "Rather than destroying them we now store them all together
| unsorted in a giant box under the water pipe for the building.
| Hope nothing happens!"
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