Where Did All The Cops Go?

On Friday, I went to the Giants Opening Day game. After the game, I heard that an unruly patron caused a disturbance in the Gotham Club and was ejected.

Currently, cops usually eject people from games at the direction of the Giants. In a few cases, the cops may need to pull the unruly fan away, or escort them out using a control hold. Most interactions do not cause any injury. Cops then fill out a card with the fan’s information and then go back to patrolling the game.

However, starting tomorrow, April 12, all of this will change. Now that simple interaction, with no injury and no formal penalty, except missing the rest of the game, will be a reportable use of force. This change leads to much more paperwork, including a police report, a supervisor evaluation, and review of available video of the incident. The Giants/Dodger series games should be interesting.

2ND LAW OF MOTION: FORCE

In my last piece I wrote about staffing and related it to Sir Isaac Newton’s Laws of Motion. The second law of motion is Force. The second law of motion is stated as:

The acceleration of an object depends on the mass of the object and the force applied.

The staffing crisis is accelerating, and the new Use of Force policy is a massive object that will only apply more force and lead to the acceleration of departures.

As discussed above, on April 12 the SFPD Use of Force policy is changing. The already cumbersome 19 page policy, will now weigh in at 21 pages long with 120 uses of the word “Shall,” up from 104 in the previous version. This means at a moment’s notice; all cops must make sure they know all the “Shalls” and not run afoul of them while under intense stress in the field. In addition to that behemoth, there is a 6-page explanation bulletin, and a training guide to help cops understand what the policy means.

I’m sure these 30 or so pages will make everything so much clearer, like mud.

This force being applied to the members will only push those considering leaving the department, to go through with it. We all signed up for this job to help people. To be cops. Police work has changed so much recently, that it’s hard to see any similarity to what is used to be. We did not sign up to be hall monitors, and with these new policies, people will start looking to other places where they can actually do police work.

BIGGER CHANGES

There are three rather large changes in addition to many smaller ones. These three bigger changes will have immeasurable impact on staffing levels and leave many people wondering where are all the cops? And why wont the cops do anything?

1)    Using force to overcome any resistance is now a reportable use of force.

Under the new policy any force required to overcome resistance is now reportable. Even if no pain or injury was caused, the mere grabbing someone’s arm, wrist to stop them from leaving, will now be reportable.

This would not be that big of a deal if the steps required for the report weren’t changing too. Now with every use of force comes video review. Sergeants shall watch the video they determine is substantive. Of course, in the volumes of pages that is the new policy, no one could bother to define the term substantive. Merriam-Webster’s defines substantive as, “having substance: involving matters of major or practical importance to all concerned.” But how do you know if video has substance until you review it? We can assume someone’s video is not pertinent, to the matter, but we all know to assume is to make an ass out of “u” and “me.”

2)    Drawing/Exhibiting Firearm is now reportable.

The new policy now requires the reporting of drawing or exhibiting (displaying) your firearm. While it is not a “reportable use of force,” the drawing of the firearm is now required to be reported. While this change is made to track how many times we draw our firearm, it should just be a check box form at best. Instead, this reportable incident now also requires Sergeants to review video footage to ensure the drawing was reasonable.

These incidents would include a building alarm where cops conduct a building search and find no one inside. Now it would need to be reported to the Sergeant and the video reviewed. It begs the question, if Sergeants are stuck inside watching hours of basically useless video, who will be on the street to supervise the cops?

3)    Safeguarding dignity means no one can be ordered to sit on the ground, except as a last resort and only in exigency circumstances.

Usually after detaining someone, police ask or order the detainee sits on the ground. This is not done to dehumanize or eliminate someone’s dignity. It’s actually done because trying to run from a seated position is more difficult than if the detainee is already standing. It allows the officer a split-second advantage to recognize if their detainee is going to run and stop it before they escape.

But now to safeguard dignity, cops will no longer be allowed to take this step, unless it is a last resort and it is exigent. In addition, the reason you ordered someone to sit on the ground shall be articulated in a police report.

So, something every cop has been trained to do, is now eliminated by policy, effective tomorrow.

Interestingly enough, ordering someone down onto their knees is not subject to this same level of scrutiny. In fact, if you order someone to their knees, it does not implicate the new policy at all, and has no special reporting requirement other than justifying the detention. I guess the policy writers must think having detainees on their knees is more dignified?

These changes will no doubt have a major impact on operations. It will create hours of administrative tasks for patrol officers and their Sergeants. Sadly, this will only create more crime as fewer cops are out on the street and visibly on patrol.

QUICK UPDATE ON STAFFING

I know I’ve been writing a lot on staffing lately. Mostly because I’m getting sent information like I’m drinking from a firehose. Also, because outside of an upper management meeting that happened last week, only about 2 years too late, nothing seems to be being done to address the almost one cop a day loss to the ranks of the SFPD. Talk is cheap, money talks and bullshit walks.

With all that in mind, this past Saturday the department held the Physical Agility Test (PAT), which is one of the tests for applicants in the hiring process. I’m told we usually get 40-80 attendees for these things, which ends up with 10-12 viable candidates.

On Saturday, only 8 people came to take the PAT. Eight!

In the immortal words of NASA Apollo 13 Commander Jim Lovell, “Houston we have a problem!”

Click Here to Review the Text of the New Use of Force Policy - DGO 5.01