A culture of favoritism within the San Diego Police Department has recently been described in a number of civil suits against the Department by plaintiffs who allege the misconduct.
The U-T San Diego picked up the story yesterday, with a report by Jeff McDonald and Greg Moran, on how the case of former officer Anthony Arevalos – who is currently in prison for 8 years – has produced over a dozen law suits against the city for his conduct. Eleven of the 14 suits have been settled – to the tune of $1.55 million – and 3 are pending.
The U-T article described the culture of favoritism:
Two of the remaining cases portray a department that fails to discipline wayward officers, with a command staff that provides special protections to certain employees and their families and to other law enforcement professionals. The allegations are contained in testimony from officers drummed out amid corruption allegations themselves.
SDPD Chief Lansdowne.
The article goes on to state, that during a deposition taken last July of former officer Arthur Perea for one of those cases, Perea testified that based on his 18 years with the SDPD, “police officials routinely hide officer misdeeds from the public”, and that “commanders favor officers who are ‘in the club’ over others who are not.”
Perea had quit the force 2 years ago amidst complaints about his own sexual misconduct, none of which resulted in him being charged. He stated:
“A lot of things that happened on the San Diego Police Department don’t ever hit the media. A lot of misconduct.”
Perea was asked to be more specific, during the deposition. He answered:
“Officers getting arrested for DUI off duty. DUI crashes. Beating up prostitutes. Pursuits involving other law enforcement agencies while off duty. Sex on duty. And those — and the code of silence is that the department keeps it quiet and does not release it to the media or outside of the department.”
The U-T article also lists another former police officer, 27-year veteran Kevin Friedman, who lost his career with the force after admitting that he torn up a traffic citation for a city prosecutor. The former sergeant also testified in the case that during his training at the police academy, recruits were taught not to ticket other cops or prosecutors. Friedman admitted that he trashed over a dozen citations for friends during his time with the department, as – he said under oath – did many other officers.
Children of cops were also allowed to escape charges, the U-T article continued, when involved in illegal incidents. Friedman said this was standard operating procedure in the department.
The woman plaintiff in another suit against the SDPD claims that that Police Chief Lansdowne created “a virtual green light (for officers) to commit misconduct without the possibility of sanctions.” She claimed that after she reported being sexually attacked by Arevalos, his supervisor refused to look into it or call in Internal Affairs.
The complaint charges that Lansdowne disbanded the anti-corruption unit shortly after taking the helm, changing the manner in which complaints against officers were reported, in order to keep control of any review. The suit states:
“Lansdowne did this to try to keep complaints in house at each station house where the supervisor of the officer complained of would handle it. In most cases, the supervisors took no action …”
In another case discussed in the article, a detective with the gang unit drove his patrol car into a utility box, and there were allegations that he had been drinking. Instead of calling the crash in and triggering an investigation into whether Det. Jeffrey Blackford was a DUI, the investigation was delayed for hours, and in the meantime Blackford was allowed to call his department friends to the crash site.
Officer Henry Castro was called to testify for a deposition, and he stated that a security video of the crash showed that police officers were attempting to cover up the DUI, by “feeding him, to bring down blood alcohol levels,” and by having Blackford “run wind sprints to lower blood alcohol levels.”
The U-T reported:
The detective eventually pleaded guilty to alcohol-related charges. City Attorney Jan Goldsmith forwarded information about the conduct of Blackford’s friends on the force to District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis, who found no charges were warranted.
There is some level of civilian review of the police in San Diego, as the U-T article explained:
The city has empaneled a volunteer group called the Citizens’ Review Board on Police Practices. The appointees do not conduct independent investigations. They rely on the department’s Internal Affairs division for the information they use to determine whether complaints are valid.
According to three recent quarterly reports, the board exonerated or ruled unfounded 147 of 172 complaints, or 85 percent. Thirteen complaints were sustained, about 1 in every 13.
Another clear instance of department favoritism did make it into the press, and was also reported by the U-T. Back in 2012, a son of a San Diego police captain “was accused of groping two women, hitting another in the face and smashing a car window during an alcohol-fueled disturbance in Pacific Beach” and he was not taken to jail.
Alex Guaderrama, son of Capt. Manny Guaderrama, was treated for cuts, put in the front seat of a police cruiser unhandcuffed and driven to a parking lot where his mother picked him up. Later, San Diego police officials defended the decision to permit the sexual battery and vandalism suspect to go free.
After the report hit the press, there had to be a regrouping of sorts. Eventually, over 6 months after the incident, Guaderrama pleaded guilty to four misdemeanor charges, received three years summary probation, $850 fine, and ordered to perform 50 days of public work service.
As the issue of department favoritism under Lansdowne simmers, there could be morale problems as there is a reported “brain drain” from the top echelons of the force. A Voice of San Diego article recently counted three high-profile officers leaving San Diego, and included this quote from Jeff Jordon, vice president of the San Diego Police Officers Association:
“There’s going to be massive turnover in the department soon.”
The City’s ability to retain police officers will probably be an issue in the upcoming mayoral campaign, no doubt.
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Good for excellent U-T reporters Jeff McDonald and Greg Moran for this story.
I love that infractions are kept at the precinct to be handled, rather than going to HQ and that the citizens review board only looks at predigested material coming from the Police Department’s own Internal Affairs cops. A perfect remedy for any intrusive complaints from the public or the civilian agency tasked with keeping the police on their best behavior. And when it comes to Police Chief Lansdowne or Sheriff Gore, the District Attorney never sees or hears anything that would call for her intervention.
Good points. I hope the next mayor removes Lansdowne. The department needs new blood at the top. Norm Stamper, care to consult on the new appointment?. PS- Jeff McDonald is an excellent reporter!
What do you expect from the police force that shot Jacob Faust and Danny “the Walker” Woodyard.
[sarcasm] But at least we don’t have a police gang like the Lynwood Vikings, right? [/sarcasm]
The more things change the more they stay the same…. back the final days of the San Diego Door they (I was gone by then) ran a story regarding date rape allegations involving an SDPD officer. The SD Police Officers Association, then headed by former Red Squad leader Jack Pearson filed suit… former judge and attorney Roger Ruffin stepped in to help the Door and the case disappeared after he requested access to the officer in question’s personnel files…
No single person can clean up the P.D., not even a crusading D.A., and certainly not the D.A. now in office. San Diego’s department is probably even beyond the control of its city council. What’s needed is a local commission with subpoena powers and investigative help from the state of California or the Feds.
If the SD=UT can summon the will and energy to summarize these civil suits against the city then San Diego may well be on the verge of finding its courage and ending the almost religious adoration of its police as a force that must be kept above and beyond government oversight.
I think X-Box should come out with a Civl War game for the most honest depiction of this storm. All the Druglords in San Diego hav a meeting to divide all the business. It would be better than Scareface. Who plays the part of Al Paccino..PitBull or 50cent….would be good in a Flick like this. You all know who has taken over San Diego the meth capital of the United States. East vs. West.. it’s a dead draw..South Vs. North, now would Camp Penalton take care of business ???
Both the police department and Bonnie Dumanis are poster children for corruption and abuse of power. When will anybody challenge them? Thanks U-T for shining a light on this, but unfortunately I think they’ll get some kind of blowback on this.
Does anyone remember the allegations against SDPD of command manipulating crime stats in the city, for benefit of making the mayor look good and for tourism, by having officers responding to calls talk the victims out of filing official reports?
The allegations initially came from IIRC an El Cajon beat cop who noticed that city crime stats up and down the state were ever increasing, yet San Diego’s were falling- in all categories but one, car theft, which mirrored the same rises all other cities’ rising rates.
He concluded that because this was the only crime which MUST be reported, due to requirements of insurance claims, it did reflect the real trends and other crimes were being intentionally unreported.
While purely speculative (but common sense) his allegations were somewhat validated by an incident soon after:
An attempted rape i0n Mission Valley went unreported when the victim was talked out of filing a report by the responding investigators- thus no composite sketch was distributed, no suspect was searched for, even though she later was able to accurately describe the perpetrator.
Who two weeks later did in fact successfully rape another woman about a block away from the original unreported crime.
If real police reform is what we seek and you want to create a sense of outrage in the citizens, perhaps focusing less on the hanky panky of officers getting the same favoritism most people would negotiate for their own children if they became so entangled, and more on how the safety of the public is in real jeopardy by outrageous levels of malfeasance, is in order.
My feelings on the current chief are mixed. He has a gruff demeanor reminiscent of either a hard core military man who takes no BS and runs a tight ship- or an old school senior cop cozy with corrupt officials. However if it was the latter we would assume Bob Filner would have had his eye on immediately sacking him, but we heard nary a hint of that.
Before we throw out the baby with the bathwater we might want to give Lansdowne the benefit of doubt because he just might be an effective leader and we may not realize just how much worse things could be. Does anyone remember the era of some years ago when it seemed about every 6 months a person with a tree branch, a cement trowel, or other common item in their hand was gunned down by several officers or more, seemingly with written orders to empty their weapons in the suspect as they went down?
Well as far as I can tell on the surface it appears when Lansdowne came to town from San Jose, that nonsense ended just like that. Again, the most important thing here is the safety of the citizens.
I don’t expect anyone on the otherside of the border to make a single complaint about the new police Chief. I don’t expect anyone in east San Diego to be disapointed with the new Police Chief.Cause they know they will just have to police themselves regardless. I don’t think any of the more successful drug dealers in San Diego will feel at all discouraged by the new police Chief. Cause they all know theres alot of need for meth in San Diego. I have a pretty good hunch alot of the wild bunch of San Diegos Finest are pretty sure to get along real well with the new police Chief,cause the Deputy D.A.’s sure won’t take up very many cases against San Diego police officers. and the mre there is the less the media will get to know,same as always in San Diego