Tag: Units | Page 3

Internal Investigation Shows The Houston PD’s Narcotics Units Was An Unsupervised Mess

July 18, 2020/in Internet Security

The Houston PD decided to take a look at itself after a botched drug raid ended with two people killed by officers. The raid was predicated on pure bullshit. Officer Gerald Goines turned two Houston residents into dangerous drug traffickers by using a nonexistent confidential informant, drugs Goines had stashed in his squad car, and a narrative unsupported by any actual facts. Claims of heroin trafficking by a violent drug dealer were undercut by the raid itself, which turned up no heroin or the gun the (fake) informant claimed he saw.

Officer Goines is now former officer Goines. He’s facing multiple state and federal charges, including two counts of felony murder. This sort of thing doesn’t just happen. It’s not an anomaly formed in a pristine environment. The almost-nonexistent oversight of the Houston PD’s drug warriors led directly to Goines’ deadly concoctions. An internal review of the drug unit by the Houston PD shows officers operated with indifference, carelessness, and negligence. Officer Goines may have been the worst of the 175 officers, but he was far from the only one abusing the system to engage in unsupervised drug warrior freelancing. (via Grits For Breakfast)

The report’s authors wrote that while reviewing Goines and Bryant’s casework from 2016 to 2019, they found 404 errors and a “high level of administrative errors and overall lack of attention to detail” while completing required paperwork.

Auditors found that in the 84 casefiles they reviewed, Goines submitted evidence late 48 percent of the time (40 times) and made unauthorized informant payments 18 times. A quarter of the cases he filed — 21 — did not have tactical plans, the critical documents that officers create showing how they plan to carry out a search warrant raid.

Four times, investigators found cases with no search warrant on file. Three cases included problems where there was inadequate documentation about the case’s informant. Two dozen cases lacked case review sheets. Auditors found discrepancies in Goines’ expenses 23 times. In two cases, there were discrepancies in evidence, and another two cases, evidence submission slips were missing.

The full report [PDF] breaks this down by officer. It appears Officers Goines and Bryant had developed a working relationship that made bending/breaking rules easier. When working together, they relied heavily on “controlled buys.” This made it easier to obtain cash from supervisors who seemed unwilling to ask questions — even when the officers failed to submit paperwork or justify expenditures. In some cases, it appears payments to CIs were broken up into smaller chunks to avoid mandated supervisory reviews. In other cases, Goines and Bryant did not get approval for payments or paid well above the going rate for information leading to very small drug busts.

The sloppiness of officers’ work was indirectly encouraged by the indifference of their supervisors.

The audit also found “overwhelmingly” the need to improve administrative procedures, specifically, supervisory review of case files and case tracking. About 25 percent of the time, supervisors failed to sign case file review sheets, and auditors found many cases were turned in six months to a year late — far longer than the 10 working days allotted by policy.

And the problems go all the way to the top. Police Chief Art Acevedo has been holding onto this report for weeks, refusing to allow the public to see just how corrupt and unrestrained his narcotics division is. Acevedo finally released the report (via Twitter) after the Houston Chronicle released a series of articles discussing the department’s lack of transparency. This unconventional release may have been additionally prompted by another set of criminal charges being brought against police officers by the Houston DA.

Prosecutors probing a Houston police narcotics unit announced charges against six former officers tied to a fatal 2019 drug raid. Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg accused the former officers of lying on police reports and other documents as part of a scheme to enrich themselves.

[…]

Besides the new charges Goines and Bryant face, Ogg announced charges against former HPD Lt. Robert Gonzales, Sgts. Clemente Reyna and Thomas Wood and Goines’ old partner.

It appears several officers and supervisors in the Houston Police Department feel this isn’t going to end well for them. They’re getting out before the department gets to them.

In the months after the raid, Goines retired from HPD. Bryant also retired, along with Goines’ other former partner, Hodgie Armstrong. Three supervisors — Sgt. Clemente Reyna, Sgt. Tommy Woods and Lt. Robert Gonzales also retired. Former Narcotics Commander Paul Follis was transferred to a different post, the Hobby Airport Division.

There’s some good news at the end of all of this. Some reforms are now in place to reduce the likelihood of this sort of tragedy repeating itself. A supervisor is now required to be on the scene during warrant deployment. No-knock warrants have to be approved by the chief himself (or his “designee”). Officers can no longer use municipal court judges for warrant approval. And, finally, body cameras are mandatory for all drug warrant service. They must be activated before officers leave their vehicles and cannot be shut off until the scene and all suspects are secured. All evidence collected must be logged and photographed. All interactions with informants must be documented and, more importantly, all informants will be subject to periodic background checks and random face-to-face interviews with PD supervisors.

This may fix some things going forward. But a more permanent solution would be to dismantle the current unit and reform it using other officers — officers who’ve proven worthy of trust. Officers who’ve been in a system this devoid of oversight and accountability are pretty much ruined. They need to be given the shortest leash and the least amount of responsibility until they’ve proven they can handle more. Without a major overhaul, the next horrendous abuse of power is still an inevitability.

Techdirt.

More NYPD Reforms: Super-Violent Plainclothes Units Disbanded, Body Cam Footage Given A 30-Day Release Mandate

June 24, 2020/in Internet Security

A bunch of police reform efforts are underway in New York City. NYPD officers may not have been responsible for the killing that has sparked protests around the country, but they’ve provided plenty of ammo for police critics and reformers over the years.

With Mike Bloomberg no longer running front office interference for the PD, the department has found itself absorbing more un-deflected criticism. This criticism is finally turning to action, now that it’s incredibly inconvenient for ANY city to pretend its law enforcement agencies aren’t in need of an overhaul.

Early last week, NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea decided to dismantle the NYPD’s plainclothes units. These officers didn’t look like police officers. And since they didn’t look like police officers, they didn’t behave like police officers. Removing the uniform seemed to remove all pretense of accountability as well, resulting in the so-called (and strangely-named) “anti-crime” units being the NYPD’s leader in crimes committed against citizens.

The plainclothes “anti-crime” units operated out of unmarked vehicles, and did not respond to 911 calls. Instead, they were charged with what Shea called “proactive” policing. The anti-crime teams across all 77 precincts will be disbanded.

“When you look at the number of anti-crime officers that operate within New York City, and when you look at a disproportionate, quite frankly, number of complaints, shootings—and they are doing exactly what was asked of them,” Shea said. “I think we can do better. I think that policing in 2020 is not what it was in five, ten, twenty years ago.”

While it seems strange Commissioner Shea would state that generating complaints and corpses is “exactly what was asked” of the anti-crime units, the good news is they won’t be roaming around menacing the public as a cohesive unit. The 600 officers were responsible for 31% of fatal NYPD shootings, despite only being 6% of the total police force. In recent years, “anti-crime” officers were responsible for a number of high-profile killings of citizens, including Eric Garner, whose death similarly prompted protests all over the nation. The disbanding scatters the plainclothes officers across several other units, giving more divisions a chance to be corrupted by these bad apples.

On a more positive note, the NYPD can no longer act like body camera footage is a proprietary good the public shouldn’t be allowed to have access to. The NYPD’s body camera policy — released months after the cameras were deployed (as the result of court-ordered reforms) — gave the department every excuse it wanted to never release footage.

This followed a lawsuit against the NYPD by one of the city’s police unions, which sought to block almost any release of footage ever under the state’s infamous “50-a” law, which forbids the release of police officers’ personnel files and disciplinary records. (Or at least it did… until it was taken off the books in another recent reform move.) How footage of interactions with residents fit these descriptions was left up to the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association’s imagination.

The policy has been rewritten in light of national events. The previous version gave the NYPD up to 30 days to come up with a reason why it wouldn’t be releasing recordings. The new policy mandates the release of certain recordings within 30 days, flipping the old policy on its head.

The new policy obligates the NYPD to release and eventually publish online all audio and video of officers’ interactions that involve gunshots fired in public spaces, the deployment of tasers and the use of force that results in death or substantial bodily injury.

“Effective immediately, the NYPD’s 24,000 body cameras now have a mandatory 30 day release policy,” he tweeted Tuesday morning.

Certainly the NYPD will do everything it can to prevent release of these recordings, despite the mandate. It has two powerful unions willing to sue the city and their members’ employer over anything that might result in additional transparency or accountability. But the city’s tolerance for these unions may finally be running out. Mayor Bill de Blasio, who talked a tough police reform game while campaigning only to dial back his rhetoric once in office, is back on the warpath and calling out the unions for their contribution to the destruction of the relationship between city residents and the NYPD.

“The SBA leadership has engaged in racist activities so many times I can’t even count it,” he said of the NYPD sergeants’ union.

“I’m just sick of it, I’ve been sick of it for years,” he added. “What I’ve seen of the SBA, and too often the PBA, is efforts to divide us, to hold us back, to create all sorts of negativity, to push back progress, to undermine efforts at unity. It’s literally anti-social what these union leaders do.”

Whether these reform efforts result in lasting change remains to be seen. But it’s far more than anyone’s demanded of the NYPD in years.

Techdirt.

Army Cyber Warfare Units Are Seriously Undermanned: GAO – Military.com

September 12, 2019/in Internet Security

Army Cyber Warfare Units Are Seriously Undermanned: GAO Military.com

The Army needs more personnel for its ambitious plan to fend off cyberattacks by high-tech enemies, according to the Government Accountability Office.

“cyber warfare news” – read more