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On Monday, March 14th HB 261, which would limit the Open Records Act passed unanimously out of the House of Representatives in the Georgia Legislature.

Our ability to get open records is one of our best tools for keeping the police & our government accountable to the people.

This bill would potentially limit us from getting access to officer disciplinary records and getting information on officer training.

HB 261 has been referred to the Senate Public Safety Committee, which will meet on Tuesday, March 22 at 1pm.

Please call the following members of the committee NOW and urge them to vote NO to HB 261!

Gloria Butler  (404) 656-0075

Jason Carter  (404) 463-1376

Valencia Seay  (404) 656-5095

Here’s what to say:

"I urge you to oppose HB 261 in the Senate Public Safety meeting on Tuesday. This bill would limit the disclosure of public documents relating to law enforcement, further jeopardizing police accountability, transparency and good government. Thank you again in advance for voting NO to HB 261.”
 

ONE: REQUIRE DATA COLLECTION IN ALL STOPS, SEARCHES, FRISKS AND ARRESTS TO PREVENT PROFILING

APD officers should document citizen contact through the completion of a form each time they stop, detain, search or frisk an individual. The collection of this data will assist APD in addressing issues of profiling and disparate treatment across communities. APD should require officers assigned to respective communities to discuss and disclose this data with the community on a monthly basis.

TWO: TERMINATE CAYENNE MAYES, DION MEREDITH AND TRAVIS BRITT FOR RECENT STRIP SEARCH INCIDENT

Atlantans deserve a police force that demands respect for members of all communities. Now is the time for APD to purge themselves of toxic officers. If the allegations against Officer Mayes are true, this is at least the second time he has placed the people of Atlanta in jeopardy.  This level of repeat misconduct should not be tolerated.

THREE: CURRENT AND PAST RED DOG OFFICERS MUST BE INELIGIBLE FOR PLACEMENT IN THE NEW TACTICAL UNIT.

In order to facilitate real changes within APD, current RED DOG officers should be ineligible for placement in the new tactical unit Further, current RED DOG officers should be removed from patrol until they have been retrained in methods of community policing, constitutional law, and cultural sensitivity. There is blatant camaraderie among the current members of the RED DOG Unit that stands to jeopardize any concrete reforms within APD. The Department should require that other officers interested in being placed in the new unit undergo a formal application process, complete with interviews and a critical review of their current disciplinary and complaint histories.

FOUR: NO PARAMILITARY UNIT

Despite any alleged “elite” status bestowed upon members of the new unit, selected officers should be required to engage members of the community without relying on tactics of intimidation and threats of force. More specifically, officers should (1) wear standard issue APD uniforms5; (2) patrol in teams no larger than two persons6; (3) drive marked patrol vehicles; (4) wear visible name tags at all times; (5) be trained in constitutional protections, community policing methods and (6) participate in non-enforcement activities in the community.

FIVE: PRESENT PROPOSED STRUCTURE FOR THE NEW UNIT TO BLOCS AND THE LARGER COMMUNITY WITHIN 30 DAYS; SOLICIT PUBLIC INPUT BEFORE MAKING PERMANENT CHANGES.

Given the extreme impact members of the RED DOG Unit have had on the lives of Atlantans for over two decades, it is proper that the public be included in the conversation about this new unit. Transparency demands that the public be made aware of (1) the findings of the OPS investigation of RED DOG (2) the names of officers selected to populate this new unit; (3) the selected officers’ records of complaints—sustained, unsustained and exonerated; (4) non-sensitive background information about selected officers, including previous work experience within and outside of APD; (5) proposed rotation and community assignments of officers within the new unit9 and (6) training history for each officer, including the dates that every officer attended NEW training on Constitutional protections (required by a recent Federal order), cultural sensitivity, and community-oriented policing.
 

Units that were created to come down hard on criminals are being dumped nationwide because of liability issues

By Steve Visser 
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
 
ATLANTA — Cristina Beamud's job may get a little easier now that the Atlanta Police's Red Dog unit is being disbanded.
 
"We have a disproportionate number of complaints about officers who belong to the Red Dog unit as opposed to officers involved in the zones," said Beamud, executive director of the Atlanta Citizen Review Board that investigates citizens complaints against police for such things as excessive force or abusive language.
 
Police departments nationwide have been dumping units like the Red Dog that were created to come down hard on criminals because the units became more of a liability than an asset in the war on crime. That war requires community support. But the units tended to draw the most lawsuits and scandals, which undermined law enforcement, said Beamud and other experts.
 
Atlanta Police Chief George Turner and Mayor Kasim Reed announced Monday the Red Dog would be disbanded within 60 days and would be replaced by a unit designed to target violent crime. They also said the new unit would only be manned by officers who are schooled in ensuring their arrests could withstand constitutional scrutiny and who do not have "sustained" complaints of excessive force against them.
 
"It was a good move for the chief of police and the mayor to make," said Volkan Topalli, a professor of criminal justice at Georgia State University. "As a tactical unit the Red Dog was very efficient and effective but because of the actions of a minority of officers it got a reputation for strong arm (tactics). It got to the point that its reputation outstripped the reality.
 
"It was hard for them to be effective because anything they did could only be seen as negative."
 
Turner acknowledged as much when he said the new unit would focus on gathering intelligence to pinpoint the core of violent offenders in Atlanta. Topalli, an expert on gangs and street criminals, noted that only a tiny percentage of the population commits most of the violent crime. The police often know them but it is usually the beat officers and detectives who arrested them after the crime is committed. That information isn't shared across the department and should be.
 
Beamud, a former police officer and prosecutor, said targeted policing as opposed to drug sweeps will result in fewer legitimate complaints against the police and more resources aimed at the serious offenders. "Don't just arrest everybody," she said.
 
She noted, however, that the criteria that no officers in the new unit have "sustained" complaints of excessive use of force should be an easy one to make.
 
The APD's Office of Professional Standards, which investigates complaints of officer misconduct sustained one complaint of excessive use of force in 2008 and 2009. The 2010 figures aren't out yet.
 
The citizen review board was created by the City Council to investigate complaints about police outside of the chain of command because of public suspicions about OPS. So far Turner has rejected the board's findings every time they resulted in a complaint being sustained against an officer, according to the board's figures.
 
David Klinger, a former police officer and expert on policing said that numbers of complaints and how many the department sustains don't necessarily indicate a problem within the department.
 
"If they are just rubber stamping things and saying, 'I believe the cops,' then you have a problem."
 
APD spokesman Carlos Campos said Turner will not only rely on sustained complaints for ensuring problem officers don't get into the new unit, which is open to Red Dog applicants. Turner also will look at the officer's overall disciplinary record.
 
John Gordon, a Buckhead businessman who was involved in establishing the Atlanta Citizen Review Board, said the actions that gave the Red Dog a reputation were part of pattern across the police department. He cited the series of lawsuits that have resulted in payouts from the city because of charges of police misconduct.
 
"That unit is well-intentioned but it has been the source of a lot of problems," said Gordon who co-chairs Friends of English Avenue.
 
"If anybody thinks the problems in the police department are limited to the Red Dog unit then I think they are sorely missing the point. But this is a good start."
 
Copyright 2011 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

 www.ajc.com/news/atlanta/no-red-dog-could-831804.html

 
AJC: Atlanta police will disband Red Dog unit

By Larry Hartstein

11:24 a.m. Monday, February 7, 2011
Atlanta police Chief George Turner announced today that he is disbanding the controversial  Red Dog narcotics unit. The unit was at the center of the botched Atlanta Eagle raid in 2009 and the Kathryn Johnston killing in 2006.
Last month, the Atlanta City Council agreed to pay $1.2 million to 19 patrons who sued APD on grounds that police officers violated their federal and state constitutional rights. The customers said the officers threatened them and used slurs about their sexuality.
In 2010, the city agreed to pay $4.9 million to the family of Johnston, a 92-year-old woman who was shot and killed when Red Dog officers burst into her home on raid in a  November 2006.
 
http://www.ajc.com/news/atlanta/atlanta-police-will-disband-830190.html

Last Updated On:  1/28/2011 11:31:45 PM
ATLANTA -- The Atlanta Police Department's Red Dog Unit is back in the headlines again.
According to police, three officers have been placed on administrative duty following claims of alleged misconduct.
Two of the three were involved in the infamous Midtown Eagle Bar raid.
The allegation made by two men stem from a traffic stop last June near Downtown at Fulton and Windsor.
Brian Kidd and his roommate Shawn Venegas went out for a pizza. Both young men were students with jobs.
Their attorneys say three officers in the APD Red Dog Unit pulled them over at gunpoint, searched their car found nothing and were according to the young men "angry."
Their attorneys pick up the story of what they say happened next
"So now pull down your pants, pull down your underwear in the center lane in Downtown Atlanta at 6:30 p.m. (daylight) in June. Vehicles have to pulled around to escape the traffic event," said co-counsel Mark Bullman.
Dan Grossman is the other co-counsel, "If [Atlanta Police] really care about stopping this, you have to train cops this is illegal and you have to discipline them when they do it."
One day before the attorneys planned on filing their lawsuit in this matter, Atlanta Police released this statement:

"The Atlanta Police Department is in the process of concluding the internal investigation into this matter. There is evidence to suggest that some of the officers' actions during this traffic stop were inappropriate. As a result, Chief Turner intends to move swiftly to discipline some of the officers with actions - up to, and including, dismissal."

"We're hopeful they will pick up the phone so we can sit down and have an intelligent conversation about what can be done to end this so this does not happen to anyone else," Bullman said.
The Red Dog Unit is made up of 29 officers. They are active in the areas of vice.
The citizens review board has looked into other complaints about the unit's conduct.
Attorney Grossman represented the plaintiffs in the Eagle Bar case.
"APD has multiple reports of cops doing illegal public strip searches of people, and they don't discipline them that is encouraging this kind of stuff," he said.
APD spokesman Carlos Campos says the three officers involved have been placed on administrative duty in a non-enforcement capacity pending disciplinary decisions.
Video here: http://www.11alive.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=175300&catid=3