Because it's been a difficult year for Metro—more than two dozen officer-involved shootings, a second fatality caused by Tasers and more cops absolved by an under-attack coroner's inquest process—it's probably not the best time for a public opinion poll on the police. Nor is it the best time to ask whether the Citizen Review Board, created as a police oversight mechanism, is doing its job. The Weekly asked anyway:
Retired state Sen. Joe Neal, co-author of the 1997 legislation authorizing the board: "As far as I know, it's been somewhat successful. Any time you put into practice a mechanism to review the misconduct of police, whether it's effective or not, it has an impact. It has been effective in this case because the board had subpoena powers; it has some teeth. The only problem I have is with the appointments [the 25 civilians appointed to the board by city and county leaders]. We have to make sure that those people who are appointed do the job that they are supposed to do. With all the police shootings this year, you've got to have somebody to review that particular conduct."
Franny Forsman, former chair of the committee that drafted the board: "In general, these boards are helpful in a couple of ways: They provide another avenue that might be more trusted by the public than going to the Internal Affairs department of the police department they're filing a complaint against. It also provides a method, that is trusted by the public, to clear officers of unwarranted charges in a way that Internal Affairs couldn't. It's my understanding that this is happening."
Dr. James Tate, president of the local National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression: "I think the person who's heading it [Andrea Beckman] is trying to make improvements, but she doesn't have the tools. Citizen Review Boards ... have very little power. You are putting the fox in charge of the henhouse and you're complaining to another fox. The review board has to then go back to the police department and tell them, you're doing something wrong. The police can tell them to go to hell. We need a control board that sets policy: This is what you will do while you're on the street. If something goes wrong, the control board would make a determination on what happens. In Toronto, if the police chief doesn't enforce the punishment, the board can do it. The authority in Toronto comes from the Ontario Supreme Court."
Mike Ault, deputy chief of Metro's professional standards division: "It's been a good check and balance on the police department's ability to police itself. A couple of times the board has caught some things we didn't and we made corrections. There's been at least two cases, maybe more, where a COB review resulted in policy changes. One was in the registration of felons, when we could arrest, and another one on obtaining consent to search, where we made it clear we wanted a record of consent. It's caused us to pay extreme attention to thoroughness, not that we don't do it already. And it reinforces that what we do is subject to external review. Supervisors know to look at a situation and ask, Would this make sense to citizens?"
Gene Collins, president of the local National Action Network: "It depends on who you talk to to see if it's doing its job. It's good that we created the board, but since then, we've had a lot of police shootings that have been ruled justifiable. In that regard, it hasn't done what it's supposed to. The board was set up to be an overseer of the police. Before the board was created, coroner's inquests ruled that all police shootings were justifiable. After the board was created, we thought this would change. If we've got the same results now [via the coroner's inquest] as before the board was created, is it doing its job?"
Dean Ishman, former New York officer and president of the Las Vegas NAACP: "It's a necessary entity. The fact that this one has subpoena power is a great thing. I believe it has been doing its job, doing its due diligence. Certainly we would like to see more people using the system, as it relates to police complaints. The NAACP still gets a lot of calls about police complaints. We routinely ask them to file complaints with Internal Affairs department and the Citizens Review Board. We try to go with the review board first, so people feel they will get an unfettered investigation into their issue."
Urban Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Louis Overstreet: "It's about as effective as the coroner's inquest. If it can't be strengthened to where they can bring charges or make recommendations on charges, then it might as well disband."
The Citizen Review Board's offices are downtown, on 3rd Street, off of a ruthlessly plain hallway.
Executive director Andrea Beckman is leery about my motive. A Weekly story five years ago canvassed for opinions on the board's first-year effectiveness. Then, as now, no one criticized Beckman—consensus is she's doing a good job. They're frustrated with things outside her control: police misconduct; the feeling that the Internal Affairs department operates as an in-house protectorate; near-guaranteed absolution, via the coroner's inquest, for cops who fatally shoot suspects.
Of the 120 cases the board has annually received in the past few years, Beckman says nearly 96 percent end up in dismissal because of a lack of merit (the board can't substantiate a complaint) or a lack of jurisdiction (cases involving cops who work for departments other than Metro; incidents that occurred more than a year ago). The latter doesn't reflect the board's effectiveness, Beckman says—it can't investigate what it can't substantiate. She says a better gauge is looking at the high percentage of cops who're sticking to the rules.
In 2001, she counted as the board's biggest victory the case surrounding officer Richard Splinter, who, after getting ejected from a July 30, 2000, baseball game at Cheyenne High School, lifted his shirt, flashing a gun at an umpire. Internal Affairs exonerated Splinter, but the review board complaint triggered another investigation that uncovered Sgt. Dan Southwell's investigatory whitewash. Other wins: Metro changed its courtesy code (officers must identify themselves upon request) and amended policy on handcuffing nonviolent traffic offenders.
Other changes that have the board has prompted: rules complying obeisance to subpoenas and to obtain written consent (or a witness to the officer present) for search and seizure operations; forcing Metro to mark their contraband and defining how canine units can be used in arrest situations; outlining procedures for handling county jail inmates and de-escalating situations; and pushing Metro to abide by state law on sex-offender registration.