By Chauncee Smith

On a daily basis, Americans now see people of color unjustifiably killed by law enforcement. Particularly disheartening is that many of these homicides border on the edge of horrific.

Police officers partially severed Freddie Gray’s spine while he was handcuffed and in custody. Walter Scott was shot in his back and head five times.  He was running for safety.  And, as Eric Garner repeatedly pled for air, officers strangled him until his body laid listless.

Whether it be Maryland, South Carolina, New York, or our home state, these “lapses” of justice have become all too familiar. Indeed, it seems as if our system of public safety produces fixed results which dictate that black and brown males must die, regardless of what they do.

While it is quite difficult to discern betterment in such tragedy, if it exists, it may be that a proverbial “gut check” has been delivered to our nation. Americans, across the ideological spectrum, are no longer casting a blind-eye toward racially biased policing.  Many have instead been forced to deeply wrestle with the rules in place, and the unsettling degree to which they reveal that lives of color are less-valued, despite immense progress since our nation’s founding.

In our State Capitol, legislators, the ACLU, and our partners are responding to this moment by advocating for a broad range of measures that, collectively, could put California on a path toward socially just police reform.

Racial profiling & excessive use of force

In communities of color, racial profiling and police brutality are far from uncommon. As in the cases noted above, there are numerous are examples of these lived experiences. However, to move from anecdotal accounts towards a systemic, evidenced-based understanding of profiling and use of force, we need access to basic information on daily police-community interactions.
Together, AB 953 & AB 619, both introduced by Assemblymember Shirley Weber (D-San Diego), would fill this void. Specifically, AB 953 would update California’s legal definition of profiling, create a uniform system for collecting and reporting data on stops, searches and seizures, modernize law enforcement training, and establish an advisory board that provides recommendations on how to curb profiling.

AB 619 would expand existing state and local law enforcement reporting requirements beyond deaths-in-custody to include serious uses of force that fall short of death. In addition, AB 619 would ensure that the California Department of Justice routinely analyzes and makes public use of force information that it receives from law enforcement agencies.

Transparency & accountability

Senator Holly Mitchell (D-Los Angeles) and Assemblymember Kevin McCarty (D-Sacramento) have introduced bills that respond to a significant lack of public trust concerning how officer-involved shootings are prosecuted. UnderSB 227, Senator Mitchell would prohibit the use of a criminal grand jury to determine whether an officer should be indicted for using deadly force.  In doing so, it would address concerns about the exoneration of police officers by secret grand juries, which reach decisions that are often viewed as unfair and illogical.

AB 86, introduced by Assemblymember McCarty, would require that fatal officer-involved shootings be handled by an independent prosecutor, who would be appointment by California’s Attorney General. Through this approach, AB 86 addresses the appearance of impropriety that stems from the close working relationship held between law enforcement and district attorneys.

Training: Mental health & respect

Every year, close to a thousand Americans are killed during routine encounters with police.  Many of these deaths occur due to inadequate law enforcement training.

SB 11 and SB 29, both introduced by Senator Jim Beall (D-San Jose), seek to ensure that officers are sufficiently prepared to manage interactions with people suffering from mental health problems. Among other things, SB 11 would add 20 hours of classroom evidenced-based behavioral health training for officers in the Academy, as well as 4 hours of continuing education training on how to work with the people suffering from mental illness. SB 29 mandates 40 hours of evidence-based training for Field Officer Trainers, and 20 hours of field training on mental health issues for new officers.

AB 1118, introduced by Assemblymember Rob Bonta (D-Oakland), seeks to address a growing distrust in law enforcement by revitalizing police-community relationships. The bill would establish a Procedural Justice Task Force, administered by the Board of State and Community Corrections, to implement enhanced procedural justice training for local law enforcement agencies. The training would be based on four key principles: treating people with dignity and respect; making decisions fairly and not based on illegitimate factors, such as race; giving people a voice to tell their side of the story; and acting in a way that encourages community members to believe that they will be treated with goodwill in the future.

Decriminalization

Currently, people identified as suspected gang members are not given a fair chance to address such scrutiny. They are often classified as gang members based on racial profiling and associations they hold with family and friends. When this occurs, they may be placed in a gang database without being told that they have been included or how to be removed.

AB 829, introduced by Assemblymember Nazarian (D-Los Angeles), would address this over-criminalization by requiring that people be notified when they are placed in a gang database, and informed about how to challenge such placement.

The ACLU of California supports the bills listed above. The organization is also a proud co-sponsor of AB 953 and AB 619, along with Asian Americans Advancing Justice–Asian Law Caucus, PICO California and Youth Justice Coalition.

Chauncee Smith is racial justice advocate at the ACLU of California Center for Advocacy and Policy. Follow ACLU_SoCal.

By Chase Strangio

The past few weeks have been pivotal for conversations about LGBT people in the public discourse. Just days after Olympian Bruce Jenner announced to Diane Sawyer and 17 million viewers that he is a woman, leading gay rights advocate Mary Bonauto argued for marriage equality at the United States Supreme Court.

We believe that we will win

There is good reason to believe that the decades-long fight for marriage for same-sex couples will be concluding on the side of love and equality.

And as that fight (fingers crossed) comes to at least a formal end, many have assumed that transgender rights will become a key legal and political project that follows marriage equality.

Yet that narrative obscures the important reality that the struggle for justice for transgender people preceded the fight for marriage equality, continued throughout that fight, and will persist long into the future. Inevitably, as we come to understand the common humanity of trans people, our stories and struggles will become a part of the public consciousness.

At the same time, we mustn’t perpetuate such an ahistorical view of the struggle for justice for trans people that only begins where the fight for marriage equality leaves off.

While it may well be the “Transgender Tipping Point,” it is only because trans people have been fighting in the streets, in the courts, in prisons and jails, and in legislatures for decades.

Protect trans lives

Led by trans women of color, that fight is not just one for equality but also for survival.

It is a demand to be understood as human in the face of institutional, systemic, and interpersonal violence.

It is a demand for accountability in the face of police profiling and targeting.

It is a demand for worker’s rights, for health care, for equality.

It is as simple as a demand to use the restroom in peace.

It is as nuanced as the demand to be visible and understood as existing outside of the gender binaries that organize our legal and social structures.

As The New York Times today recognized, it is a request “to come out in a nation where stories of compassion and support vastly outnumber those that end with a suicide note.”

The call for justice for trans people is not merely what comes after marriage. It is a call that has been animating the LGBT rights movement for as long as there has been one.

Chase Strangio is staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union. Follow ACLU_SoCal.

In the unrelenting stream of videos showing violent police encounters with citizens, none has carried more sheer power to stun the public than the shooting death of Walter Scott in North Charleston, South Carolina. Officer Michael Slager initially said Scott wrestled with him and tried to take his Taser. But the video told a disturbingly different story as it captured Slager firing eight times at a fleeing Scott, hitting him five times in the back. Slager was promptly charged with murder once the bystander video surfaced.

Recordings of police encounters have demonstrated their impact since home video caught Los Angeles Police officers beating Rodney King in March 1991. When George Holliday, who videotaped the King beating, offered the footage to the LAPD, an officer expressed no interest. If only that sergeant had known. Holliday then took his video to a television station.

Videos capturing the chokehold death of Eric Garner at the hands of a New York Police officer and the roadside beating of Marlene Pinnock by a California Highway Patrol officer are only some of the more recent examples of video that has proved critical in allowing the public to judge for itself whether police acted properly.

Though so many adults now have smartphones with video cameras, people exercise the right to record the police far less than they could or should. Some people don’t know the right exists. Others are intimidated by officers who mistakenly believe that recording a police encounter is unlawful. These officers may threaten to arrest them. The bystander who recorded the Scott shooting was so fearful of possible police retaliation that he considered erasing his video. Still others fear recording an encounter won’t make a difference because they assume police officers will confiscate their phone and delete the video.

The ACLU of California has moved to ease those concerns with the launch of Mobile Justice CA, a free smartphone application allowing people to record video that is sent straight to local ACLU offices. This transmission is key because it prevents anyone from grabbing the phone and deleting the only copy of the video. The app, available on Apple and Android phones, also enables the Android phone screen to lock as soon as the video stops recording to protect that footage if the phone is confiscated.

The app enables a user to receive notifications if someone nearby is using it to record. It also sends such notifications to others when someone is recording with the app, bringing more witnesses to the scene. Last, the app contains Know Your Rights information, educating individuals about their rights, including the right to record the police. We hope that these functions, individually and collectively, provide reassurance against officers who seek to intimidate or discourage people from exercising their rights.

The app provides a needed tool for accountability. Often incidents of serious misconduct go unreported because people don’t feel that they will be believed in the game of “he said, she said” that often results. Worse yet, other incidents go without remedy because the only person who can contradict the officer’s version is dead. A federal judge has described such encounters as the game of “we said, he’s dead.” With Mobile Justice CA, the technology empowers the people to document police activity and directly place a check on police power: users are encouraged to submit a detailed incident report of a law enforcement interaction they saw or experienced, whether or not they recorded it.

Video technology may also serve as a practical deterrent. In a recent study, police officers wearing body cameras, for example, were shown to be more than 50 percent less likely to use force. This makes sense. People behave better when they know they are being watched. By multiplying the number of cameras that can be trained on police, the app promises to deter bad behavior and improve police interactions with the public.

The courts have decided for decades that the right to gather information that can be made publicly available about government officials serves a key purpose of the First Amendment. Such activity promotes the free discussion of government affairs. This right is particularly critical when applied to the conduct of law enforcement officers and their extraordinary powers to detain, search, arrest or use force – powers that may be misused to deprive people of their rights, liberties or their very lives. Public scrutiny of the police guards against the abuse of power and the miscarriage of justice. The people’s well-established First Amendment right to record police conduct is a cornerstone of that scrutiny.

Though the national debate around police abuse has naturally focused attention on the app’s value as a check on law enforcement abuse – whether by police officers, sheriff’s deputies, border patrol, or other officers – we know the app can be used more broadly to record or document other abuses.

The ACLU of California was able to develop the app thanks to the generosity of Susan Adelman and Claudio Llanos.

The ACLU of California is a collaboration of the three ACLU affiliates in the state—the ACLU of Northern California, the ACLU of Southern California, and the ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties.

Hector Villagra is executive director at the ACLU of Southern California. Follow ACLU_SoCal