I was extremely disappointed with a Daily News piece I read in Mariel Garza’s column on Nov 12th. Let me start by explaining that I am speaking exclusively for myself (not as a representative of any agency or anyone else). However, I proudly serve as a middle manager on the LAPD at one of the Community Police Stations in the San Fernando Valley. In my case, I work in my own community. I waited for a significant portion of my 25-year career to work exactly where I do, and consider it an honor to serve there.
With that in mind I’d like to share a few recent contacts I encountered while on-duty at the station. As a Watch Commander for the late-night shift, several college students recently came to the station in close proximity to gather information on a CSUN homework assignment they were completing. One particular college woman and her boyfriend came to the station and spent some time with one of my desk officers. After about 15-minutes the officer came to me informing that the young woman at the desk was requesting documentation related to her homework assignment that the Department couldn’t release to her. The young woman pushed the issue stating that her professor informed her that she would be entitled to the documents she was requesting.
I responded to the desk and engaged in a very positive contact with the student and her boyfriend. We had a good laugh over the “tomorrow” due date of her assignment … never do any homework today that you can put off until tomorrow … We did, however, spend the better part of twenty minutes actually discussing her assignment. The student was asking for copies of fresh crime reports and officers’ activity logs from that day (DFAR’s - Daily Field Activity Reports). The information listed on such documents includes the name, address, and other confidential information on victims, witnesses, and suspects that is not available for simple release to the public. Could you imagine the police releasing information on anyone who was included on a sexual assault investigation? I did, however, also explain how the student could access public information via other sources. I even extended her an invitation to come back during daytime hours to glean information from personnel in our Crime Analysis Detail (CAD Unit). In each station the staff in that assignment keeps and continuously updates statistical data on crime trends, patterns, wanted suspect flyers, and an entire host of other related information that is available to the public. I offered to leave word with the CAD staff that the student would be coming in the next morning, and to prepare to assist her. She declined that offer, as the due date for her assignment would come around before she could take advantage of it. My desk officer offered to give her and her boyfriend a station tour to assist her with her project. She happily accepted, and I approved the officer’s time to do so.
Despite the mutually positive encounter with the student there was one exceptionally worrisome element in the contact. The young woman described that her teacher had suggested to the students that they could earn a good grade on the project if they were to get themselves arrested and see the law enforcement function from the inside. I was amazed that a college teacher would suggest such a thing. I clearly and distinctly cautioned the young woman to think that advice through completely before acting on it. I pointed out to the young woman that her marketability to the work force could be compromised should she do something that would get her arrested. I made it very, very, clear that the teacher’s suggestion might not be in the students’ best interest. I repeated the point to the student, and encouraged her to have the teacher contact me personally to discuss the teacher’s advice to the students. In the end the above mentioned station tour was given, and the student and her boyfriend left with a spirit of good wishes and hopes for her success in the future.
A few days later I was supervising the Day Watch Patrol assignment when another student came to the station to gather information for a homework assignment from Pierce College. This particular young woman came to the station with her approximately 20-month old baby (a darling child in a stroller working a binky that matched the outfit!). This student was tasked with speaking to a police supervisor to address her homework project. I had a field sergeant come to the station and submit to an interview with the young mother. The sergeant spent over 35-minutes with her. During that time I twice stopped what I was doing to wash off her baby’s pacifier that kept finding its way to the floor. She too left my station after what turned out to be a mutually positive community contact.
With all this in mind, I repeat my disappointment with the Daily News article posted in the Nov. 12th edition. The article displays the utter disdain and condemnation of the Valley LAPD stations as seen through the eyes of a CSUN journalism teacher who also writes for the Daily News. The teacher opined that her students found an overall lack of care and cooperation during their encounters at several of the Valley’s Community Police Stations. Granted I have no way of knowing what her students told her about those encounters. Lord knows I have enough parenting and educational experience myself to know that her students could have told her anything about the timeliness of their assignment ... i.e. the dog ate my homework / the police wouldn’t give me any source documents / etc. In any event, the simple truth is that I bent over backwards to accommodate the needs of these students, as I do with all citizens in this community. I view the people who come into my station as my neighbors, and I demand my subordinate officers treat them accordingly. Given the quality of the fine men and woman that serve the community along with me at “my” station, this is a self-fulfilling policy and not something I have to “sell” to them. Though I can’t account for the opinion Ms. Garza holds for those in my profession, I am certainly let down that as a Daily News journalist she would print the article she did on the Nov. 12th edition without first checking on the reliability of her story.
My thoughts go to an all too familiar twist to an old expression “No good deed goes unpunished!” I’ll close my thoughts with these two points (again, me personally). First, if Ms. Garza should ever find herself as the victim, witness, or suspect on a crime report, followed by someone coming to the station asking for a copy of that police report (listing her name and other personal information), I promise to completely respect her privacy and not release an unauthorized copy of the report to a complete stranger. Secondly, my opinion that the students should not get themselves arrested for a grade, stands firm. I am available to discuss that opinion on my own time, on Ms. Garza’s schedule, and at her choice of venue. As for the Daily News, I wonder if this response will hold the same prominence in your newspaper as the one displayed by Ms. Garza on Nov. 12.
Vincent Neglia
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