Berkeley, CA PD Citizen Complaints

To Whom It May Concern:

Pursuant to the California Public Records Act (California Government Code §§ 6250), I hereby request the following records:

1. What is the total number of citizen complaints made against your department’s officers annually for the last 10 years?

Please include the type of complaint (i.e., use of force, abuse language, unwarranted search) and the result of complaint (i.e., sustained, exonerated).

2. What is the total number of complaints police officers made against their peer officers in department annually for the last 10 years?

Please include the type of complaint (i.e., use of force, abuse language, unwarranted search) and the result of complaint (i.e., sustained, exonerated).

3. What is the total number of calls for service your department received annually for the past 10 years?

4. What is the number of officers involved in shootings in your department for the past 10 years?

Please include the number of officer-involved shootings resulting in discipline.

5. Which of the above data are published publicly? Please provide a link to any and all publicly available reports containing the data above.

The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.

In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 10 calendar days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Alexander Cartwright

Hello L. Norman,

Thank you very much for the information you provided. Do you have any information on "internal" complaints? If so, how many were made annually for the last 10 years.

Respectfully,
Alex Cartwright

Hello L. Norman,

Thank you very much for the information you provided. Do you have any information on "internal" complaints? If so, how many were made annually for the last 10 years.

Respectfully,
Alex Cartwright

I am writing to follow up on my original request made on

Thank you very much for providing the information we requested. I am writing to ask for some clarification regarding the data on officer-involved shootings. We requested the total number of annual officer involved shootings each year for the past 10 years.

While you sent us data on officer complaints, the OIS data seems to have been overlooked. Could you please provide that data? If not, could you please clarify that your department does not collect OIS (officer involved shooting) data.

If you are able to provide the data, please define what constitutes an officer-involved shooting in your department. For example, some departments do not count misses while others count all discharges; some include shots at animals. Other departments include intentional and accidental shootings; others do not. Please explain to us how your department classifies the OIS included in the numbers you sent to us.

Respectfully, -Alex Cartwright