Religious group calls for police review

News Article by James Faulk
1/6/07
Times-Standard

EUREKA -- The Humboldt Buddhist Peace Fellowship is sending a letter to the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors and the Eureka City Council asking for a police review board.

The letter became public after the fourth police-involved shooting in the past eight months occurred Thursday, but the letter was written before the most recent shooting.

”The members of the Humboldt Area Chapter of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship are alarmed and disturbed by the three fatal shootings in the past eight months by officers of the Eureka police, and by the behavior of members of other law enforcement agencies in Humboldt County,” said the letter.

The letter states that data from Bureau of Justice Statistics, an arm of the U.S. Department of Justice, indicate that Humboldt County should have roughly one police-involved shooting every three to four years.

”We've had three in eight months,” said the letter.

”We believe it is urgent that civilian institutions with substantial powers of investigation be created and assigned the task of reviewing the behavior of law enforcement officers in Eureka and throughout Humboldt County,” it reads. “We would like to see a civilian police review board be created by the county and/or the city, and provided with subpoena powers.”

If officials at the county or city fail to take action, the group says, it will take the case to the Grand Jury.

”While we commend law enforcement officers for the protection they provide us all under sometimes difficult conditions, we still believe civilian review is imperative. We must all take responsibility for the manner in which our government enforces laws.”

Mitch Trachtenberg, a member of the group, said the calls for police review are not an attack on police.

”Law enforcement is the responsibility of everyone,” he said. “When the police are behaving appropriately, there's no problem with civilian oversight. If someone is worried about police review, then perhaps they're behaving inappropriately.”

Eureka Police Chief Murl Harpham said he doesn't see a need for a police review board. “We do a pretty good job of policing ourselves,” Harpham said.

He said the last three people fired from the department were fired for things discovered from internal investigations, not from a citizen's
complaint.

”We see a problem, we take care of it,” Harpham said.