9 ms·

L.A. County sheriff’s unit accused of targeting political enemies, vocal critics

244 points by scotuswroteus 5y ago

wayoutthere 5y ago
This happens in every police department in the country. Who polices the police? They have a complete lack of accountability either codified into law or labor contracts — why would they not do this to anyone who pledges to hold them accountable?
glenda 5y ago
There are also ongoing investigations into gangs within the LA Sheriff department and a fraud lawsuit coming from the City of Compton against the sheriffs. LASD might be one of the most corrupt police departments in the country.
fedreserved 5y ago
Chaos by tom O'Neil (about the Manson murders) does an excellent job of showing the corruption in la law enforcement and their ties to the federal intelligence agencies. He also did a podcast with Joe Rogan, which is how I discovered his book, and is well worth listening to. He found that the prosecutor in the Manson trial subjourned perjury, mansons ties to mk ultra, and quite a few other rabbits down the hole https://youtu.be/r1hv5P4SwbU https://youtu.be/r1hv5P4SwbU Snippet of interview with Rogan
pcbro141 5y ago
LA Sheriff's also have a gang called 'The Executioners' and several other gangs operating in the force. Cops are held to a very low standard, especially for people who we place so much trust in. I would get fired for starting a gang at my job called 'The Executioners'. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/police-gangs-la-sheriff-executioners-b1862105.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/police-gan... https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/morning-brief-sheriffs-department-gangs/ https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/morning-brief-sheriffs-d...
- jeffbee 5y ago
  Cops can't get fired for anything short of shooting a child in the back on live TV and, sometimes, not even for that. California sheriffs are elected and can't be fired at all. The Alameda County (where I live) sheriff is a closet white supremacist in an organization where most of the deputies drive jacked up monster trucks with punisher stickers in the windows, in a county that votes 85-to-15 for Democrats. Sheriffs and their deputies are self-selecting exurban white men with tendencies toward AM radio, conspiracy forums, and horse paste.
  - scotuswroteus 5y ago
    HEY! AM radio is not a monolith in the Bay Area. KNBR is rad.
  - tengbretson 5y ago
    That's really unfortunate. They sound like they might be the sort that make individual judgments based on group stereotypes.
    - stronglikedan 5y ago
      Sounds like the person who posted that story would fit right in with them.
  - AnimalMuppet 5y ago
    If the county votes 85-15 Democrat, and the sheriff is elected, then... why does that area elect a sheriff like the one you're describing?
    - jdavis703 5y ago
      Because the sheriff runs unopposed because only credentialed LEOs can run for sheriff in CA. And then the sheriffs have a habit of resigning in office and appointing an heir (i.e. incumbent). Our upcoming election in 2022 is the first competitive election in about 50 years. And if you look at the vote totals, most people under vote on the sheriffs office (i.e. people just leave it blank or write in dumb stuff like “deez nutz.”)
mig39 5y ago
Who watches the watchmen? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quis_custodiet_ipsos_custodes%3F https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quis_custodiet_ipsos_custodes%...
- humanistbot 5y ago
  Civilian police oversight agencies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_police_oversight_agency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_police_oversight_agen...
  - slg 5y ago
    What happens when the police/sheriff uses their power to investigate/harass the people on those oversight agencies as described in the article?
  - loeg 5y ago
    Which, to be clear, range from completely toothless, to only mostly toothless.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  Everyone watches everyone else, there just needs to be transparency.
jjwiseman 5y ago
Using their own techniques against them, a group of journalists created a LASD gang affiliation database: https://lasdgangs.knock-la.com https://lasdgangs.knock-la.com For more information see http://lasdgangs.com/ http://lasdgangs.com/
- x86_64Ubuntu 5y ago
  This is A LOT of research, and none of it surprises me. One thing that I'm not a fan of is that they are using imagery and slang associated with criminals, while operating with the legitimacy of the state. It comes across as someone who wanted to live a life of crime, without criminal consequences.
  - ncmncm 5y ago
    The police are just the biggest gang. They operate like criminal gangs because they recognize that way works. The only thing that does any good is independent civilian oversight, with teeth. Bodycams and dashcams required, with recordings held by the oversight board, and dismissal for turning them off. Disarming them while on patrol would be a useful intermediate step toward defunding.
  - namelessoracle 5y ago
    Its actually becoming a larger problem than people might realize. More organized gangs sending people "inside" the system to get them intel and also make sure things go well overall for their people. It's especially a problem in corrections which has laxer standards and background checks where gangs will send people to be the guards that are in charge of their people. "Gang infilitrator" has started becoming a serious concern and something they look out for at police and correctional academies.
danhak 5y ago
Back in 2018 I got into a serious car accident. I was driving eastbound on Fountain Avenue when another car blew a red light and t-boned my Miata at full speed, crushing my entire driver's side, causing my car to spin 540 degrees, take out a stop sign and land on the front lawn of a nearby apartment building. I got out of my car, dazed amid a cloud of air bag dust and miraculously unscathed. I was wearing my seat belt and had my convertible top and windows all the way down. I otherwise would surely have ended up with a face full of glass. The other driver -- about a block away -- also got out of their car. They took a glance at me, got back into their car and sped off. Their car had no plates. I called 911 and Deputy Penate of the L.A. County Sheriff's Department arrived on the scene. His attitude toward me was immediately hostile. I was in a completely traumatized state and had just experienced the scariest moment of my life. As I was on the phone trying to arrange a tow, he approached me and said: "Do you think we could hurry this up? I'd really like to have some dinner tonight." A few minutes later as we were waiting for the tow truck, he got out of his patrol car and approached me again, making sniffing noises: "Why do I smell marijuana right now, sir? If I search your car am I'm gonna find anything I'm not supposed to find?" I don't smoke marijuana. There was no contraband in my car, which had been laying totaled on the side of the road with its top down for an hour. I had just been the victim of a serious crime and here was this law enforcement officer, trying to turn me into a criminal instead of assisting me in any way. That experience was a serious blow to my faith in law enforcement.
- maybelsyrup 5y ago
  I'm glad you shared this, thanks. Keep sharing it! They're terrified of losing their blank check to behave this way. The more that people suspect that police are extremely dangerous and stop giving them the benefit of the doubt, the more chance we have of changing how they operate. When I moved to the US, a friend's dad, a high-powered attorney (and former prosecutor) in our region, told a group of us: "don't ever talk to a police officer unless you absolutely have to. They can make your life hell for any reason they want, or no reason, and they'll always get away with it." Coming from a country where the cops were much, much less violent and much more trusted, this was shocking to me. But that was a long time ago now and I can't honestly say the advice has served me poorly.
comeonseriously 5y ago
I'm of the opinion that if, when things like this happen, the house isn't cleaned, it will only embolden others to do this.
micromacrofoot 5y ago
ACAB
newbamboo 5y ago
I would believe it if it weren’t written in the LA Times. They’ve lost all credibility in the last few years, which is a shame because occasionally they have really stellar bits of journalism. But alas, I can no longer trust them, and local politics is an area where their reporting is especially prone to bias. I guess they aren’t alone in falling prey to the same economic forces as other formerly renowned journalistic institutions.
- moate 5y ago
  What forces, and what biases are you talking about specifically? Why have they lost credibility in your eyes?
- etc-hosts 5y ago
  Go read the pages of content about this at Knock LA then https://knock-la.com/tradition-of-violence-lasd-gang-history/ https://knock-la.com/tradition-of-violence-lasd-gang-history...
openasocket 5y ago
I've thought about this a lot, and have some thoughts about what we need to achieve police reform in the US 1. Re-organizing police departments into a hierarchy. Currently we have a bunch of different districts with their own regulations and leadership. In some the police chief is appointed by the mayor, in others there's the sheriff system where the law enforcement leader is elected. But I don't think local elections are a sufficient check on power, same for appointments my mayors. Departments need to be re-organized under a hierarchy, with police departments of individual districts reporting to a regional police department (which can be on county lines or some other organizational system, though this level could be skipped for less populated states) which in turn reports to a state-wide police department. While there are state-wide police organizations now (AKA state troopers) with responsibilities broken up by jurisdiction (i.e. only state troopers enforcing traffic laws on state highways) there isn't an actual hierarchy of command. Setting this up will actually make things more efficient, because you can better pool resources, but the main benefit is that it makes it easier to regulate police conduct across the entire state. Currently each police department has their own regulations. It also opens the door to creating more centralized internal affairs divisions and prosecution, so that the local district attorney who works with the police department every day isn't the one deciding what police misconduct cases to prosecute. 2. We should establish an accrediting body for police departments, made up of legal experts, law enforcement professionals, and others. This body should determine and publish best practices (for use of force standards, training, organization, etc), and be able to review and certify departments. Then states and the federal government can require that police departments be certified by this agency in order to receive funding. Public outrage doesn't seem to be doing much to compel changes in behavior, lets see if the threat of denied funding and re-possessing military surplus hardware will do it (fun fact: the program by which most police departments get surplus military gear is structured so that the department doesn't actually own the equipment, and the federal government has the power to rep-possess it if they see fit). 3. Establishing federal and state resources to actively audit police conduct, investigate corruption, and prosecute cases. This should actually be expanded to all local governing bodies, because there is plenty of corruption in small local governments that goes unnoticed, but there should be a specific focus on police abuses.
- scotuswroteus 5y ago
tclancy 5y ago
It's nice to know that in an ever-changing world, one thing I have always been able to rely on in my 45 years on the planet is the overwhelming shittiness of LA law enforcement. Daryl Gates would be proud. This is straight out of "LA Confidential" with the gangs within gangs within the sherriff's department.
artificialLimbs 5y ago
Why is this on the front page of "Hacker News"? Edit: I have directly violated the guidelines. Apologies, HN.
- wetpaws 5y ago
  Because 155 people upvoted it
- loeg 5y ago
  Hackers think it's news.
- brink 5y ago
  I'll upvote what I want to upvote, thank you.
exabrial 5y ago
They are also in constant violation of the equal protection clause. It's well known that celebrities get ripe treatment and free services. It's also common practice for the dept to issue concealed-carry permits to celebrities but not common people.
QuasiGiani 5y ago
> ...dressed in a sheriff’s uniform to pose as a deputy to sneak a McDonald’s Egg McMuffin and a cup of coffee in to an inmate at Men’s Central Jail Such clear proof that the article of this debacle... is nothing more than a cynically crafted advertisement for Mickey D's. ~~~~~ ETA (with, mind you, appropriate alarm & dismay at the downvote): > “That’s what I’m telling you, dumb f—, is that clear?” Lillienfeld said. “I can’t make it any clearer than that.” > Lillienfeld did not respond to a request for comment. The guy is so clear(ly) nothing but a shill for McDonald's.

244 points by scotuswroteus 5y ago

This happens in every police department in the country. Who polices the police? They have a complete lack of accountability either codified into law or labor contracts — why would they not do this to anyone who pledges to hold them accountable?

glenda 5y ago

There are also ongoing investigations into gangs within the LA Sheriff department and a fraud lawsuit coming from the City of Compton against the sheriffs. LASD might be one of the most corrupt police departments in the country.

fedreserved 5y ago

Chaos by tom O'Neil (about the Manson murders) does an excellent job of showing the corruption in la law enforcement and their ties to the federal intelligence agencies. He also did a podcast with Joe Rogan, which is how I discovered his book, and is well worth listening to. He found that the prosecutor in the Manson trial subjourned perjury, mansons ties to mk ultra, and quite a few other rabbits down the hole https://youtu.be/r1hv5P4SwbU https://youtu.be/r1hv5P4SwbU Snippet of interview with Rogan

pcbro141 5y ago

LA Sheriff's also have a gang called 'The Executioners' and several other gangs operating in the force. Cops are held to a very low standard, especially for people who we place so much trust in. I would get fired for starting a gang at my job called 'The Executioners'. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/police-gangs-la-sheriff-executioners-b1862105.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/police-gan... https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/morning-brief-sheriffs-department-gangs/ https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/morning-brief-sheriffs-d...

jeffbee 5y ago
Cops can't get fired for anything short of shooting a child in the back on live TV and, sometimes, not even for that. California sheriffs are elected and can't be fired at all. The Alameda County (where I live) sheriff is a closet white supremacist in an organization where most of the deputies drive jacked up monster trucks with punisher stickers in the windows, in a county that votes 85-to-15 for Democrats. Sheriffs and their deputies are self-selecting exurban white men with tendencies toward AM radio, conspiracy forums, and horse paste.
- scotuswroteus 5y ago
  HEY! AM radio is not a monolith in the Bay Area. KNBR is rad.
- tengbretson 5y ago
  That's really unfortunate. They sound like they might be the sort that make individual judgments based on group stereotypes.
  - stronglikedan 5y ago
    Sounds like the person who posted that story would fit right in with them.
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago
  If the county votes 85-15 Democrat, and the sheriff is elected, then... why does that area elect a sheriff like the one you're describing?
  - jdavis703 5y ago
    Because the sheriff runs unopposed because only credentialed LEOs can run for sheriff in CA. And then the sheriffs have a habit of resigning in office and appointing an heir (i.e. incumbent). Our upcoming election in 2022 is the first competitive election in about 50 years. And if you look at the vote totals, most people under vote on the sheriffs office (i.e. people just leave it blank or write in dumb stuff like “deez nutz.”)

mig39 5y ago

Who watches the watchmen? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quis_custodiet_ipsos_custodes%3F https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quis_custodiet_ipsos_custodes%...

humanistbot 5y ago
Civilian police oversight agencies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_police_oversight_agency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_police_oversight_agen...
- slg 5y ago
  What happens when the police/sheriff uses their power to investigate/harass the people on those oversight agencies as described in the article?
- loeg 5y ago
  Which, to be clear, range from completely toothless, to only mostly toothless.
lotsofpulp 5y ago
Everyone watches everyone else, there just needs to be transparency.

jjwiseman 5y ago

Using their own techniques against them, a group of journalists created a LASD gang affiliation database: https://lasdgangs.knock-la.com https://lasdgangs.knock-la.com For more information see http://lasdgangs.com/ http://lasdgangs.com/

x86_64Ubuntu 5y ago
This is A LOT of research, and none of it surprises me. One thing that I'm not a fan of is that they are using imagery and slang associated with criminals, while operating with the legitimacy of the state. It comes across as someone who wanted to live a life of crime, without criminal consequences.
- ncmncm 5y ago
  The police are just the biggest gang. They operate like criminal gangs because they recognize that way works. The only thing that does any good is independent civilian oversight, with teeth. Bodycams and dashcams required, with recordings held by the oversight board, and dismissal for turning them off. Disarming them while on patrol would be a useful intermediate step toward defunding.
- namelessoracle 5y ago
  Its actually becoming a larger problem than people might realize. More organized gangs sending people "inside" the system to get them intel and also make sure things go well overall for their people. It's especially a problem in corrections which has laxer standards and background checks where gangs will send people to be the guards that are in charge of their people. "Gang infilitrator" has started becoming a serious concern and something they look out for at police and correctional academies.

danhak 5y ago

Back in 2018 I got into a serious car accident. I was driving eastbound on Fountain Avenue when another car blew a red light and t-boned my Miata at full speed, crushing my entire driver's side, causing my car to spin 540 degrees, take out a stop sign and land on the front lawn of a nearby apartment building. I got out of my car, dazed amid a cloud of air bag dust and miraculously unscathed. I was wearing my seat belt and had my convertible top and windows all the way down. I otherwise would surely have ended up with a face full of glass. The other driver -- about a block away -- also got out of their car. They took a glance at me, got back into their car and sped off. Their car had no plates. I called 911 and Deputy Penate of the L.A. County Sheriff's Department arrived on the scene. His attitude toward me was immediately hostile. I was in a completely traumatized state and had just experienced the scariest moment of my life. As I was on the phone trying to arrange a tow, he approached me and said: "Do you think we could hurry this up? I'd really like to have some dinner tonight." A few minutes later as we were waiting for the tow truck, he got out of his patrol car and approached me again, making sniffing noises: "Why do I smell marijuana right now, sir? If I search your car am I'm gonna find anything I'm not supposed to find?" I don't smoke marijuana. There was no contraband in my car, which had been laying totaled on the side of the road with its top down for an hour. I had just been the victim of a serious crime and here was this law enforcement officer, trying to turn me into a criminal instead of assisting me in any way. That experience was a serious blow to my faith in law enforcement.

maybelsyrup 5y ago
I'm glad you shared this, thanks. Keep sharing it! They're terrified of losing their blank check to behave this way. The more that people suspect that police are extremely dangerous and stop giving them the benefit of the doubt, the more chance we have of changing how they operate. When I moved to the US, a friend's dad, a high-powered attorney (and former prosecutor) in our region, told a group of us: "don't ever talk to a police officer unless you absolutely have to. They can make your life hell for any reason they want, or no reason, and they'll always get away with it." Coming from a country where the cops were much, much less violent and much more trusted, this was shocking to me. But that was a long time ago now and I can't honestly say the advice has served me poorly.

comeonseriously 5y ago

I'm of the opinion that if, when things like this happen, the house isn't cleaned, it will only embolden others to do this.

micromacrofoot 5y ago

ACAB

newbamboo 5y ago

I would believe it if it weren’t written in the LA Times. They’ve lost all credibility in the last few years, which is a shame because occasionally they have really stellar bits of journalism. But alas, I can no longer trust them, and local politics is an area where their reporting is especially prone to bias. I guess they aren’t alone in falling prey to the same economic forces as other formerly renowned journalistic institutions.

moate 5y ago
What forces, and what biases are you talking about specifically? Why have they lost credibility in your eyes?
etc-hosts 5y ago
Go read the pages of content about this at Knock LA then https://knock-la.com/tradition-of-violence-lasd-gang-history/ https://knock-la.com/tradition-of-violence-lasd-gang-history...

openasocket 5y ago

I've thought about this a lot, and have some thoughts about what we need to achieve police reform in the US 1. Re-organizing police departments into a hierarchy. Currently we have a bunch of different districts with their own regulations and leadership. In some the police chief is appointed by the mayor, in others there's the sheriff system where the law enforcement leader is elected. But I don't think local elections are a sufficient check on power, same for appointments my mayors. Departments need to be re-organized under a hierarchy, with police departments of individual districts reporting to a regional police department (which can be on county lines or some other organizational system, though this level could be skipped for less populated states) which in turn reports to a state-wide police department. While there are state-wide police organizations now (AKA state troopers) with responsibilities broken up by jurisdiction (i.e. only state troopers enforcing traffic laws on state highways) there isn't an actual hierarchy of command. Setting this up will actually make things more efficient, because you can better pool resources, but the main benefit is that it makes it easier to regulate police conduct across the entire state. Currently each police department has their own regulations. It also opens the door to creating more centralized internal affairs divisions and prosecution, so that the local district attorney who works with the police department every day isn't the one deciding what police misconduct cases to prosecute. 2. We should establish an accrediting body for police departments, made up of legal experts, law enforcement professionals, and others. This body should determine and publish best practices (for use of force standards, training, organization, etc), and be able to review and certify departments. Then states and the federal government can require that police departments be certified by this agency in order to receive funding. Public outrage doesn't seem to be doing much to compel changes in behavior, lets see if the threat of denied funding and re-possessing military surplus hardware will do it (fun fact: the program by which most police departments get surplus military gear is structured so that the department doesn't actually own the equipment, and the federal government has the power to rep-possess it if they see fit). 3. Establishing federal and state resources to actively audit police conduct, investigate corruption, and prosecute cases. This should actually be expanded to all local governing bodies, because there is plenty of corruption in small local governments that goes unnoticed, but there should be a specific focus on police abuses.

scotuswroteus 5y ago

tclancy 5y ago

It's nice to know that in an ever-changing world, one thing I have always been able to rely on in my 45 years on the planet is the overwhelming shittiness of LA law enforcement. Daryl Gates would be proud. This is straight out of "LA Confidential" with the gangs within gangs within the sherriff's department.

artificialLimbs 5y ago

Why is this on the front page of "Hacker News"? Edit: I have directly violated the guidelines. Apologies, HN.

wetpaws 5y ago
Because 155 people upvoted it
loeg 5y ago
Hackers think it's news.
brink 5y ago
I'll upvote what I want to upvote, thank you.

exabrial 5y ago

They are also in constant violation of the equal protection clause. It's well known that celebrities get ripe treatment and free services. It's also common practice for the dept to issue concealed-carry permits to celebrities but not common people.

QuasiGiani 5y ago

> ...dressed in a sheriff’s uniform to pose as a deputy to sneak a McDonald’s Egg McMuffin and a cup of coffee in to an inmate at Men’s Central Jail Such clear proof that the article of this debacle... is nothing more than a cynically crafted advertisement for Mickey D's. ~~~~~ ETA (with, mind you, appropriate alarm & dismay at the downvote): > “That’s what I’m telling you, dumb f—, is that clear?” Lillienfeld said. “I can’t make it any clearer than that.” > Lillienfeld did not respond to a request for comment. The guy is so clear(ly) nothing but a shill for McDonald's.