fourteenth-report.pdf

Independent Monitoring Team Fourteenth Status Report of the Independent Monitor Delphine Allen, et al., v. City of Oakland, et al. July 31, 2009 to January 13, 2010 Page 95 During the current reporting period, the Department completed made additional revisions to the Matrix that were reviewed and approved by the Parties and the IMT. The Matrix, properly implemented, helps ensure that the discipline system is transparent and objectively applied. The Matrix lists rule violations contained in the Department’s Manual of Rules and sets out specific criteria for calculating discipline recommendations. For each rule violation, the Matrix provides a specific, progressively higher penalty range for first, second, and third offenses. Some of the ranges include a lower limit, midpoint, and upper limit penalty. The Department’s Discipline Officer is required by policy to determine the appropriate penalty by reviewing disciplinary histories and obtaining mitigating and aggravating information from supervisors, and make a disciplinary recommendation to the Chief. According to OPD’s discipline policy, the Discipline Matrix is to be “administered in a systematic and equitable manner to all personnel,” in order to “ensure fair and consistent implementation of discipline within the Oakland Police Department.” The policy expressly preserves the Chief’s discretion to impose any level of discipline he deems appropriate to achieve these goals. During the ninth reporting period, we evaluated OPD’s implementation of the new disciplinary system by reviewing the discipline recommendations and decisions in every sustained case involving conduct occurring on or after December 6, 2005, the date the policy was implemented. A complete discussion of our audit findings is included in our ninth status report. In reviewing these cases we observed a number of practices that in our judgment undermined the Department’s efforts to establish a disciplinary system that is fair and consistent. Many of these practices occurred because the Department decided that a number of the penalties and formulas, if applied, would result in unduly harsh discipline. As discussed above, during subsequent reporting periods, OPD revised its Matrix to address these concerns. During the tenth reporting period, two of the compliance standards for this task were modified to include a more subjective pass/fail assessment. During the twelfth reporting period, the Parties agreed that OPD would track and maintain disciplinary and corrective action resulting from an IAD or Use of Force Board finding, as well as Performance Deficiency Notices and Letters of Discussion in the centralized supervisory notes file. During the thirteenth reporting period, we completed another actual practice compliance assessment of Task 45. We found that although the Department was not yet in compliance with Task 45, it had made substantial progress since our last assessment. We found that OPD has implemented a centralized system for tracking discipline and corrective action but that this system has not yet been fully implemented throughout OPD. OPD remained in compliance with the requirement that the Discipline Officer make discipline recommendations in all sustained internal investigations. The Department also remained in compliance with the requirement that before recommending discipline, unless directed by the Chief of Police, the Discipline Officer convene a meeting with the Deputy Chief or designee in the affected chain of command for a confidential discussion of the misconduct, including the mitigating and aggravating factors and the member or employee’s overall performance.