LAPD could soon provide detailed reports, communication with ICE to LA City Council

A new piece of legislation introduced today in the City of Los Angeles aims to hold the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) accountable for their role in the recent immigration raids and their violent tactics against demonstrators and journalists during the recent  protests against federal immigration enforcement across the city. 

The legislation package, introduced by Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez (CD-1), would begin a process of transparency, legal review and structural reforms of LAPD’s conduct.

“We're seeing raids of federal agents going to different workplaces, snatching people off the street and taking vendors all in the name of enforcing federal immigration laws. There’s a lot of terror in places that usually were vibrant,” Hernandez told CALÓ News. “People all over L.A. are reacting and responding to the horror that they're seeing in our communities. They're rightfully angry. Thousands of people have been protesting in the city since these raids began and for the most part it's been peaceful. What we're seeing is people angry because they're seeing families torn apart and the LAPD trying to control the crowd, but people are getting harmed and their rights are also getting violated in different ways.”

The recent ICE raids, which have targeted low-income, working-class people of color, have cost the city $32 million, according to City Controller Kenneth Mejia. 

On Friday, June 20, Mejia stated that $29.5 million, or 92%, of these costs relate to the LAPD's response to protests against ICE, including citywide tactical alert costs. In a time when the city is already suffering from a $1 billion budget deficit, the costs are expected to increase in the next month due to potential lawsuits against the LAPD by those who have been injured. 

Economic accountability

Mejia also said LAPD officers are already costing the city and its taxpayers millions of dollars. 

Last weekend, in response to June 14’s No Kings protests, all of LAPD’s nearly 9,000 officers were mobilized and approved for overtime pay. The “full mobilization” tactic alerts obtained by LA Public Press showed that all LAPD officers were approved for 12-hour shifts beginning at 6 a.m. Saturday through 6 a.m. Sunday. 

Due to the LAPD’s significant financial expenditures and the legal implications that might follow after filed lawsuits, one of the motions in the legislative package looks to seek transparency of the agency’s spending. 

The legislation directs LAPD to report on overtime expenditures that have taken place since June 6, a breakdown of LAPD deployments related to protest response, curfew enforcement and looting suppression, including personnel numbers, locations and duration of activity, as well as the number of legal claims filed against LAPD personnel stemming from actions during this period. 

“Our motion, particularly around the fiscal accountability and liability piece, demands that we audit the overtime deployments and potential pending legal claims,” Hernandez said. “We want to know how much overtime has been used; we want more information on that. How was that decided? How many officers are we deploying? What does that look like? That way, we can better calculate how much money we're going to need in the future. We still have millions upon millions that we need to pay to fix the infrastructure of the city.”

Violent tactics

Another one of the motions within the legislation also demands accountability for crowd control tactics used by LAPD and brings transparency to the repeated history of use of force in response to protests.

Lawsuits have already begun to circle in, many by journalists who have reported being detained without due process and the use of excessive force by officers, even after identifying themselves as media.   

LAPD has employed crowd control tactics, including utilizing less-lethal munitions like 37mm and 40mm foam round launchers, tear gas and flash bangs, which have left dozens of people injured. 

Hernandez said there were multiple reports of injuries sustained by the public and members of the media as a result, including video of officers firing projectiles at reporters and protestors at close range. 

On Monday, the Los Angeles Press Club and investigative reporting network Status Coup filed a federal lawsuit against the LAPD and LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell. 

The lawsuit alleges that the LAPD violated journalists' rights during recent protests and cites instances of officers firing foam projectiles at journalists, hitting media members with tear gas and less-lethal ammunition, unlawfully detaining journalists and forcibly preventing journalists from filming and targeting journalists with the intent to intimidate them and interfere with their constitutional right to document public events. 

If the legislation passes, LAPD will have to submit daily written memos of all LAPD crowd dispersal activity, which started on June 6, including deployment times, crowd sizes, officer count, weapons and tools used. 

The memos would also have to include justifications for each crowd control tactic used and documentation of review of the Use of Force policy ahead of each crowd control deployment. 

LAPD responses to ICE

Although the city became a sanctuary city last November, meaning that the city government and city employees, including the LAPD, are prohibited from using city resources or personnel to enforce federal immigration laws, people in L.A. have denounced LAPD tactics and violence against peaceful protesters and their inability to protect Angelenos, many of whom are legal residents that have been profiled and assaulted by ICE agents. 

“Being a sanctuary city means protecting our communities, not turning on them,” said Hernandez. “When our city institutions fail to keep that promise, leadership has a responsibility to step in, demand answers and take action. These motions are about defending the Constitution, restoring public trust and making sure that no one in our city is above accountability.”

The new piece of legislation also looks to demand answers on the multiple reports of the LAPD providing support for these federal operations despite L.A.'s sanctuary city status. The raids, which have been under federal immigration enforcement agencies—including ICE and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI)—have detained at least 45 Angelenos, with over 300 taken into custody without due process.  

It would essentially demand a report on all LAPD responses and communication with ICE, starting on June 6. 

The LAPD would have to report on the details of any request from ICE or other federal immigration enforcement agencies, LAPD actions taken and tools deployed and the names of commanding officers on scene. “We want to make sure that we aren't, as a city and our city entities, enabling both what's not legal under a sanctuary policy and also enabling these unconstitutional acts that the federal government is doing on our city and on our Angelenos and families,” Hernandez said. 

The legislative package has been submitted and assigned to their respective city committee. Hernandez told CALÓ News she hopes the city council moves the package along “as urgently as possible because we want to get this information while it's fresh and while things are happening.