Khan tells Loud and Clear that the Los Angeles Police Commission "has completely failed to meaningfully respond to community concerns related to the Los Angeles Police Department’s violence, the tactics they’ve been using…the sheer misuse and abuse of power and the violation of people’s constitutional rights."
He describes the makeup of the commission as containing three lawyers, two of them being law professors and one an entertainment attorney, the executive director of a non-profit organization, and a land developer. Hamid says that not only does the commission not use the rarely seen power it has, but in fact colludes with police to persecute activists.
"This is one of the few police commissions in the country that has subpoena power, but has completely failed to use [it]," he says.
Hamid details the LAPD’s history of violence, pointing out that "in 2015, the LAPD led the country in killing the most people of any police department in the nation.There were 1,145 killings by police, which comes to about every 7 hours and 41 minutes someone was killed by cops."
He adds that "out of the 38 shooting incidents the LAPD was involved in [this year], one third of the people who were shot were mentally ill. This year already, LAPD has killed nine people in the community."
The organizer believes that a police commission is "supposed to represent the best interest of the community," and be "custodians of public trust", but in reality, it functions as "a shock absorber for a system that is fundamentally flawed by design."
Eight activists have already been arrested this year for protesting at commission meetings.
"What people have been demanding is more accountability," he explains. "People have been demanding public hearings into these violations of their rights, people have been demanding full investigations into these things, but nothing has changed."
Even the timing and setting of the meetings are designed to intimidate.
"People are saying these meetings need to be open and accessible to the public because they’re held every Tuesday morning at 9:30 in the morning at the police headquarters, which is pretty much a garrisoned building. When you go to the meeting you are surrounded by armed police, so it doesn’t have any semblance of a place where people can freely speak."
The Stop LAPD Spying Network feels that genuine community oversight will be critical, as local police are equipped to use military might against poor, working, and oppressed communities of color.
"We’re exposing that counterterrorism and counterinsurgency methods are being incorporated into domestic policing,” he says. “A whole apparatus is being created where these technologies being used by the military is being used locally."
