Judge tells Oakland: Pay up on cop reform

The federal judge overseeing Oakland’s mandatory police reforms lashed out at city officials Thursday and ordered the city to pay for court-appointed experts to fix the troubled Police Department — with or without a city contract.

“This is untenable,” U.S. District Court Judge Thelton Henderson said of the City Council’s refusal this week to renew the annual contracts with compliance director Robert Warshaw and his consulting group, Police Performance Solutions LLC.

Henderson ordered the city to deposit $100,000 into the court registry by Feb. 1 and to comply with future payment orders to keep that fund fully replenished until the expert services are no longer needed.

The council on Tuesday voted to extend the contracts for only two months, saying the costs are exorbitant and should be vetted by the council’s Public Safety Committee to see if the city is getting its money’s

worth. Oakland pays $815,000 a year for both contracts, and was poised to add an additional $75,000 this year for extra services the consultants provided in the wake of last year’s sexual misconduct scandal.

The city has spent $13.6 million on court costs, mandatory audits and monitors since 2003, the year it settled a landmark civil rights case over alleged beatings and falsified reports by a group of officers known as “The Riders” in West Oakland.

“This is absolutely a waste of taxpayer dollars for the return that we’re getting,” Councilman Noel Gallo said Thursday, defending the City Council’s unanimous vote.

Councilwoman Desley Brooks, who chairs the Public Safety Committee, pushed her colleagues not to approve the annual contracts.

At the meeting Tuesday, she accused Warshaw of delivering perfunctory, “cut-and-paste” reports and of concealing details about police discipline — including the sexual misconduct scandal that led Chief Sean Whent to resign in June.

But Henderson said in his order that Warshaw and Police Performance Solutions “derive their authority from the court, not from any contractual agreement with the city.”

The judge said further that Oakland’s revolt was “somewhat suspicious,” given that it came a week after he announced his planned retirement in August. At that point, the case will be assigned to a different judge.

Attorney John Burris, who helped represent 119 plaintiffs in the civil rights case that put Oakland under federal oversight, praised Henderson for “striking back with a vengeance.”

“Given that this effort to usurp his authority was just wrong, the judge had to send a message to reassert his control,” Burris said.

“I’m glad the ship has been righted — we can’t have uncertainty around whether the monitor is going to be paid or not.”

Burris went on to criticize the council for putting the city at a greater financial hardship simply so it could send a message to the court.

“Now they’ll have to put up the money in advance, and they’ll always have to have it there,” he said. “It’s a way (for the judge) to ensure there’s no break, no haggling, and the payments are all made on time.”

Gallo stood his ground, calling the council’s defiance an act of principle.

“There comes a time when you have to stand up and challenge the system,” he said.

“This is absolutely a waste of taxpayer dollars for the return we’re getting.” Councilman Noel Gallo