City officials and business leaders are on a three-day fact-finding trip to study police use of force and training in Las Vegas, Nev., which undertook a major revamp after a series of shootings.
Mayor Richard Berry, Police Chief Gorden Eden, members of the Greater Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce's APD Reform Task Force and representatives of the ACLU will be attending sessions dealing with how the police department there changed its use of force policies, internal affairs investigations and how those investigations are reviewed.
"The bottom line is to achieve collaboration between the community and the police department," Berry said. "I want to know what the best practices are around the country."
The Albuquerque delegation will also hear about how the Las Vegas Metro police are being retrained in crisis intervention and in the use of force.
"We're going because we have been told these are pieces of reform that Las Vegas police have done well," said Chamber President and CEO Terri Cole.
Unlike the Albuquerque Police Department, the Las Vegas Metro Police Department was not investigated by the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division.
The group will also meet with local representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union and will be accompanied by Peter Simonson, executive director of ACLU New Mexico.
Simonson said he was interested in seeing how a police department "grappled with the reform process."
"We also have to be careful about drawing direct comparisons between Las Vegas and Albuquerque because the situations are very different," he said.
Instead after news reports and at least two shootings of unarmed African American men, the Las Vegas police department asked for advice and guidance from the Department of Justice on what reforms were needed.
Mayor Berry has agreed to enter into a consent decree overseen by a special master and the U.S. District Court as a result of a lengthy investigation into fatal shootings and use of force complaints involving Albuquerque police.
The consent decree is being negotiated between federal and city attorneys and consultants.
"We are not trying to supplant the consent decree process," Cole said. "We want to look at best practices."
Cole said the Chamber's APD Reform Task Force plans on visiting Los Angeles, which spent 10 years fighting the Department of Justice over a consent decree until it finally agreed to federal oversight.
Copyright 2014 - Albuquerque Journal, N.M.
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
