Crime
According to the California Office of Traffic Safety, a government agency that provides grants to local and state public agencies for programs to help them enforce traffic laws, Oakland has consistently had the highest rate of hit-and-run crashes of any large city in the state. “In 2014, there were 7,000 traffic collisions, of which 4,000 were hit and runs,” said Officer Glenn Hara, who works in the traffic investigation unit at the Oakland Police Department. Out of those cases, which include incidents with injuries and fatalities as well as more minor cases, such as damage to a parked car, OPD has solved fewer than 2 percent.
Oakland Police Department releases information about “wanted suspect” they are searching for in connection with the fatal shooting of Jasvir Singh, an East Oakland ice cream truck driver.
On Friday morning, the Oakland Police Department Ceasefire Team and the FBI arrested five people and recovered weapons and drugs in a raid targeting the Ghost Town gang.
Merritt’s new law enforcement pre-academy program hopes to recruit students of color to the Oakland Police Force. In a department whose officers’ past use of force against minorities fueled generations of distrust, that can be a hard sell.
Around 200 people gathered at a vigil Wednesday morning to honor the life of Antonio Ramos. Ramos, a West Oakland-based artist employed by the nonprofit Attitudinal Healing Connection (AHC), was shot and killed Tuesday while working on a mural on West Street between 35th and 36th Streets, under the 580 freeway.
The Oakland Police Department and the FBI have been partnered together since June 2014 to tackle the large amount of homicide active and cold cases still under investigation. Almost a year later, a physical new joint workspace in the OPD administration building is now near completion and a new billboard campaign has been launched, resulting in a staggering significant amount of cases that are being solved.
Hundreds of pounds of prescription drugs were collected Saturday as part of National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day.
On Wednesday, members of the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity coalition (PHSS) spent hours rallying in the heat to protest the new welfare check procedures in security housing units (SHU) at Pelican Bay State Prison.
Daniel J. Rush, a union official who has been at the center of a four-year FBI investigation, sat on the front bench in a federal courthouse in Oakland waiting to enter his plea in a lawsuit filed by the US Attorney’s Office that alleges he was involved in attempted extortion, money laundering and receiving illegal payments.