Police
Oakland police arrested a suspect Friday morning in the “targeted” killing of Laney College athletic director and longtime Oakland football coach John Beam, who was shot on campus Thursday and died at Highland Hospital early Friday. At a news conference Friday, Assistant Police Chief Jim Beere said Alameda County sheriff’s deputies took Cedric Irving Jr., 27, into custody without incident around 3:15 a.m. at the San Leandro BART station. He is awaiting charges. Beere said Irving knew Beam but that…
Two members of the Oakland Police Commission have drafted a scathing letter to the federal court, saying the City Council is threatening the city’s progress toward ending two decades of federal oversight of the Police Department. The letter is included in the agenda packet for the commission’s Thursday night meeting, during which commissioners will decide whether to send it to the federal monitor overseeing Oakland’s police reforms. The letter, which is not addressed or dated, is signed by Commission Chair…
Whoever broke into an off-site Oakland Museum storage facility earlier this month probably had no idea they were stealing historic artifacts, the museum said in a statement issued Friday. “There is no indication that the perpetrators specifically identified the facility as museum storage or sought particular artworks or artifacts. Instead, it appears they gained access and took items that were most easily available,” the statement said. No arrests have been made in what the museum is calling “a crime of…
As Oakland Police Chief Floyd Mitchell prepares to leave in December, city officials will be tasked with selecting a new head for the Police Department. The Oakland Police Commission, known as one of the strongest oversight boards in the country, will help decide who becomes the city’s next police chief. Its involvement is under scrutiny by the Oakland Police Officers Association and some residents, after some said Chief Mitchell left because the job comes with too much oversight. “We will…
Oakland Police Chief Floyd Mitchell resigned Wednesday morning, 18 months after being hired. In a statement on its website, the city said he will step down on Dec. 5. “It has been an honor to serve the Oakland community, and I am grateful for the support I’ve received from the residents,” Mitchell said in the statement. “I’m incredibly proud of the men and women of this Department and the collaborative working relationships forged with the community and business owners to reduce…
The Oakland Police Commission this week gave police Chief Floyd Mitchell the green light to allow officers to start a car chase without prior approval from a supervisor and to exceed 50 mph in those pursuits. Previously, officers were required to get supervisor approval before chasing any suspects and had to abandon the chase if it exceeded 50 mph. Mitchell has been advocating for a new chase policy for the department for over a year. Though he did not need…
The Oakland chapter of the NAACP on Monday announced a new collaboration with the Oakland Police Department to recruit more officers from the community, especially Black residents as well as other people of color. At a press conference at the Oakland NAACP west office, retired Alameda County Superior Court Judge Brenda Harbin-Forte, an executive member of NAACP Oakland, spoke about racial patterns she has noticed among crime victims. “I realized that the vast majority of cases, the victims were African…
Oakland leaders closed a $265 million city budget deficit by cutting spending across many departments and programs earlier this month in what Councilmember Zac Unger called a “nobody’s happy budget.” But one controversial area of spending is seeing a substantial increase in the new budget: police overtime. Over the last decade, the Oakland Police Department has consistently overspent its overtime budget by tens of millions of dollars each year. Last year, as the city’s fiscal crisis deepened, the police department overspent…
After several hours of debate, the Oakland City Council voted Tuesday to renew its contract with ShotSpotter, a gunshot detection technology system. The council renewed the $2.5 million contract for one year to start, instead of three, because of concerns about a lack of data and the city’s strained budget. But if the City Council does not make changes to the contract next year, it will automatically renew for the full three years. It was approved by a 7-1 vote,…