Police

On Thursday afternoon, the announcement that court hearings regarding the proposed Fruitvale gang injunction would be delayed did not stop approximately 30 demonstrators outside the office of the Alameda County Administrator from demanding an alternative measure to reduce gang violence in their neighborhoods.

Oakland police have arrested a man in conjunction with a shooting that took place last night, December 1st, near the 1500 block of Madison Street.

Bike bells chimed as voices shouted “Bike for justice!” on the streets of Oakland’s Fruitvale and San Antonio neighborhoods late Tuesday evening. A group of 30 community activists toured the streets—lined with taco stands, vedura y fruta mercados, liquor stores and auto body shops—calling people inside stores and at bus stops to join them in opposing what could be the city’s second gang injunction.

On Monday, the Congressional Quarterly (CQ) Press released its annual City Crime Rate Rankings list, which ranks cities from highest number of crimes reported to lowest. Little has changed since last year—the top five remain the same—and Oakland, California, is still one of them. The good news, sort of, is that Oakland has dropped out of third place and is now No. 5.

Currently, the OPD has 324 officers assigned as 911 call respondents, five crime reduction teams and two traffic unit teams. But to fulfill Measure BB requirements, Batts announced that OPD is moving officers back into the 75 public safety officer (PSO) positions starting in January.

“Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together for … Guns N’ Hoses!” On Sunday, the Oakland Ice Center will host the third annual charity police versus firefighters hockey match between some of Oakland’s finest, titled “Guns N’ Hoses.”

At nighttime along Oakland’s International Boulevard, dozens of teenage girls are working the track—and there’s nothing athletic about it. “The Track” is the street nickname for the epicenter of underage prostitution in Oakland, where girls well under the age of eighteen strut down the street in platform heels and mini dresses while predatory pimps wait in cars around the corner.

Neighbors and friends of an unarmed East Oakland barber who was killed by Oakland Police Monday night reacted angrily today to the police account of the shooting. Police said the officers were responding to a domestic dispute call between Jones, who was on parole for a firearms offense, and a woman at a nearby laundromat on Bancroft Avenue.

Oakland police officials say there was minimal damage Friday night as protesters marched through the city in response to the sentencing of Johannes Mehserle. By the end of the evening, two Oakland businesses sustained broken windows and six cars were damaged in the wake of the protest.