To make Denver’s beleaguered police discipline system more efficient, the city’s new police monitor is proposing an overhaul that would allow the city to resolve allegations of minor police misconduct informally.
The goal of the new filtering policy is to free up resources for investigating more-serious allegations, such as improper use of force, lying on police reports and criminal conduct.
Currently, the Denver Police Department is required to investigate all allegations of officer wrongdoing. The result is that insignificant cases are clogging the system, causing delays in internal-affairs investigations, according to union and police administration officials.
Richard Rosenthal, the city’s police monitor, said that when he arrived in Denver last summer, he discovered that many internal-affairs investigations had been languishing for more than a year.
“There were major timeliness issues and concerns that this new policy is intended to address,” he said.
Although no comprehensive data are available on how long it is taking to resolve such cases, “anecdotally, there were numerous discipline cases that were taking years to address,” Rosenthal said.
The proposal also specifies a mediation process that would allow complainants to resolve some of their beefs in a meeting with the officer involved. More- serious allegations, such as unnecessary use of force, would not be eligible for mediation.
A draft of the policy has been forwarded to Al LaCabe, Denver’s safety manager, who oversees the city’s police officers and firefighters. LaCabe did not return telephone messages seeking comment, but Police Chief Gerry Whitman said he did not anticipate any significant objections.
“This will take a huge chunk of these complaints off the officers’ backs,” Whitman said. “It’s good for the city, but it’s even better for the officers.”
The proposal also is getting praise from the police union.
“I think it’s long overdue,” said Mike Mosco, president of the Police Protective Association. “All I know is that these low-level cases shouldn’t take months to resolve.”
The changes are modeled after those Rosenthal implemented when he was the police review director in Portland, Ore. Rosenthal said that policy resulted in a system that succeeded in resolving about 90 percent of police misconduct cases in fewer than 150 days.
Rosenthal’s former boss in Portland, Auditor Gary Blackmer, credited the filtering system with cutting down on a backlog of cases.
“If you look at the breakdown of complaints that come in, 80 (percent) to 90 percent have to do with courtesy issues that don’t have to do with excessive use of force or criminal violations,” Blackmer said. “There really is a need to apply resources so they have the greatest long-term impact on policing.”
Denver’s draft proposal specifies that the Police Department’s internal-affairs bureau still would investigate all allegations of serious misconduct, which could involve such matters as police shootings, in-custody deaths or duty-related incidents that result in serious injuries.
But minor-misconduct allegations could be handled in an expedited manner, resulting in resolution within five days of the time the complaint was received. No formal finding or imposition of discipline would result when the issue is resolved in this manner.
The draft proposal specifies minor misconduct as: “Potential violations of policy or procedure that have minimal adverse impact on the operation or integrity of the department and that are not likely to result in a formal disciplinary action against a named employee.”
Rosenthal said what constitutes minor misconduct would be left up to supervisors to decide in individual situations. Typically, a minor-misconduct complaint would involve an officer accused of rudeness unless a pattern of such accusations had developed for an officer, Rosenthal said.
Supervisors could resolve minor-misconduct allegations by discussing the matter with the officer. All such allegations still would be documented.
Rosenthal also would have the power to review all internal-affairs investigations. If he believed additional investigation was warranted, Rosenthal could conduct it on his own and would have the power to issue subpoenas in such instances.
Staff writer Christopher N. Osher can be reached at 303-820-1747 or cosher@denverpost.com.
