system in the room. please refrain from flash photography. if you would, please stand in joint commission in the pledge of allegiance.

i pledge allegiance to the flag of the net is states of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. thank you, ladies and gentlemen. if you would, please direct your attention to the roll call of commissioners. president joe marshall? president marshall: present. vice-president mazzucco. vice president mazzucco: present. thank you, commissioners. also see it with the commissioners is the chief of police and the director of office complaints. mr. president, you have a quorum. president marshall: thank you, lieutenant. this is the regular meeting of the san francisco police commission, july 21, 2010, and

please call item no. 1. >> item one, mr. president, his approval of the minutes for the meetings march 31, april 7, and it 14, 2010. -- and april 14, 2010. president marshall: we have the meeting minutes for march 31, april 7, and april 14. if there are no corrections? >> so moved. >> second? president marshall: alright, second. item number 2, please? >> this is public comment, were members of the public may address the commission for a time determined by the chair on items that are within the subject matter jurisdiction of the commission but do not appear on the agenda. president marshall: general public comment, anyone? none. item number three, please?

>> item three is reports to the commission, under which we have item 3-a, the chief's report, the occ director's report, and the commission report. we start with the chief's report. president marshall: midevening, chief. and mr. president, how are you today? president marshall: tired. go right ahead. >> mr. president, commission, members, i like to go over quickly the status updates concerning basic policy and the dna backlog. starting with the crime numbers for this four-week cycle, updated this week. we are down 15% total, 17% down on property crimes, 6% violent crimes year-to-date. we're down a total of 10%

compared with last year to date. we are talking about roughly 2300 crimes less, 4% down in property crime, 4% down violent crime. as far as any noteworthy events, we are continuing to develop our regional crime center. we are getting better at collecting crime information very quickly and putting it out to our troops. we had a series of robberies that occurred in the city in the last few days. we had the director who was able to very quickly identify the pattern. we have one suspect was arrested. we're not sure if the suspect was involved in the other crimes. but the point i wanted to make is this is what we talked about, creating a real time crime center, doing better

identification. it is already taking place and is getting better, obviously, as we have improvements in equipment and record managements. but it is rewarding to see the evolution of this. we're now combining bric with other units and we will be able to having more and that -- more robust crime analysis section. we will be able to provide better tools for the men and women on the street. i thought that was a good point that things are working out for us. what i would like to do, concerning the crime, we asked the lapd internal affairs unit and the inspector general from the lapd to come in and help us provide training both for director hicks and their personnel and our people considering federal

investigations, general investigations, evaluating evidence, and adjudicating evidence. i think it will be useful. we had the inspector general who is someone who has a great deal of expertise in training as well as one of the captains. we will have investigators and supervisors from occ for the entire day, and as far as the investigator, and command staff supervisory staff for the entire date, the investigators will get the investigative piece, how to evaluate evidence, ask the right questions, conduct interviews, and the supervisor and command staff will get in touch with the evaluation of the evidence, adjudication. i think this will be the first that for us. i believe it will also help the occ and the department of internal affairs unit to work more collaboratively.

i think it is win-win, and at the end of the day, the community gets better work product and i think the officers get a more expeditious and more fair cross. i think it is a good improvement for us. unless there are any questions about this, i will move on to the next area, which is the update on the brady policy. ok, if we could start? >> good evening, president marshall, commissioners, chief. the department continues to proactively approach this issue. we have been meeting and communicating with the representative groups this week. as recently as this afternoon, we were communicating with the city attorney's office. i have also kept the district attorney's office in the loop. we have a two further meat and defers that represents civilian

groups that may be impacted by the brady procedure. at the same time, we continue to respond in a very timely fashion inquiries from various offices that we received several times a day, if not dozens per day. finally, if you want to get an estimation of time, it is my optimistic belief we are talking a matter of weeks, not days, not months, for implementation. with the final approval of the chief at his direction. >> go ahead. >> thank you. the chief mentioned, i think all of us mentioned the idea that at some point meet and confer cannot go on forever at some point you say here is the brady policy. what is the current thinking? what is the drop dead date? how close are we? >> the one area that we need to resolve is quite frankly -- this

popped out and we never gave it full consideration with the civilian piece of it, so we are meeting with the civilian union. obviously, their impact will be minimal, but nevertheless it is important. i have had conversations addressing the executive board, today as a matter of fact. i believe we will get this done very quickly. with aclu, i do not anticipate the world be a large amount of difficulty given the local work has been done already. one way or the other, we will quickly, but i agree with the director. we're talking weeks. we're not talking a month. president marshall: okay, thank you. thank you very much. >> next, we have the capt. to

provide us with an update on both the crime lab and the dna backlog. >> good evening, commissioners. i will defer to the captain i was at the crime lab for a couple of hours today. she will provide the update. >> good evening, mr. president and commissioners. we have gotten our documentation that we need to outsource some of the cases to help out with the crime load, and we have our technical specifications document done that our criminalist that is the technical leader at the dna unit has drawn up in conjunction with comptroller's office that is ready to go.

and we have an audit. she has to have one more meeting with the people at one of the labs, and we will be ready to outsource. it just this afternoon, she identified six sexual assault cases that have recently, in that have not -- have recently, and that have not been assigned to any analyst and will be outsourced. we are in the processin of outsourcing some of these. their cases were there just comparison cases. 14 of them were just outsources. the lieutenant and officers are assigned to the lab are in the process of contacting various labs to try to ascertain best practices, how we can do better trying to identify how not to have backlogs and to try to find out what are the best ratio of catalyst to caseload ratio to avoid backlogs and what ideal

personnel ratios should be. so, questions? >> i have a few. we spent two hours at the lab. i thank you for your work. i think we have made a lot of progress today in terms of identifying exactly how big the problem is and some quick solutions to it. just for the sake of my fellow commissioners, we had heard the number 100 sexual assault cases pending. the good news is it may be somewhat less than that. i think rather than putting out new numbers, we want to make sure what those numbers are. we have identified from that subset of strangers sexual assaults, the most important with the greatest rate of recidivism and new victims being victimized. plus, the chances of getting hit with codis, that once samples are obtained in dna profiles are

provided that we catch the perpetrator. i think based on our discussions today, things are moving quickly now to get this outside lab ready to take some of this backlog. the reality is the lab has been overworked and underfunded for a long time. i want to say publicly as i said to the director of the section, it is not her fault. there have been working hard. we have good employees there. they have been cast under the shadow of deborah madden and they're feeling the sting of that. it is important to acknowledge the hard work they're doing today as we speak. the simple fact is they have not been able to keep up with the work load they have been given. so the plan we were talking about putting together today was identifying cases that we can send out quickly to an outside lab, to take away some of the excess burden on the current analysts so they can keep up with their current work load. i am somewhat optimistic that we can come back in two weeks with

a definite plan of how to lay this out. maybe in a number of months we can get rid of the entire backlog. that is my hope, and i think the chief and a captain with their leadership and work of the crime lab we can do that. i would suggest we bring it back into weeks. i think we will have a full plan at that point. i think that would be the best approach. >> there was also good news from my subsequent visit later on to the crime lab. the 3100 machine, the connectivity is part of the legacy day-to-day migration. the estimated time on that project was about eight months. that is the one that will run 16 samples at a time. >> so that people who are listening, commissioners, everyone here, there is equipment which are lab acquired years ago which i could tell you from my work is d a doing homicide cases would go from

testing one sample at a time to 16 samples at a time. you could imagine this time savings. some of this equipment was acquired by grants five and six years ago and has never been plugged in. we never had the i.t. resources in place to hook up this machine that would dramatically decrease the workload. i don't know the whole history of what requests have been made to get i.t. funding, but we have expensive equipment sitting at the crime lab that is unplugged, never used. >> i learned today that it is part of that project, that is working now, that data migration. when that product is completed, estimated time eight months, that will be functional and we will have the ability to run the 16 samples at once. >> the other good piece of news that the department is finalizing the process of hiring two additional analysts, which

will bring the number from 6 to 8, so we could keep up with the caseload. there is good equipment, acquired six years ago, unplugged, not connected. i am sure it is disheartening for the analysts, but also us. people are getting their hands around it now, because it was a shocker to see that today. >> and personnel is currently recruiting for dna specialized criminalists. >> again, i just want to commend the work of the analysts there who feel under siege about the bad press around the crime lab. they're doing good work, working hard, and underfunded circumstances from the past. they're very proud of their work. they want to keep doing their work. i think we can help them with the resources to do that. thank you again. i would like to calendar two weeks out to look at a comprehensive solution to this problem. thank you, captain. >> thank you. president marshall: thank you

very much. >> ok, that concludes my report. ipresident marshall: is that all your items? >> yes, the dna backlog, the investigation of the crime lab. we are waiting for the prosecutorial decision. once we get that, we can move forward and basically, then notify the commission and to a full press conference to announce the results. the lab worke that was requested has been done, has been completed, and at some point we could i agendas that -- we could put that on the agenda. >> my other question, chief,

sometimes the attorney general's office to take a long time making a decision. i would just request sometime by which if they have not made the decision, that we have irresponsibility to get some report in the department -- we have the responsibility to get some report and the department. >> we can talk about the administrative fixes that have been done. we're trying to avoid a recurrence that has not been noticed. we can never guarantee that human beings will not commit crimes, but we can guarantee we will have systems that pick up quickly. we are in the process now of handing out the criminal side of internal affairs. we have a new command structure within the lab. we have a supervisory structure. we are in the process of reducing the workload to make

sure we never put our people back in the situation where they were before, where the workload was way above what it should have been. and the budget just passed today, so we have funding that will make possible the removal of this backlog. another problem was we were underfunded for the work, so the lab as it is currently configured today is and will continue to function based on best practices, whether a combination of outside sourcing of internal worked. obviously, it will continue to evolve from this, and eventually find the right point as to what kind of configuration we want to have, whether it needs to be a smaller lab with a combination of outsourcing and internal work or whether we want to get it all done internally. that will be discussion, quite frankly, that would take more than a year to finalize, given

that we have to be out of the current location within a couple years. there are still no plans to where we will move to. we are involved in some negotiations, but this will be an area that it would be better for closed session as far as relocation. the point, what is important is, number one, the lab is functioning today according to the right set of protocols. it will only get better, because now we have the funding to hire additional people and get the work done so we don't have a backlog. thanks to your work and that of others, i think one of the problems with this piece of equipment that has been sitting there, it has to have i.t., but it is not a department i.t. problem. it is beyond the control of the department.

the priority and a supervisor talked about the frustrations of trying to get this equipment going -- the prior dna supervisor talked about the frustrations of getting this equipment going. this is much like the other system that was sitting there five years, not functioning, and we hope first district will be up and running by this fall and we hope to and have the entire police department functioning with an automated records management system by the spring. but there has been tremendous underfunding of i.t. in general, and that has impacted the police department and other parts of the city. those things will be corrected as far as the of i.t. the current operation of the lab today is sound, and it will get better as we come up with different protocols. the prosecutorial decision as to whether to prosecute and how to prosecute, obviously we don't control them. we have been waiting on the adman -- admin communication

piece of it before we move forward with administrative discipline, but that is all part from the running of the lab today. the running of the lab today is running well. the work that is being done is being done according to good practices, and obviously the backlog is being addressed. i think we need to segregate that from the discipline or the criminal side, because although they are kind of connected, one can go forward without the other, meaning the lab can run well and move forward regardless of whether the case is prosecuted or not. eventually, the administrative solution to any misconduct or negligence by personal involved in this case. commissioner hammer: i would defer to my fellow commissioners. i don't know without pushing my colleagues if we should set a date at some point, what we can

do in public or closed session, to put a final coat on it. i am open to whatever my colleagues suggest. president marshall: commissioner? vice president mazzucco: if we get some idea of where it is going. we understand the criminal side is out of our control. that is what the attorney general and district attorneys do. we could have more of a closed- session read on that and the parallels and personal matters. we have to go to close session anyway. if we could do that may be. then we will have clarity on that. >> i think if we set up a couple of weeks out in closed session, which have a more full discussion and determine -- we could have a more full discussion and determine what we do with public disclosure. again, the structure of the lab and the running of the lab, we have partially discussed that. it is fine to get it out there.

i am only concerned about any public disclosure at this time that may compromise the prosecution, and it is important of a closed session discussion first. commissioner hammer: great, thank you chief. president marshall: madam city attorney, we have to put that on the agenda? ok. all right. thank you. >> we will look at a couple weeks out? commissioner hammer: sometimes we do a closed session, pending the outlook of the criminal. once that happens, the chief can report on that as much as he can after that, taking names out, so the public understand what was undertaken. >> very good, great. emmett is it two weeks from now, three weeks from now? -- >> is it two weeks from now, three weeks from now? >> basically, for closed session

hearing, we will give you an update. frankly, we could do it tonight. is is that we cannot because it is not on the agenda. so that is not a problem. that is a discussion to have with the city attorney to prepare the proper counseling as to how this should be done. >> two weeks from now? >> that would be fine, if that is ok with the commission. vice president mazzucco: i would also point out one thing, we might have a very light agenda. president marshall: ah. ok. we have that in two weeks. >> change it to three weeks from now?

vice president mazzucco: i would say that, or maybe the litani can tell us if the case we were going to hear is falling apart -- or maybe the lieutenant can tell us if the case we were going to hear is falling apart? >> commissioner, we have been served with motions to continue on both sides of the matter that we were scheduled to hear next week. president marshall: there were a couple of pieces that we were going to stick in there. we could do it next week? >> that would be ok. next week. president marshall: great. that concludes your report, chief, i believe? >> yes. president marshall: we move onto the occ director's report. director hicks? >> good evening. it this evening, i evening,occ complete statistics and mediation statistics. as of july 20, the occ open 516 cases and we closed 482.

we open 30 more cases than we have closed. during the same time last year we open 5 stoddert 62 cases and closed five under 41. -- 562 cases and closed 541. this is an 8% decrease in cases opened as compared to the same time last year. as of july 20, we had for under 15 pending cases -- 415 pending cases. today, we have sustained a 39 cases. during the same time in two dozen 9, with sustained 27 cases. this represents 44% increase in sustained cases. the sustained rate is 8%, which is more in line with the historic average of sustained cases since around 1996. today, the occ has facilitated

the mediation of 20 complaints this year, compared with 45 by the end of july last year. so far this month we have had three mediations. that concludes my report. president marshall: anything further for the director? vice president mazzucco: thank you. >> you are welcome. president marshall: alright, commissioner reports. i don't think we have anything to report, commissioners, do you? vice president mazzucco: briefly, i spent parts of this week presiding over two older cases on the docket another commissioner had that i took over. one is resolved, one is not. that hearing will finish up in august. but it is an arduous duty, but hopefully one of them will be resolved by the end of next month. president marshall: any public

comment on these items? seeing none. item number 4. >> item four, mr. president, is routine administrative business , commissioner announcements, and 4b is the schedule of items identified for future commission meetings. under 4a, i will announce the assignment of disciplinary charges filed in case number alw c-10-158 to an individual commissioner for taking of evidence on a date to be determined by the commissioner. similarly, the second assignment of disciplinary charge has been filed in case number alw c10-169 to an individual commissioner for the taking of evidence on a date to be determined by the commissioner. i would recommend in an effort