The Assault on the LA Sheriff’s Department – The CA-DOJ Has Simply Lost Its Mind

As initially reported in my most recent article on The Current Report, “Leadership Failure – State DOJ Poised to Take Over the LASD,” dated April 2, 2024, I discussed the impending arrival of a report from the CA-DOJ regarding their findings of a nearly 3-year long investigation into the LA County Sheriff’s Department.

Looking back, I find that I was woefully naïve when it came to the reality of what absurdities the DOJ was planning to inflict on our once proud department.  When summing up what I believed to be the purpose and direction of the investigation, I had wrongly assumed that the agency was interested in what was best for not only the Sheriff’s Department, but for the people of LA County as well.  Boy was I wrong.

While I understood that the investigation was working to determine a “pattern and practice” of operational behaviors and help the department come into compliance with the law where deemed necessary, it is instead proving itself to be anything but.  It is clear by some of the demands reportedly coming out of the DOJ that their real focus and direction is the absolute gutting of not only the LASD, but southern California law enforcement as well.

As an example of what is being discussed at the highest levels of the Sheriff’s Department and the CA-DOJ, I am offering one of the reported demands of the DOJ:

“LASD shall develop and implement policies and practices prohibiting arrests for small amounts of drugs or simple possession of drugs absent a threat to public safety and welfare directly related to drug possession (See, e.g., Health and Safety Code 11350, 11364 and 11377.”

Let’s translate what we just read:

11350 H&S is the possession of controlled substances such as cocaine, heroin, opiates, peyote, LSD, and other hallucinogens.

11377 H&S is the possession of methamphetamine and phencyclidine (PCP).

11364 H&S is the possession of drug paraphernalia such as opium pipes, crack pipes, “hype kits,” needles, etc.

Apparently, what the brain surgeons at the DOJ are proposing (ordering/recommending/suggesting/demanding) is that deputies simply look the other way when encountering drug addicts on the streets. Imagine if you will (Rod Serling’s voice) a county where drug addicts are free to roam the streets, high as a kite and in possession of illegal narcotics, many of which can routinely be filed as felonies. Now imagine any scene from the television series “The Walking Dead,” and you will begin to understand what is being proposed.

Other than the fact that this “recommendation” is illogical, nonsensical and dangerous, I would like to know why this topic is even being presented in the first place.  How is arresting people in possession of illegal substances contrary to the law?  The mere fact that these crimes are covered by legal statutes makes them enforceable.  Isn’t enforcing the law a commendable “pattern and practice?”  How many of these folks turn to illegal behavior to pay for their habit by committing burglaries, car thefts, petty theft, grand theft and robberies?

I think what this boils down to is that the investigation has morphed into becoming a sweaty teenage pipe dream for some very progressive, anti-law enforcement, very naïve people.  They can say what they want and argue that this proposal is simply “boiler plate” or a harmless negotiation starting point, but the fact remains that it is so draconian in nature and beyond the pale that it smacks of something far more dangerous.

No one is saying that the department is perfect and beyond oversight.  There are things that can and should be changed, but if the DOJ’s focus is to simply stick it to the LASD, then all of us in LA County will suffer.  We deserve better, but I am fearful that the current sheriff is not up to the task of standing up to some of this stupidity and will simply crumble to their demands.  Only time will tell, and I hope and pray that the department will somehow grow a backbone and refuse to give the DOJ a free hand and carte blanche to unjustly tear the LASD to shreds.