The Burlingame Voice

BPD Use of Force Townhall: A Summary

Last night's Zoom Townhall on the Police Department's "Use of Force" policies, its track record and its responses to residents' concerns was somewhat enlightening.  But not in the way you might have expected.  If you were expecting to learn that this is an actual problem in B'game and that major changes are needed, you were disappointed.  It's not and they aren't.  But if you wanted to see how much some people need to learn about how the City is organized, how it operates, or how it interoperates with the County and other entities then this was the place to be.

First, what has been the extent of Use of Force in B'game?  Chief Mike Matteucci saved the statistics until near the end.  I was writing as fast as I could but missed a couple of numbers that I will add when the recording becomes available.  From 2016 to present there have been 2,643 arrests in B'game.  I missed the 2019 figure for uses of force, but all the other years totaled 35 and I believe all but 3 were "empty handed" use of force.  Tasers accounted for 3 in five years, if I heard right.  Hospitalizations totaled....zero, except for a few officers.  After the Chief noted that BPD policy doesn't allow choke holds and now "carotid holds" are newly off the table, the elephant in the room is how exactly empty-hand force will work?  Only my first two questions in the post below were addressed, but I am really anxious to get the answer to the fourth question.  I wrestled in high school and a bit in college.  I know what a challenge it is to just get a guy down on a mat who weighs exactly the same as me; with both of us wearing tights and a referee to prevent eye-gouging, head slaps, etc.  It ain't easy.

The Q&A took up about an hour of the 90 minutes.  Attendees were informed that the City doesn't have mental health professionals (it's a County function and BPD works with them if they have advance notice), the Taser policy is one-time-only except in rare cases where a second might be needed, and MOST IMPORTANTLY that there is NO SUCH THING as routine call or routine stop.  City manager Lisa Goldman's shining moment in an overall excellent performance last night was when she pushed back completely on the idea of some officers going unarmed.  Thinly-veiled, leading questions about the use of a private company (Lexipol) for legal updates, officer "impunity" (it's qualified immunity), and the police unions were deftly handled by the Chief and the City attorney Kathleen Kane. 

There was more on the education front and I'll link to the recording when it comes out.  This webinar was billed as the first step with more to come, but I really don't see why we should bother.  Maybe provide written or video'ed answers to the rest of questions in the hopper and let staff get back to work.  I took this photo during the Avenue shut-down for potential rioting and I like its nuanced message.

Arson at the Library, War Zone on the Ave.

Just as things were reverting to a highly-modified normal (an oxymoron if ever there was one) we get hit with the triple whammy of an arson event at the main library and a warning from BPD to shop owners to take necessary precautions against vandalism and looting.  Then a two-night county-wide curfew went into effect.  When the Ring Neighborhood alert came in yesterday about a fire in the 400 block of Primrose, I got worried.  Fortunately, as you see below, the fire appears to be just umbrellas in front of the library, not the library itself.  BPD made an arrest of a 45 year old, white male and I'm sure there will be more information to follow.

The scene on the Avenue is really disappointing.  Many shops were just reopening or announced that they will in the coming week.  The precautionary boarding up of windows certainly won't induce people to return soon and the restaurants that have been barely eking by on take-out will have to absorb even more stress.  Anyone who thinks this will somehow cure what ails our society is mistaken.

Crime Update - 5 Year Trends

I had a chance to sit down with Chief Mike Matteucci and Lt. Jay Kiely for an update on police affairs.  I would say that I was meeting with the "new" chief after Chief Wollman, but Chief Matteucci's been in the position for a year already.  Time flies but the Chief move up through the ranks here in town and it appeared to be an easy transition .  Voice readers will recall a three-part series I did five years ago on various department initiatives including the Quality of Life team, the actions to reduce property crimes and technology initiatives.  During our discussion, it was clear that many of the initiatives have come to successful conclusion or are continuing to progress.  The most notable shift in the crime figures came in Vehicle Burglaries (i.e. of locked vehicles) which jumped near the end of the year especially downtown.  BPD has some on-going tactics to fight this trend that I won't go into here.  Here are the monthly averages:

Monthly Average                    2015    2016    2017    2018    2019

Residential Burglaries                5        5        2            3        3

Vehicle Burglaries                    22       23    25        21       39

Commercial Burglaries                8        9        4            5        4

Other Thefts                              56        60      51        56      61

Robberies                                   1        1        1            1        2

Stolen Vehicles                          10        9        6          4         6

Vandalism                                  14       13    13          11       12

 

"Other Thefts" include porch pirate package thefts, shoplifting and stealing items out of unlocked cars.  B'game averaged 127 crimes per month in these seven categories last year.  Having now subscribed to the daily email crime summary for several months, I can also say there are a semi-regular occurrences of other, more serious crimes like assault and sexual assault.  Fraud, scams and DUIs are also represented on a monthly basis.

As the city's population grows with all of the building taking place we should expect to grow the police department budget as well.  It may not have to grow linearly with population, but it will have to grow.                                                           

Crime Doesn't Take a Holiday

Happy New Year?  I've been getting the daily email from our centralized crime mapping tool that the City has enabled on its website.  It can be eye-opening some days and I would encourage you to subscribe at least for a couple of weeks to get a sense of what is happening on an on-going basis in town.  You can go here:  https://brm.crimegraphics.com/2013/default.aspx  and look on the lower left side to sign-up.  Here is the crime report for the first three days of 2020 courtesy

Case #	Date of Crime	Date Reported	Crime Type	Crime	Classification	Location	Map
19-4074	12/19/2019 20:28-20:28	12/19/2019 20:28	Assault	Battery On Person	Misdemeanor	1400 Block of OLD BAYSHORE BL, Burlingame	(View)
20-10	1/1/2020 21:30-08:30	1/2/2020 08:32	Burglary	Burglary:second Degree	Felony	3100 Block of FRONTERA WY, Burlingame	(View)
20-11	1/2/2020 08:45-09:57	1/2/2020 09:57	Burglary	Burglary:first Degree	Felony	1400 Block of BALBOA AV, Burlingame	(View)
20-13	12/23/2019 14:12-11:52	1/2/2020 11:52	Stolen Vehicle	Vehicle Theft	Felony	1400 Block of ROLLINS RD, Burlingame	(View)
20-14	1/1/2020 19:00-12:00	1/2/2020 12:34	Attempted Burglary	Attempted Burglary	Felony	800 Block of WALNUT AV, Burlingame	(View)
20-23	1/3/2020 13:47-13:47	1/3/2020 13:47	Warrant	Outside Warrant Arrest Misdemeanor	Misdemeanor	1400 Block of BURLINGAME AV, Burlingame	(View)
20-24	12/25/2019	1/3/2020 15:41	Assault	Attempted Sexual Battery-Misd	Misdemeanor	1500 Block of NEWLANDS AV, Burlingame	(View)
20-28	1/3/2020 19:30-21:30	1/3/2020 21:30	Burglary	Burglary:second Degree	Felony	HOWARD AV/HIGHLAND AV, Burlingame	(View)
20-37	1/5/2020 01:23-01:23	1/5/2020 01:23	DUI Driving	Driving Under Infl Alcohol	Misdemeanor	CALIFORNIA DR/HOWARD AV, Burlingame	(View)
20-38	1/5/2020 04:31-04:31	1/5/2020 04:31	Assault	Battery W/Serious Injury Felony	Felony	1400 Block of HOWARD AV, Burlingame	(View)

Apple Heists: What is to be done?

Almost exactly a year ago, we posted about the Apple store heists getting out of control.  There were some unarmed sort-of-security guards standing around outside on the Avenue for awhile, but that mostly ceased about six months ago and was a for-show-only response anyway.  As the local multi-person, grab and go thefts continue, other merchants on the Avenue are growing concerned as are many local residents.  It seems like just a matter of time before someone gets hurt--most likely not in the store itself, but on the street as the getaway car or cars zoom off down the Avenue.  BPD has placed a decoy cruiser outside on occasion and I would guess some patrol has been upped, but it seems incumbent on Apple to do more.  Here's the decoy in place a couple nights ago.

Pipe Bomb at Rollins Rd. USPS

In the spirit of covering all things Burlingame, I'll just note that we made the national news yesterday when the Postal Service located a pipe bomb in the mail addressed to activist Tom Steyer.  The mail sorting facility on Rollins Rd. went into shutdown and this message went out at 11:50 am

Burlingame Police responded to assist the FBI on a report of a suspicious package located at our mail facility on Rollins Rd. The package is consistent with the mailings throughout the nation. The package has been removed from that facility and the area has been rendered safe. This incident poses no danger to the community of Burlingame.

Later in the day, a guy with a long criminal record was arrested in Florida and accused of being the perp who mailed about a dozen such packages.  If you want the full details, the Daily Journal has it here.

 

Apple Heists Continue

At some point one needs to ask if it is safe to enter an Apple store.  I had a chat with a knowledgeable person last night that would indicate Apple has not yet taken a very good approach to securing their stores.  It sounds like they are making an attempt but in their opinion it's not the best way (or ways) to go about it.

Massage Envy Lawsuit

Here's some news that has gone national that we really didn't need.  The East Bay Times is reporting with a local photo and all

A Bay Area resident and five other California women have joined a national wave of litigants suing Massage Envy on allegations that the spa giant routinely turned a blind eye to male employees who sexually assaulted their clients, enabling the men to victimize again.Massage Envy was sued this week by six California women for allegedly protecting masseurs accused of sexually assaulting clients, including some who were later charged with sex crimes. One plaintiff is a victim in a case involving the Burlingame location pictured. 

The latest lawsuit, filed in San Mateo County this week, involves massage clients who patronized the spa chain’s locations spanning from Orange County to Burlingame, the latter involving a former massage therapist who last month was charged with more than a dozen counts of sexual battery for his alleged conduct on the job.

“This is happening everywhere,” said Bobby Thompson, whose Burlingame-based firm filed the suit alongside Philadelphia-based Laffey, Bucci & Kent.

The Bay Area victim, a San Francisco resident identified as “Jane Doe #1” in the lawsuit, visited the Burlingame Massage Envy location in November and described an encounter where during a session, 28-year-old Brandon James Davis sexually assaulted her. Doe is one of the victims behind the sexual battery charges against him.

We have heard rumblings of a different sort about massage parlors on Broadway and elsewhere in B'game but this is the first charges of this sort.  The only positive is that the news may cause more victims to come forward if they exist.

Another Time, This Place

I don't want to push the misplaced Stop Sign post down from the top, but the Voice needs to stay fresh so here is a little "thought piece" that starts 69 years ago.  If you find it boring, just scroll down to comment on stop signs, scooters, wildfires, SFO runway noise, our lack of water security, BHS woes, empty stores on the Avenew, etc, etc.

I always loved Herb Caen's take on EssEff life.  In the '80s and '90s, I read him every day and twice on Sundays.  I also read and reread his books.  His 1949 classic, Baghdad by the Bay, starts off chapter 28 with this paragraph

San Francisco, brought to life by the lusty, gusty roars of the gold seekers, has never taken itself too seriously.  From the very start there has been life and laughter in Baghdad-by-the-Bay, with every citizen a potential comedian, every stuffed shirt the inevitable butt of a joke, every facet of the city's life wide open to the snide observation.

Herb would be so disappointed by the EssEff of 2018.  There are so many stuffed shirts strutting around SF that it is positively regressive--in a progressive sort of way.  The City is a mess and I am afraid the effluent will taint B'game even more than it already has.  It's bad enough that they control our water supply, let their airport disrupt our sleep and keep trying to make socialist rent control seem mainstream.  The November ballot will be packed with sneakily written propositions and innocent claims about dangerous initiatives.  Let's hope we can channel Herb Caen and keep our sense of humor and whatever the noun is that goes with "snide".

New Firearms Range

We have been tracking developments at the Coyote Point shooting range for sometime; most recently here.  It closed for renovation last May 9th.  There are two different communities involved out at the range--law enforcement which needs a certain amount of range time to stay sharp and the public.  Back on June 26, 2016, I commented

There is some big news in yesterday's Daily Post. It reports that the Supes will vote on Tuesday on whether to accept a $5.2 million dollar donation for Tom Seibel and John Arrillaga to remodel and expand the range.

"The project will modernize the 54-year old range as well as add an approximately 7,000 square foot indoor range to used only for law enforcement training. The public will still have access to the outdoor pistol and rifle range."

The supes accepted the donations and that enclosed, sound-proofed, ricochet-proof indoor range is now a reality.  I was able to attend the Grand Opening tour a week ago and got a first-hand view of both the old and the new.  The new indoor range is impressive with low-light conditions (if desired), running and turning targets, lead dust containment, 25 yard distances and capability to go up to .308 caliber rifles.  This is what our law enforcement needs for true "gun control", i.e. hitting what you aim at.

The story on the public range side is a bit murkier as you would expect when you don't have a $5.2 million gift to work with.  The public range is operated by the Coyote Point Rifle and Pistol Club and its website notes that

Phase II, the improvement of the outdoor 100 yd range to be used by both Law Enforcement and the public is underway. This will be completed some time in the first quarter of 2018.

It looks a lot like it probably did in 1962 when the range opened.  Hopefully some nice renovations will allow the public to get some practice in at a nice facility during the hours of 7:00 PM and 10:00 PM Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays as it has for years; with some tournaments on the weekends.  Here's a photo of the new indoor range.