By Ernesto Arce | KPFK News
Broad coalition such as Community Control Over the Police and the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Oppression are backing efforts to Defund the Police.
Cliff Smith, an organizer with CCOP Los Angeles supports the mass demand to defund police across the country but he says the first step is local, democratic control over the departments.
“It’s an economic reaction to the epidemic of police abuse,” says Smith. “It can have a positive impact but there are a lot of questions it raises that we haven’t heard a lot of answers to yet: what’s going to replace the police and how is public safety going to be ensured to the extent that the police provide any public safety.”
The issue of routine excessive abuse by law enforcement is one at the forefront of groups across the southland.
On the east side, Centro CSO took part in recent efforts to kick start a civil rights-era group called the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Oppression.
Sol Marquez, with Centro CSO, says one of her partner organizations in Minneapolis is concerned about how local officials plan to disband their police department. Although it’s a righteous demand, Marquez says she hopes Los Angeles can push for a better solution.
“I think that would look very similar if it were to happen in Los Angeles,” says Marquez. “We do have a city council that tends to be progressive but what does that really mean? We’ve been helping try to jail killer cops for five years and we have gone to city council before, we have gone to the Police Commission before only for it to be recommended to the district attorney.”
Many activists say local demands to hold police accountable end up on the desk of DA Jackie Lacey. They say she’s been staunch in her defense of police and her refusal to prosecute cops that kill unarmed suspects.
Lacey has repeatedly stated that she would not prosecute such police unless there was evidence to do so. While she calls for discipline she says criminal charges are a last resort.
Smith with CCOP LA says Lacey must be removed.
As the top prosecutor for the county, ultimately it’s her authority whether or not any police officer that breaks the law is going to be brought up on criminal charges,” Lacey says. “[She] goes easy on the police because she works very closely with them so it’s clearly a conflict of interest.”
Centro CSO is taking part in another National Day of Action to hold police accountable at the Boyle Heights site where another unarmed suspect was killed by a problematic police officer.
