This September 2017 article in the NYU Law Review by Elizabeth Joh gives a few shoutouts to the work of Oakland’s Privacy Advisory Commission and OP member Mike Katz-Lacabe.
Download the full article below.
2017 Urban Shield Report Card
A dozen community members affiliated with various Bay Area nonprofit organizations observed the 2017 Urban Shield Expo and Anti-Terrorism training drill. The Stop Urban Shield coalition collated their observations and issued an event report card.
The report concluded:
Urban Shield is fundamentally about “defeating the enemy.” This is primarily due to the federally mandated requirement that trainings and exercises of the program have a “nexus to terrorism.”
Urban Shield is structurally unable to address concerns of police militarization, racism, and xenophobia, and is heavily steeped in a warfare culture.
Read the full report card here. Urban-Shield-Report-Card
August Oakland ICE Raid Started Deportation Proceeding – No Criminal Evidence
As reported on IndyBay by Dave Id:
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ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) unit raided the home of a West Oakland Latina family on August 16. Oakland police claim their only role was blocking street traffic while the raid was conducted, but it’s hard to take anything Oakland police say at face value when both ICE and the Oakland police department have lied about the incident. Defensive about the raid, Oakland police first smeared the family with a salacious and blatantly untrue allegation while the raid was still in progress — and OPD Chief Anne Kirkpatrick continues to spread falsehoods about the matter, inferring at a recent town hall that one brother was charged for trafficking his younger sibling. Bigger picture, both ICE and OPD publicly promote a false distinction between ICE’s criminal investigation and immigration enforcement functions, whittling away at the value of Oakland as a “sanctuary city.”
SB 21 Dies In Sacramento
California’s Assembly Appropriations Committee, following the lead of law enforcement agencies invested in the secret and unaccountable use of ever more complex surveillance technologies, killed California’s statewide transparency ordinance today, ensuring that communities will not get a say in how they are watched.
Oakland Privacy will continue going city to city and county to county to say there is a better way. La lucha continua.
CA Supreme Court Rules Bulk License Plate Scans Not Exempt From Public Records Act
In a huge public interest victory, the CA Supreme Court ruled that law enforcement bulk license plate scans (APRS) are not exempt from the California Public Records Act and constitute public records, overturning a Superior court decision.
The case was litigated by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the ACLU of Southern California.
The court’s ruling can be read below.
Open Letter Regarding West Oakland HSI Operation
Oakland Privacy Open Letter Regarding West Oakland HSI Operation
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On July 18, the Oakland City Council voted unanimously to terminate an existing agreement with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), one week after a similar unanimous vote in the Public Safety Committee. On August 16, HSI executed a warrant at a West Oakland Guatemalan household. HSI was accompanied by Oakland Police Department (OPD) officers.
The HSI operation has been reported on extensively by local media, with most reports quoting the statement issued by Chief Anne Kirkpatrick, wherein she discussed OPD’s participation. Eyewitness reports of the incident, media coverage of the event, and a review of the provided explanation, have caused some concerns that we would like to briefly outline here.
We believe that Chief Kirkpatrick should provide additional information to the City Council at a public hearing, so that residents can better understand the nature of this incident, including what due diligence the Chief performed prior to providing City resources, if any, and whether OPD Immigration Policy Sections 415.4, 415.5, and the city’s Sanctuary City Resolution were complied with.