On Thursday evening, the Oakland Police Commission [OPC] will review OPD Chief Mitchell’s new pursuit policy revision draft. This will be the second draft presented to the Commission after the OPC's negative reaction to changes in supervisorial permission for pursuits in the first.
Mitchell's marquee change remains the deletion of former Chief Leronne Armstrong’s 50 MPH speed limit for pursuits, which required officers to self-terminate pursuits when they reached that speed [unless they receive authorization from a supervisor]. That change has long been the focus of Mitchell’s update–but over the months he and OPD have signaled the desire for broader powers to pursue for burglaries, property crimes and sideshows. That wider latitude for pursuits is nowhere to be seen in the edits—although as before, pursuits with supervisory permission for "exigent" circumstances will be allowed for "actions that pose an immediate and serious threat to officers and the public".
Whether or not the changes in the policy are moved forward, pursuits will remain standard procedure only for incidents where there is reasonable suspicion of a violent forcible crime and/or a crime involving the use of a firearm—or probable cause the suspect is in possession of a firearm. Most of the very big changes sought by public safety advocates who’ve falsely blamed the pursuit policy for increases in crime will not materialize.
At this point, the changes will bring the policy back to what existed in 2022, before the shocking death of Lolomania Sokai in an out of compliance high speed chase and the vehicular killing of Agustin Coyotl in another called into question OPD practices.
Previously, Mitchell posted key changes to a passage requiring officers seek oral supervisorial permission as they are engaging a pursuit. The language in the original passage has some level of ambiguity, but as interpreted by OPD requires an officer to attempt to get permission from a supervisor for a pursuit as the officer makes the decision to–and begins to—pursue. Mitchell’s first draft included language that specified that an officer could begin a pursuit and “once” initiated could contact the supervisor “as soon as reasonably practical” to “continue” it. That change had many critics, from the NSA plaintiff counsel, John Burris and Jim Chanin, to members of Anti-Police Terror Project, the Coalition for Police Accountability and Commissioners themselves.
Mitchell notes in an August memo to the OPC that he’s acknowledged feedback from the plaintiffs in the NSA, the Commission, and NSA judge and made some changes to reflect it. One of those changes appears to satisfy some of the criticisms from Commissioners, Burris and Jim Chanin that Mitchell’s changes for permission were too open ended.
The new text now makes the commencement of the pursuit contemporaneous to the request for permission and eliminates the “as soon as reasonably practical” language altogether. But questions will likely remain on the timing between the two.
It's unclear if the OPC will make a decision approving the changes at the meeting Thursday—per the charter, the OPC has 120 days to review the changes. The OPC could make its own changes if Mitchell were not amenable to them and present them alongside the Chief's for review to the City Council and its final approval, but that's also unlikely given previous public discussions.
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