Doing it wrong.
San Diego Councilwoman Lorie Zapf has suspended her community representative - Shirley Owen - for two weeks without pay after hateful remarks aimed at a group of demonstrators were overheard and published by KPBS reporter, Tarryn Mento.
The group (the Student Justice Coalition) of college and university students had attended inauguration day activities on December 10, at San Diego's Golden Hall for a "hands up, don’t shoot" rally, and planned on handing officials a list of suggestions they thought would lend credibility to investigations of cops who kill.
After expressing themselves outside by walking around and reciting the motto, the two dozen protesters moved inside, where council members were set to speak.
During the speeches, members of the
SJC performed silent demonstrations, including raising their arms, bringing their hands to their throats and staging a "die in", at the back of the room. No one on stage objected during that time, in fact, officials, including a cop, said the group was not disruptive.
After the speeches were done and the group resumed chanting and walking around the room, though, Ms. 30 years of customer service experience for Nordstrom Owen decided to express herself.
While members of the public and news media waited near the front of the room to speak with Zapf after the ceremony, her community representative Shirley Owen called the protesters “f------ idiots with their hands up” and said “I wanted to shoot them."
KPBS reached out to Zapf the day of the incident and the day after regarding the comments. They were told it was an internal matter. Hours after KPBS published the story Friday, both Zapf and Owen issued apologies.
Zapf said the staffer "made a grossly inappropriate comment to a friend about individuals who were peacefully protesting" at the city's inauguration Wednesday.
"Her words were extremely insensitive and in no way reflect my beliefs or the values of my office," she said.
"As the first Latina elected to the San Diego City Council, I am acutely aware of the interaction between law enforcement and our communities. Ensuring that there is accountability and trust between those groups is paramount. This is a highly sensitive national conversation, which is in no way helped by flippant remarks,” she said.
Owen went with the "it was an offhand comment", because apparently, that makes everything better after saying you want to shoot a bunch of unarmed people who happen to be protesting the shooting of unarmed people.
“I sincerely apologize for my comment on Wednesday. It was an offhand comment to a friend about the protest, and I should not have said it. It was wrong and in incredibly poor taste. I apologize to all I have offended, and especially to the protestors who were exercising their First Amendment rights by peacefully demonstrating.”
She shouldn't have said it, even if it is what she wanted to do.
For his part, Marine veteran and college junior Mark Jones, who led the group pointed to Owen's comment as an example of what he and the SJC are fighting against. He went on to explain why they chose inauguration day to deliver their message.
Jones said holding the rally at the inauguration was strategic because he knew all of the the city’s leaders would be there. He had planned to give them a list of changes the group was requesting, such as a special prosecutor to handle cases when police kill a citizen on duty.
"We’re looking for systemic change across the board. There are a lot of injustices that have been committed in 2014, and obviously the killing of unarmed black men. And there’s racial injustice in our police system. There’s racial injustice in our justice system,” Jones said.
Although he did hand the list to several officials that day, Deputy Sheriffs’ Association's
favorite Councilwoman, Lorie Zapf wasn't among the recipients.
List of changes the Student Justice Coalition are calling for
A. Special Prosecutor for All Deadly Force Cases: We believe that a special prosecutor must be appointed in every incident that involves an officer’s use of deadly force.
a. Establish local measures necessitating the appointment of a special prosecutor in
any case wherein a police officer used deadly force.
B. Police Held Accountable for Use of Deadly Force: We believe that officers should be
accountable for the use of deadly force in every encounter.
a. Establish local measures establishing clear process for the response to any officer
involved deadly-force situation wherein including collection of facts, establishing
timeline and all issues related to release of information.
b. Establish local measures mandating the release of the name of each police officer
involved in an incident wherein deadly force was used within 48 hours of the incident.
c. Establish local measures requiring an annual report on the use of deadly force by
all San Diego Police Departments.
C. Representative Police Force and Intentional Officer Training: We believe that a police force should be representative of those citizens that it is designed to serve and protect.
a. Develop San Diego County wide sensitivity training program for all districts and the City
b. Develop local diversity recruiting plan for all law enforcement roles and remove nonviolent crimes, child support, and instances such as juvenile records as disqualifying
actions for law enforcement eligibility.
c. End practice of allowing police officers fired from one municipality for cause from working in any other San Diego County capacity.
D. Comprehensive Review of Systemic Abuses by Local Police Departments: We believe that there is systemic and structural racism present in policing practices nationwide and that these practices undermine the foundation of democracy.
a. Comprehensive review by the council of abuses by local police departments.
b. Development of use of force standards and accompanying training best practices, and
standards for the use of excessive force.
c. Comprehensive local review of police departments’ data collection that allows for
reporting on the rates of stops, frisks, searches, summonses and arrests by race, age, and gender.
E. End Over Policing and Abusive Use of Force.
a. Establish a Police Oversight Committee in San Diego City and San Diego County with a
range of real power, including that of being able to remove officers from duty
b. Enforce strict limits on the transfer and use of military equipment to local law
enforcement and adopt the Stop Militarizing Law Enforcement Act of 2014.