As the Department undergoes federal oversight of the jail system, a pattern has emerged of frontline supervisors in the jail incorrectly requiring " use of force" reports in cases where both common sense and Sheriff's Department rules do not require such a report. The concept of a use of force should not be confusing. However, with an 111-page policy and supervisors who do not fully understand the force policies, this can typically lead to confusion and misinterpretation. Whatever the motivation of these supervisors, be it a failure to understand the department's policies on use of force or a reflexive "CYA" reaction to the jail oversight, it must be addressed by Department leadership.

The problem persists that Sergeants do not fully understand the use force policy, and thus the Department is forced to either under report or over report incidents of force. The perception of the public then becomes one in which there is officer brutality occurring in the jail, when in reality deputies are just doing their job in a very dangerous environment. What makes this worse is when supervisors misinterpret department policies.

For example, is it considered a "use of force" when a deputy helps a jail inmate to his feet after the inmate had fallen? Department policy and common sense say "no"-yet recently; a jail supervisor insisted that a force report be written in that instance! If an inmate falls on their own and a deputy witnessed the fall and then comes to the inmate's aide, a force report should not be required. In short, it appears anything and everything is being considered "force" and resulting in some Department's management's insistence a force report be generated.

Use of force policies must either be changed to be clearer, or there must be extra training provided so supervisors can better understand it.

The disturbing trend of requiring deputies to file a use of force report when not required both forces the line deputies into a "no win" situation, where they are in constant fear they will lose their jobs over a "new policy" that does not exist in writing, or being forced to ignore the actual current written policy that does not require such reports.

The Sheriff's Department was one of the very first agencies to build a business intelligence system, which it called the Personnel Performance Index (PPI). All uses of force are entered into a Department member's PPI. If force reporting is inaccurate, it can reflect negatively on a deputy. An employee can eventually be placed on the Department's Performance Monitoring program based on the number of force incidents listed in PPI. This is leading to some deputies being mischaracterized as "heavy handed" due to misinterpretation of the force policy by front line supervisors.

This misinterpretation dramatically inflates the number of use of force incidents, creating the false impression that use of force in the jails has soared---when in fact, it has plummeted. Further, some management personnel have been using the increased number of force reports to reprimand deputies because it is believed that use of force is up in the jails.

We understand that Sheriff's management is aware of this issue and the fact that insistence on force reports when not needed inaccurately portrays what is happening in the jails. However, management's awareness that supervisors in the jail are misinterpreting the "use of force" policy is simply not enough. The Department needs to insist the policy be applied as intended, and if supervisors are unable to interpret the policy correctly, they must either retrain them, so they understand or re-write the policies so they are easier to comprehend.

The Association for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs (ALADS) is the collective bargaining agent and represents more than 8,200 deputy sheriffs and district attorney investigators working in Los Angeles County. To contact the directors, click here.