Aviso de queja relacionada con 2022-0543

CITY OF CUSTOM
OFFICE OF
POLICE OVERSIGHT
FOUNDED
NOTICE OF COMPLAINT
July 1, 2022
ICMS #: 2022-0543
On June 28, 2022, the OPO received an emailed complaint.
The complainant alleges: Dear Farah C. Muscadin,
You were brought into this newly formed office not because of a handful of complaints or a few
manageable grievances. But because policing is changing, and some of the change we may want
to see may have some systematic elements to that positive change.
To bring about the changes that the community wants to see in Austin's Police.
I would like to bring to light my experience applying to the Austin Police Department.
It has been bothering me for a bit.
In short: My experience of the process of applying at the Austin Police Department in
is a process that seems to garden individuals that can substantiate fabrications (lie with
corroboration) while maintaining known biases from past decades that have been harmful to both
the agency and the community. Dishonesty can be investigated, clever and substantiated
dishonesty seems to be hirable, armed, and on the streets in some cases.
To Explain: We all do small acts from time to time that may or may not be strictly legal depending
on what jurisdiction you are in, who is in office, who is enforcing such laws etc. My small act on
one occasion was edible use of marijuana back in
.
I wish I could enjoy it more
not being in law enforcement at moment, but it tends to make me paranoid, SO I tend to avoid it.
I applied to APD in
and answered honestly to that one use, was disqualified based
on that prior edible marijuana use, and further disqualified until
I understand that
marijuana is NOT a legal drug in Texas. But it should be mentioned, there was no meeting with
me to see if it was something I would want to do in the future or how severe it was, no questioning
of who was with me, did I drive while trying marijuana, do I have friends or family that use it, just
outright disqualification for two years.
The issue here is not marijuana, in
when commercially available edible marijuana in nearly
half of states, a good portion of the pool of candidates can be reasoned might have tried marijuana
within one or two years prior from the date of application to APD. So, you either lie, or don't get
the job. It's just the way it is.
OF
DEAT
STEPHEN
OFFICE OF
POLICE OVERSIGHT
NOTICE OF COMPLAINT
The first lesson future officers may derive here, from their very first step is: a small lie nobody
will find out about is a truth to everyone else. This is an inflection point, do we want officers that
will fabricate when it's convenient and strait laced on paper, or officers that will tell the truth in
an investigation (candidate hiring) even when it is damaging.
Maybe this is speculation, but I know if you were to take a survey of the community of Austin you
would find that rare use of a drug before being hired, a drug many are demanding to be legal for
habitual use would not be something people of Austin would find disqualifying in an APD
candidate. What's far more disqualifying is dishonesty. Cameras are everywhere now, people see
it, and lawsuits (as well as indictment) flow like rivers from officers like that.
This determination process is originated from a Journal of Applied Psychology study entitled
"Prediction of Dysfunctional Job Behaviors Among Law Enforcement Officers" published in 1998
(see figure 1). Although there are some great findings in that report the law enforcement
community has grown since this report. "Spitting out" occasional or rare marijuana users before
they applied to be officers, is not grounded in a current understanding of our community and what
is expected of police officers now. From 1984 to 1995 the year data was collected to publish this
study, not one state had legal marijuana. Yet, it is one of the standing practices even today at APD
for screening candidates to keep our community safe. -
The Texas Legislative bodies did not pass the first lawful carrying of concealed weapons for
civilians' law until 1995. It would be nearly the same to have a questionnaire that asked today,
"Have you ever as a civilian not acting in any official capacity go in public with a concealed
weapon on you in the last two years?", then disqualify based off any affirmative answer. Like I
said, the issue is not marijuana. The issue is a hiring process that encourages dishonesty because
the most common and honest answer among a pool of candidates, is one that gets a candidate
disqualified for no cause of moral turpitude.
Respectfully,
This notice of complaint is a request for Internal Affairs to initiate an investigation to
determine if the employee conduct is within compliance of APD policy, Civil Service
Rules, and Municipal Civil Service Rules.