A New Lawman Round These Parts?
Candidates for sheriff from left to right: Eli Vera, a commander in the LA County Sheriff’s Department; Lt. Eric Strong of the Sheriff’s Department, Robert Luna, former Long Beach police chief; Cecil Rhambo, chief of police at LAX. Above: current Sheriff Alex Villanueva. Graphic by Suzanne Matsumiya and Terelle Jerricks
Reactions to planned 6,200-seat amphitheater at West Harbor Project p. 2
Robert Luna
From the Long Beach Police Department, Robert Luna, like most of the contenders for sheriff, boasts a long career in law enforcement. Luna has served as the chief of the Long Beach Police Department for seven years and an officer for 29. He holds a master’s degree in public administration from Cal State Long Beach. In addition, he
has completed three programs targeted at professional executives for local institutions, one at the FBI’s National Executive Institute, one at Harvard University and one at USC’s Delinquency Control Institute. According to Luna, he advocates for a relationship based model of policing, using cooperation with local institutions and figures to accomplish this. In order to achieve his model of policing, Luna has put forward five points he wishes to achieve as sheriff. These points are reductions in both crime
The Illegitimate Court By Paul Rosenberg, Senior Editor
“It’s the basis of democracy that you control your own body. And it’s the basis of hierarchy and totalitarian regimes that you don’t.”
— Gloria Steinem, Reversing Roe
For the first time since the Dred Scott decision declared that Black people were “so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect,” the Supreme Court is poised to extinguish a fundamental right — the right to abortion enshrined in the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision — and return us to the days of back-alley abortions almost immediately in more than a dozen states. It could even be nationwide within three years if Republicans have their way. This one-way ticket to Gilead comes on the basis of multiple lies so outlandish they constitute gaslighting — an attack on public sanity, the taken-for-granted foundation on which democratic self-governance depends. Indeed, when oral arguments were heard in December, both Linda Greenhouse at the New York Times and Dahlia Lithwick at Slate wrote stories headlining the gaslighting involved. On May 2, a leaked draft of the written decision by Justice Samuel Alito provided much more of the same. The most blatant gaslighting was retroactively revealed: the bald-faced lies of five justices during confirmation [See Illegitimate, p. 13]
and homelessness, raising conditions in holding facilities, improving employee wellness and restoring public trust.
Cecil Rhambo
Cecil Rhambo currently serves as chief of LAX’s airport police. A graduate of Humboldt State University, he has a 33-year-long career, and has found himself in a wide variety of roles within the LA County Sheriff’s Department. As a lieutenant for internal affairs he assisted in the creation of a database for officer misconduct after the fallout of the Rodney King protests. He served as lead on the Asian Crime Task Force and afterward, in 2000, as captain of Compton’s branch of the Sheriff’s Department. Following this he was asked to create the Sheriff’s Community Oriented Policing Bureau, focusing on aligning department approaches on unhoused individuals and those experiencing a mental health crisis. Then under Assembly Bill 109 he was tasked with bringing prisons into consensus with the bill, it would be this that led Rhambo into his most high-profile moment as an officer. The FBI, along with the ACLU, were investigating the Sheriff’s Department under former Sheriff Lee Baca for abuse of inmates. Rhambo urged Baca to cooperate with the investigation and later took the stand to testify against him. Baca, after a retrial, would go on to serve two years of prison time. Rhambo bills himself as a reformer and has a long history of policy implementation within [See Sheriff, p. 3] 1
May 12 - 25, 2022
With new developments underway, what will become of San Pedro’s staple restaurants? p. 11
to decide whose vision for justice on the ground they would like to see enacted.
Real People, Real News, Really Effective
If there is one arm of the Los Angeles County government flush with cash, it is that of the Sheriff’s Department. Long is the arm of the law and many are their responsibilities, some expected, some thrust upon the department. As we live in a democracy we are given a chance to decide who will wield the enforcement power of state. For the first time since the dramatic George Floyd protests and proceeding conversations on police reforms, residents of Los Angeles County, the most populous county in the nation, will have a chance
By Anealia Kortkamp, Reporter