Arapahoe County Law Enforcement provides realistic look at implementation of new “Enhance Law Enforcement Integrity” law

BY JESSICA ROE - GOVERNMENTAL REPORTER

A meeting designed for the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Department to inform Centennial’s City Council on what the Senate Bill 217 to “Enhance Law Enforcement Integrity”, recently signed into law by Colorado Governor Jared Polis, ended up taking a turn when outgoing District Attorney George Brauchler took the helm to cut straight to the point. “I think that what we’re underestimating here, is how challenging this is going to be,” said Brauchler, in regards to both abiding by the intent of the law, and the actual implementation of the physical parts of SB217. “It’s going to be fraught with inaccuracies, and we need to have this information, but we need to be realistic about what we can and can’t show.” Mayor Stephanie Piko and the entire Council had been meeting with Sheriff Tyler Brown and Captain Jared Rowlison, the head of Investigation Services, on Monday night, June 22, where those from the city posed poignant, strategic, and thoughtful questions to the law enforcement officer in this era of heightened racial tensions. The meeting had been underway for approximately 22 minutes before Brauchler appeared to join late, and jump right into the conversation, where he provided the critical look at SB217. The bill, which was just signed into law by Polis on Friday, June 19, made Colorado the first state to end qualified immunity, which was a legal measure that shields a government official - in this case a law enforcement officer - from being sued on the basis that a plaintiff’s rights had been violated. The sweeping measure also requires all state and local police wear body cameras by 2023 - with footage being made public upon request within 21 days. “The footage is stored as evidence, and as part of the new senate bill, we have 21 days to provide that footage with a complaint from a victim from a suspect or a nonprofit third party and our policy will mirror that with the implementation of a more robust body camera requirements as legislated in senate bill ,” said Sheriff Brown. “I appreciate the vigor with which Sheriff Brown is going into this with, but the one part I don’t think he’s sold to you, is that this is going to be challenging,” said Brauchler. “21-days unless there’s an ongoing investigation, and that’s stretched out until - I want to say, 40-or-45, and there’s an issue here related to that. And I know here everybody’s excited about, ‘I want to see body cams, transparency.’ The problem it creates from the prosecution standpoint is I have two big ethical rules, one of which only applies only to prosecutors, which says, ‘I’m really not allowed to put things into the public stream that might poison the future jury pool against an accused’ and that accused might be a law enforcement officer, it might be the citizen to whom some force was used. I worry about that. I also worry about the fact we have created some exceptions, but probably not enough, to give maximum protection to victims.” Brauchler pointed out if this happens, we might see many cases in the future requesting change of venue out of JD18 and into other judicial districts. “I think the other piece of this though, about racial profiling, is I think we probably need to continue encourage the public - without judgment or stigma - to be able to voice their concerns if they think they were racially profiled, and to make it as easy as possible to make that known to Sheriff Brown, and my guess is he’ll run those things to the ground every single time,” said Brauchler. “Having that dual thing - the statistics as well as the open door policy for the public - it seems we’re gonna ferret out these problems if they really exist or if these things are explainable by something else.” The law also bans chokeholds and the shooting of fleeing suspects, and using deadly force unless a life is in immediate danger. Immediately, officers are now required to report every time they stop a person suspected of a crime and record that individual’s ethnicity, race and gender. Sheriff Brown assured the Mayor and Council that his team has already started collecting such data, and they are working on a back-end solution to store it so it can be searchable in a data-mining sense. Sheriff Brown and Captain Rowlison continued to answer questions for more than two and a half hours from Council. Brown said his department is working proactively to root out any deputies with racial biases. He also pointed out the department even does this at length in the hiring process. “Part of hiring process is psychological exam, that starts with a written application, then a written exam, then a physical agility test, and only after you pass those three parts, the candidate is sent right into a psychological polygraph examination so ASCO can identify biases in the candidate’s nature, and get to the bottom of those, and see if they are even compatible with the culture and at the agency” said Brown “I know there are plenty of times we pass on candidates due to those polygraph examinations.” Next, they move on to an oral board - which is a panel interview - with several different levels of command staff, and then a chief’s interview, and then on to one final psychological interview before any candidate is offered a job at ACSO. “There’s robust psychological evaluations,” said Sheriff Brown. “We see a lot of horrific things on his job, that sometimes we need to go and talk about. It hasn’t always been the most popular thing in law enforcement - and I’ll be the first to admit it - that there’s been a culture and a stigma around it,” said Sheriff Brown, who pointed out that he proudly boasts a “#StopTheStigma” hashtag sticker on his iPad. “It’s really creating another culture inside of our agency that mental health is just as important as your physical health. It’s just as important as your driving skills, your arrest control techniques. It’s making sure that you have those skills to go be mentally healthy, and be in the community to help our citizens.” For a link to all of the policies, Policies and directives at the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Departments - including training, use of force, and body worn cameras - visit www.tinyurl.com/ACSDpnd.