Long Beach police, officials react to Dallas shooting: 'Devastating'

Long Beach Police Chief Robert Luna had just finished dier with his family Thursday night when he got the news that several police officers had been shot in Dallas. He put on his uniform and went to the West Division to meet with officers who were working the graveyard shift.

“There was a combination of sadness, frustration, anger and confusion in the room,” Luna said Friday. “The mood was, like, Why does everyone hate us?”

“I told them that, despite the shock of Dallas, they put on their uniforms and showed up to do their job of protecting the public.”

Local police and city leaders grappled with the deadliest day for U.S. law enforcement since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. It came in the midst of a protest over police shootings in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and suburban St. Paul, Miesota.

Micah Johnson, 25, was killed by a robot-delivered bomb after the shootings Thursday night that left five officers dead and seven wounded.

As a precaution against similar violence in Long Beach, Luna said local police would work in pairs instead of alone at least through the weekend. Agencies across the Southland took similar measures.

Recruiting police difficult

Increased national attention to controversial police shootings, combined with society’s increased expectations of police officers, may be making it harder for agencies to recruit qualified officers, said Michael Beckman, a deputy police chief in Long Beach.

Those added demands, “broadening burdens” as Beckman called them, are problems that go beyond core police duties of preventing crime and arresting offenders. They can include social challenges like homelessness, poverty, addiction and gang membership.

“A successful police officer needs to be more brain then brawn,” Beckman said.

Beckman said on the subject of recent political issues that he perceives that a small number of anti-govement individuals may seek to incite trouble, but most people who have been vocal about controversial incidents are peaceful.

“I don’t believe it is fair to characterize the public as a whole as unsupportive of law enforcement,” he said.

‘Fitting a description’

Demonstrations were held in several other U.S. cities Thursday night to protest the police killings of two black men: A Miesota officer on Wednesday fatally shot Philando Castile while he was in a car with a woman and a child, and the shooting’s aftermath was livestreamed in a widely shared Facebook video. A day earlier, Alton Sterling was shot in Louisiana after being pied to the pavement by two white officers. That, too, was captured on a cellphone video.

Advertisement

“These videos are very violent, very real and very poignant,” said Erik Miller, a Long Beach resident and board member for Why’d You Stop Me.

Miller, who recently ran for City Council, said he does not question the integrity of the 99 percent of police officers who do a good job. He also said, however, that these kinds of graphic videos have added transparency to issues that exist between police and the broader community.

Miller, who is black, said his father repeatedly waed him about the potential risks that may follow from encounters with police officers. Those lessons amounted to very ste admonitions to precisely follow officers’ instructions, essentially to avoid giving police an excuse to escalate a situation. Miller received his father’s advice repeatedly, begiing at the age of 12 and again when he eaed his driver’s license, when he received his first ticket and yet again when he left Long Beach to attend college in Burbank. “Unfortunately, in the African American community, this is something we’re taught at a very young age,” he said.

“I do understand the frustration of ‘fitting a description.’”

Moving forward

Paul Wegner, who retired from the Long Beach Police Department as a sergeant in 2011, said what happened in Dallas is part of the job, “but not what we expect to happen.

“My biggest conce is I don’t want to see it happen again,” Wegner said. “I think the protestors made a valid point. I hope people listen and know you can be angry and protest and that police are there to protect that right and keep you safe.”

There is no word yet of any formal vigils or gatherings in Long Beach. However Officer Jason Lehman, founder of a nonprofit that works to improve relationships between police and the public, said he and others plaed to gather Friday evening at MLK Park to create a video with messages urging peace in the wake of the shootings.

Mayor Robert Garcia on Friday said “our love and our support is with the families, with our law enforcement community in Dallas, but of course also, it’s really important for our police officers here in Long Beach to know our support and our love is with them as well.”

Luna met Friday with officers at other stations, and spoke with Garcia and City Manager Pat West to discuss the city’s response.

“We’re keeping our fingers on the pulse of the community,” Luna said. “We have good relationships in the community. I want to make sure we take steps forward and not backwards.”

In a poignant and personal story, Luna said as he was leaving his family dier Thursday night, his 15-year-old son wouldn’t let him leave without putting on his bulletproof vest.

“That really got to me,” the chief said. “He was so conceed about my safety.”

Staff writers Tim Grobaty and Melissa Evans also contributed to this report.