Sacramento County Sheriff gets the OK to keep using military equipment
The Sacramento County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted Tuesday to affirm the sheriff’s military equipment policy and to allow the law enforcement agency to acquire five new drones, new breaching shotgun shells, flashbang shotgun shells and rifle ammunition.
The previous week, the board approved an $8.4 billion budget that included $695.3 million in appropriations for the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office. The supervisors gave the sheriff the largest budget increase of any department — more than $35 million higher than the current fiscal year.
Law enforcement agencies are required by the state law known as AB 481 to report their military equipment inventory to their governing body — in this case, the Board of Supervisors — and seek approval for the policy regarding the use of that equipment. Law enforcement must also seek approval for the acquisition of any new military equipment.
In his presentation to the supervisors, Captain David Becwar described the military equipment that the department already has in its possession after playing a video with zippy music that depicted some of the equipment in action. The first piece of footage was from a drone flying after a suspect into a sewage pipe.
“It really brought it to life,” Supervisor Sue Frost said of the video.
Leaders from the District Attorney’s Office and Sacramento County Regional Parks also gave short presentations on their military equipment, and the supervisors approved the prosecutors’ policy. Because Park Rangers are not covered under the state law, the supervisors were not required to take any action on the parks department’s policies governing military equipment.
The Sheriff’s Office’s current arsenal includes, among other items, 28 drones; nine robots Becwar said were usually used to investigate bomb threats and suspicious packages; three armored vehicles, including two Lenco BearCat SWAT vehicles; and two Humvees that are used for public relations events.
The Humvees, according to the annual report the Sheriff’s Office submitted to the board, require $2,000 in maintenance each annually and “provide an opportunity for the Sacramento Sheriff’s Office to interact with the youth in a manner that has proven favorable to a majority of kids.”
The annual report reviewed deployments of the Special Enforcement Detail, which performs SWAT team functions. In the report, the sheriff noted that the largest share of SED deployments over the last six months of 2022 — five deployments of 45 — occurred in a ZIP code in Lemon Hill. Of the 45 total deployments, 35% involved a suspect who was Black.
Supervisors asked about attached weapons, injuries to civilians
Several of the supervisors’ questions and comments focused on clarifying to the public that no weapons were attached to the drones or to the armored vehicles.
Becwar said that the equipment in Sacramento County helps keep people safe. “The greater amount of options at our disposal,” he said, “gives us the greatest opportunity at a safe outcome for everybody involved.”
Two notable studies, published in the journal Research & Politics in 2017 and in Political Research Quarterly in 2018, found a correlation between military equipment and harm to the public. The researchers behind each study found that the more military equipment a police department had, the more civilian deaths occurred at the hands of officers.
During the Tuesday meeting, two supervisors — Frost and Phil Serna — asked questions related to how the equipment could harm members of the public.
After a brief presentation from Tiffany King of the District Attorney’s Office, Frost asked her to describe what kind of injuries the agency’s six beanbag shotguns cause. King said it varies depending on how far away the gun is from its human target.
“The intent is obviously to not break skin,” King said. “But it’s to incapacitate the person so that they can be subdued and detained.” The rounds, she said, are like a large sock filled with lead pellets.
After Sacramento County Regional Parks Director Liz Bellas spoke for a few minutes, Serna called Becwar back to the podium.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought there was an incident in the civil unrest following the George Floyd murder, where, I think it was a gas canister that may have been fired?” Serna said. “I’m not sure if it was from our agents, from the Sacramento sheriff’s department, or another agency, but I thought it, from media reports, that it had injured someone, perhaps in their face or head, because the canister itself, it’s a projectile. So my question is, are our sheriff’s deputies trained on how to safely deploy those projectiles, those gas canisters, in a way that they don’t become inadvertently lethal?”
Serna was referencing the injuries that Tee Fansofa sustained after Sacramento city police fired a tear gas canister that hit Fansofa in the face. Fansofa had multiple skull fractures, among other serious injuries, and later became one of the plaintiffs who filed a lawsuit against the city, claiming excessive force.
Becwar responded to Serna, “Any of our personnel that would use a less-lethal shotgun device would receive substantial training on its deployment, and of course that sort of a device would not be specifically aimed at a head or vital body part, as the intended use is to be less lethal.”
When Serna asked whether the canisters could ricochet, Becwar said that he did not know. Later, the county executive who oversees his department, Eric Jones, confirmed that they can ricochet. “That,” he said, “is just the science.”
Only one public commenter, Keyan Bliss, weighed in on the three military equipment items on the board’s agenda. Bliss, the vice chair of the Sacramento Community Police Review Commission, said he knew Fansofa and several other people who had been physically hurt by weapons that law enforcement classified as less lethal.
“They absolutely do break skin,” Bliss said, “besides the psychological trauma that is caused.” He urged the board to reject the policy put forth by the sheriff.
This story was originally published June 15, 2023 at 5:00 AM.
