Home » L.A. police are grappling with a new challenge: fire duty – Jobsmaa.com

L.A. police are grappling with a new challenge: fire duty – Jobsmaa.com

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Since the Palisades fire broke out, LAPD officers accustomed to chasing 911 calls and patrolling city streets were suddenly thrust into an unfamiliar but vital role: part support worker, part night watchman, part wingman of firefighters. in the history of the region.

Across the country, police have been working for decades to respond to crises during wildfires, earthquakes, tornadoes and hurricanes. Some experts predict law enforcement will face new climate-related challenges, something LAPD officers learned firsthand over the past week.

The LAPD is struggling with how and when to enforce evacuation orders and how to do the routine work of investigating crimes while understaffed.

With about 750 officers deployed to the fire department, the crisis has already left a force far worse than what leaders say is optimal staffing levels due to chronic problems with turnover and recruitment.

Each of the LAPD's 21 patrol divisions is expected to send additional bodies — patrol officers, supervisors and detectives — to the fire front lines. As a result, low volume calls such as burglaries or other incidents where the suspect has already fled do not receive immediate attention.

LAPD officials are under pressure to focus on opportunistic burglars suspected of taking advantage of the chaos to steal from the homes of those fleeing the blaze.

Earlier this week, Prosecutors charged nine people Including three suspected robberies in the Palisades and Eaton fire-ravaged areas, as well as stealing $200,000 worth of valuables from a home in Mandeville Canyon. Separately, another man was charged with intentionally starting a fire at Azusa Park.

Officials in Pacific Palisades faced blistering criticism from enforcing the evacuation zone perimeter. Frustrated residents who were eager to return to their homes. Local city council offices and social media are flooded with complaints about misinformation and inconsistent enforcement by the police.

At a daily officers' briefing Tuesday, LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell said it continued to step up its patrols in the area to deter would-be thieves. He asked for patience and “continued cooperation” from people displaced by the fire.

“We understand the frustration and your desire to see your homes in person, but until Cal Fire tells us that the affected areas are safe for the public, we cannot allow you to return,” McDonnell said.

The department has received reinforcements from the LAX and Port Police Departments and about 200 National Guard troops, he said. The chief said authorities have arrested 14 people for various crimes including curfew violation, impersonating a firefighter, DUI and robbery. Police also investigated 34 missing-persons reports: 20 people were found alive, and several were among those who died in the Palisades fire.

Firefighters are 19% contained to the blaze, which has burned 23,713 acres and destroyed nearly 1,300 structures. Officials said that 9 people died in the fire.

Among the victims were LAPD officers. According to a department-wide memo circulated last week, 19 officers' houses were destroyed and 11 were damaged by fire.

The department is part of a just-announced state and federal task force to combat wildfire-related crimes, including housebreaking, arson and drones flying in restricted airspace. Such initiatives and disaster policing will become more routine, according to new findings from researchers studying the effects of climate change.

After Hurricane Katrina, after several officers were convicted for their role in killing unarmed civilians in the chaotic days after the storm and the city of New Orleans was forced to pay millions of dollars in settlements, U.S. police agencies began more proactive training. For disaster situations, experts said.

Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, said law enforcement agencies across the country have been watching the LAPD's performance in recent days.

“Whether you believe it's climate change or not, Los Angeles will be a wake-up call for everyone,” he said.

In a 2023 paper published in the journal Policing, a pair of researchers from the Netherlands concluded that rising global temperatures and extreme weather have already dramatically affected policing and will continue to do so, albeit in unexpected ways.

One of the authors, Anna Matzak, a criminologist and senior lecturer at The Hague University of Applied Sciences, said that more climate events “will significantly affect and change crime and damage the landscape at every possible level”. Stealing valuable resources and disaster items is domestic violence.

“You have normal crimes, but suddenly you have what you call survival crimes because people are deprived of basic needs,” Matczak said.

Some police departments around the world are beginning to develop climate-specific strategies, analyzing weather data to predict where and when crime will emerge, says Associate Professor Sylvia Berg, the paper's other author.

LAPD Deputy Police Chief Donald “Tony” Graham said the police already play an important role in the city's response to disasters, even if some critics don't want to admit it.

“They are police officers who prevent illegal entry into those areas to prevent them from preying on people at dark hours,” he said during a visit to the city's emergency response center.

He defended how authorities have acted during recent fires, saying false warnings about evacuations and other conflicting information circulating online have made everyone's jobs more difficult.

“Confusion is confusion,” Graham said.

A Santa Monica resident who was burglarized early Wednesday hopes an Apple AirTag among his stolen items will help investigators track their whereabouts. But authorities told the lawyer, Vicky, “they don't have enough evidence.”

The woman, who asked that her last name not be released for safety reasons, said her family's home fell outside the mandatory evacuation zone as the Palisades Fire burned south in Santa Monica on Tuesday. She and her family decided to leave and drove off the property in two cars to safer neighborhoods. The house was empty after 11 pm.

Around 2:30 a.m., a man entered the property, said Vicky, who shared surveillance video of the episode with The Times. In it, the thief, wearing a dark hoodie and backpack, appears to kick down the tree's front door before making off with valuables including designer shoes and a Taiwanese whiskey collection.

“They blew our house away – completely,” he said.

When the robber left the house shortly after 3am, he left with a duffel bag containing an Apple Air Tag. Vicki said she and her husband contacted the Santa Monica Police Department and then the LAPD when it became clear the air tag was ringing in the city of Los Angeles.

The LAPD located the airtag at an apartment building in Central LA, but were “unable to pinpoint” its location and did not enter the premises, Vicki said. Later, the airtag was shifted to another location nearby, where it remained for several days.

When Vicki followed up with the police in Santa Monica, she was told the department didn't have enough resources to proceed with the fire. She knows the fire is everyone's number one concern, but she worries that time is running out to solve the crime.

“If you find them, you can solve a robbery,” he said.

An LAPD spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment on the case.

Santa Monica Police spokeswoman Lt. Erica Aglufi said in a statement, “Under normal circumstances, detectives work to locate property stolen by owners through airtags and other devices, but those tracks may not always indicate a location or be sufficient evidence to make an arrest.

“We are still heavily involved in an extremely extraordinary emergency, and nothing is current at that time,” Aglufi said in a statement, adding that “every officer, including those assigned to investigations, must set aside their regular duties for staff operations in the Santa Monica evacuation zones.”

Fighting the fire remains a priority, but Vicky's airtake gas remains open, the report said.

“This investigation is not over,” Santa Monica police said. “As we move forward and get closer to normalcy, our investigative division will continue to work with the LAPD on appropriate follow-up as time and resources allow.”

Times staff writer Richard Winton contributed to this report.

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