Police Bad Behavior Often Hidden From Public
SAN MATEO (CBS SF) -- When Officer Noah Winchester was put on indefinite leave from the San Mateo Police Department last October, the public was left wonder why.
Under California law, Chief Susan Manheimer could not say. But nine months later, the public found out. District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe charged Winchester with raping five women while he was in uniform.
California law shields police officers' files from public view while they're investigated, or disciplined.
"They're shielded in their files not being open to the public or the media,"explains Alameda County Sheriff Gregory Ahern.
When San Mateo hired Winchester, they did not know he had been accused of rape at his last job, as a cop at a community college near Sacramento.
"Had we any knowledge of any sexual misconduct or allegations of sexual misconduct from anyone that we were doing a background on, we'd never have hired him," Manheimer said.
The College District is investigating why the accusations were not in his personnel file.
Attorney Mike Rains represents Winchester, as well as many other police officers. He says "the results of that investigation and even the fact of that investigation apparently was never recorded in his personnel file."
Wagstaffe agrees.
"The victim was just getting cold feet at that time and didn't follow through on it," he said. "There still should have been that initial incident report should have gone in the personnel file under good practices."
But even if the incident does get properly recorded in an officer's file, it can vanish after five years.
"Under California law, you know, matters internal, they can purge them after five years," explains Wagstaffe.
To look for past misconduct in a cop's history, the new employer must be willing to physically inspect the file at his last police department. Personnel files do not travel.
"If they're local, we send our investigators directly to that agency," Ahern said. "If that lateral's coming from faraway lands, like San Diego or even outside the state, we have to make a determination. Do we make that journey, or not?"
Ahern fired 19-year veteran deputy Shawn Osborne after the well-publicized beating of a suspect in an alley in San Francisco.
Two other Alameda County deputies were charged in that beating by the San Francisco district attorney. Osborne was not. Why was he fired?
"That individual is protected under California penal sections not to have his personnel records or internal affairs investigations disclosed," Ahern said.
A security camera in the alley caught Osborne after the beating, allegedly walking away with the victim's gold necklace.
Did the sheriff's investigation find other evidence? The public will never know.
"The problem I have is that there is this movement to now make public the results of these investigations," Rains said. "To publicize them, tell the public about it, and I have a real problem with that."
Rains, who also represents Oakland Police officers, says he knows why Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf ran through three police chiefs in less than two weeks this summer.
"I'd love to talk about what I know about some of those chiefs," Rains said. "I don't have much respect for some of them and I have good reason for feeling that way. But you know what? I respect their right of privacy."
Meanwhile, Schaaf feels frustrated by the rules prohibiting the release of information.
"It has been very frustrating in the midst of this scandal of very high public interest to not be able to share personnel matters regarding police officers. That applies all the way up to the chief," Schaff said.
Rains said Schaff simoply can't comment.
"She's not going to talk about issues in their past or their current professional lives that caused her to act as she did...That's the law and Schaaf is not above the law any more than I am or you are," he said.
