OFF THE WIRE
By Tom Abate
Police Chief Sandra Spagnoli talks about technology at a Coffee with Cops meeting Tuesday morning, and gets earful from a man erroneously detained in January.
More than two dozen people turned out for a "Coffee with Cops" gathering Tuesday morning as Police Chief Sandra Spagnoli talked about making better use of existing traffic cameras to investigate crime.The meeting allowed residents to ask police about response times, burglaries and other concerns. It was held at the Creekside Bistro inside the office complex catty-corner to the San Leandro BART station.
Salvador Cortez, whose family of three were handcuffed by San Leandro police in a case of mistaken identity in January, attended the forum to complain that as yet he had not received a letter of apology for the error.
Spagnoli took responsibility for the lapse. She said police received an erroneous tip that the family's 24-year-old son, Joshua, was an assault suspect they were seeking, which led to a 45-minute detention until police realized their error.
Cortez sat at the same table as City Manager Chris Zapata who recently started work and was attending his first such meeting.
Neighborhood tips -- obviously not infallible -- and technology emerged as two of the department's favorite crime-fighting tactics.
Crime Prevention Officer Tim Degrano said neighbors and residents were instrumental in apprehending suspects.
"It's fantastic to have all those eyes out there to tell us what you saw," he said.
Spagnoli has been big on technology since she took over the department a little over a year ago. She said Tuesday that the city has a network of low resolution traffic cameras that could be used for gathering evidence or leads.
While a formal plan doesn't yet exist, she told Patch that it should be relatively cheap and easy to better integrate those cameras into a database police can access quickly instead of doing what they do now, which is to request traffic camera files from the city's engineering department.
Spagnoli said once the department comes up with a plan she would present it to the city manager for approval.
Police Department spokesman Lt. Jeff Tudor said an "anonymous" text tip line is also in the works but not ready for deployment.
Tudor said the texting option grew out of feedback from high schoolers who had been bullied but were afraid to report incidents either because of potential retaliation or to avoid being labeled snitches.
The idea would be for an individual to text one phone number and for that number to forward the text to police.
But Tudor was not certain whether this would truly be anonymous or whether, with a court order, the department could reach though the intermediary number to locate the original caller.
Residents raised several issues, including the perception that there were more homeless in the city. Spagnoli said San Leandro had a softer heart than adjoining cities which drew the down-and-out from elsewhere to panhandle here.
One attendee asked about being put on hold for more than eight minutes when she felt accosted. A police department dispatcher said there is one person on duty most of the day to handle all calls, emergency and routine, and sometimes less critical calls must wait.
