The number of officer-involved shootings in the City of Los Angeles has nearly doubled since last year, the Los Angeles Police Commission announced Tuesday. Officials are now seeking changes to reduce use-of-force-incidents by LAPD officers, with Commission President Matthew Johnson calling the latest figures “alarming.”
According to the Commission, there have been 45 officer-involved shootings so far this year, compared to 23 in all of 2014. Those incidences have worsened a “crisis of confidence” that Johnson said affects the Los Angeles Police Department, along with numerous police departments throughout the country. “As a result of both real and perceived racial disparities in policing, there are deepening wounds in Los Angeles and cities across the country,” he added.
Johnson has requested a report detailing all LAPD-involved shootings over the past decade to compare the incidents with those of other law enforcement agencies. He also suggested a review of the department’s non-lethal weapons to see if they could more effectively be used against certain criminals and called on the Inspector General to take a closer look at police training programs and the department’s use of body cameras.
"Once we have this information, it will be our collective responsibility - the department, this commission and the community - to use it to continue the reform efforts that began with the consent decree and to build the LAPD into the best trained, best equipped, most professional and most respected police organization in America," Johnson said.
Read more about latest figures here.