Omaha, NE PD Citizen Complaints
Submitted | Aug. 14, 2017 |
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Communications
From: Alexander Cartwright and Jennifer Dirmeyer
To Whom It May Concern:
Pursuant to the Nebraska Public Records Statutes (Neb. Rev. Stat. § 84-712), I hereby request the following records:
We are Economics Professors in the College of Business at Ferris State University, and are engaged in an empirical research project on police behavior and citizen complaints. This project requires us to request data from your department. If you have questions about this request or suggestions, we would be happy to discuss them with you.
If you have copies of the annual report for 2016 and 2017, we believe that will contain the information we are looking for. If those reports are not available, will you kindly provide answers to 1 and 2.
Also, the information requested in number 3 is not located in any publicly available report that we were able to locate.
1. What is the total number of citizen complaints (allegations of misconduct) made against your department’s officers annually for 2016-2017? If your department logs complaints in a database, spreadsheet, or other log, a copy of those logs is fine instead.
Please include the type of complaint (i.e., use of force, abuse language, unwarranted search) and the result of complaint (i.e., sustained, exonerated).
2. What is the total number of complaints police officers made against their peer officers in department in 2016-2017? If your department logs complaints in a database, spreadsheet, or other log, a copy of those logs is fine instead.
Please include the type of complaint (i.e., use of force, abuse language, unwarranted search) and the result of complaint (i.e., sustained, exonerated).
3. What is the annual number of officers involved in shootings in your department for the past 10 years? Any documentation or reports that detail the annual number of officer-involved shootings in your department for the past 10 years would be sufficient.
Please include documentation regarding how many of these officer-involved shootings involved disciplinary action. (Please list officer firearm discharge directed at a person separately from a shooting involving an animal and separately from accidental firearm discharges).
Please include the number of officer-involved shootings resulting in discipline.
4. Which of the above data are published publicly? Please provide a link to any and all publicly available reports containing the data above.
Collecting this information is very important to our research, so we would like to emphasize, if you have questions about my request or suggestions, we would be happy to discuss them with you.
The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.
In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.
Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 4 business days, as the statute requires.
Sincerely,
Alexander Cartwright and Jennifer Dirmeyer
From: MuckRock.com
To Whom It May Concern:
I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request, copied below, and originally submitted on Aug. 14, 2017. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is needed.
Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.
From: Bernard in den Bosch (Law)
Under Nebraska Law, we have 4 business days after receiving a public
records request to respond to a public record request. The day a response
is due is today and here is a response.
Please appreciate that there are no records in the form that you have
requested and so it does take some time to gather and compile requested
information, particularly while trying to balance the day to day work being
done by the police officers who have to compile the information. All
further inquires should be directed to my attention.
*Bernard J. in den BoschDeputy City AttorneyCity of Omaha - Law
Department1819 Farnam Street, Suite 804Omaha, NE 68183Telephone: (402)
444-5022Facsimile: (402) 444-5125*
*E-Mail: *bernard.bosch@cityofomaha.org
The information contained in this email contains confidential information
from the Omaha City Attorney’s Office that is intended solely for the
recipient set forth above. Any redistribution, copying or other
dissemination of the contents of this transmission is prohibited. Please be
advised that the contents of this email may be intercepted or diverted
through transmission over the internet and therefore the security of this
email cannot be guaranteed by the sender.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Lt Darci Tierney (OPD) <darci.tierney@cityofomaha.org>
Date: Fri, Aug 18, 2017 at 2:31 PM
Subject: Fwd: Nebraska Public Records Request: Omaha, NE PD Citizen
Complaints
To: "Capt Thomas Shaffer (OPD)" <Thomas.Shaffer@cityofomaha.org>
Cc: Chief Todd Schmaderer <Todd.Schmaderer@cityofomaha.org>, Bernard in den
Bosch <Bernard.Bosch@cityofomaha.org>, "Ofcr Gregory O'Neil (OPD)" <
Gregory.O'Neil@cityofomaha.org>
Tom... Here is an updated request for this public records request.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: <requests@muckrock.com>
Date: Fri, Aug 18, 2017 at 4:00 AM
Subject: RE: Nebraska Public Records Request: Omaha, NE PD Citizen
Complaints
To: opdpublicinformation@ci.omaha.ne.us
August 18, 2017
Omaha Police Department
Omaha Police DEPT.
505 South 15th Street
Omaha, Nebraska 68102
This is a follow up to a previous request:
To Whom It May Concern:
I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request,
copied below, and originally submitted on Aug. 14, 2017. Please let me know
when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is
needed.
Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.
---
On Aug. 14, 2017:
To Whom It May Concern:
Pursuant to the Nebraska Public Records Statutes (Neb. Rev. Stat. §
84-712), I hereby request the following records:
We are Economics Professors in the College of Business at Ferris State
University, and are engaged in an empirical research project on police
behavior and citizen complaints. This project requires us to request data
from your department. If you have questions about this request or
suggestions, we would be happy to discuss them with you.
If you have copies of the annual report for 2016 and 2017, we believe that
will contain the information we are looking for. If those reports are not
available, will you kindly provide answers to 1 and 2.
Also, the information requested in number 3 is not located in any publicly
available report that we were able to locate.
*1. What is the total number of citizen complaints (allegations of
misconduct) made against your department’s officers annually for 2016-2017?
If your department logs complaints in a database, spreadsheet, or other
log, a copy of those logs is fine instead.*Please include the type of
complaint (i.e., use of force, abuse language, unwarranted search) and the
result of complaint (i.e., sustained, exonerated).
*2. What is the total number of complaints police officers made against
their peer officers in department in 2016-2017? If your department logs
complaints in a database, spreadsheet, or other log, a copy of those logs
is fine instead.*
Please include the type of complaint (i.e., use of force, abuse language,
unwarranted search) and the result of complaint (i.e., sustained,
exonerated).
*3. What is the annual number of officers involved in shootings in your
department for the past 10 years? *Any documentation or reports that detail
the annual number of officer-involved shootings in your department for the
past 10 years would be sufficient.
Please include documentation regarding how many of these officer-involved
shootings involved disciplinary action. (Please list officer firearm
discharge directed at a person separately from a shooting involving an
animal and separately from accidental firearm discharges).
Please include the number of officer-involved shootings resulting in
discipline.
*4. Which of the above data are published publicly? *Please provide a link
to any and all publicly available reports containing the data above.
Collecting this information is very important to our research, so we would
like to emphasize, if you have questions about my request or suggestions,
we would be happy to discuss them with you.
The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and
this request is not being made for commercial purposes.
In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform
me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer
the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or
CD-ROM if not.
Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I
look forward to receiving your response to this request within 4 business
days, as the statute requires.
Sincerely,
Alexander Cartwright and Jennifer Dirmeyer
------
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------
--
Officer Gregory O'Neil | Omaha Police Department
Public Information Office 505 South 15th Street
Office: (402) 444-5884 Omaha, Ne 68102
Mobile: (402) 253-4204
From: Bernard in den Bosch (Law)
FYI.
*Bernard J. in den BoschDeputy City AttorneyCity of Omaha - Law
Department1819 Farnam Street, Suite 804Omaha, NE 68183Telephone: (402)
444-5022Facsimile: (402) 444-5125*
*E-Mail: *bernard.bosch@cityofomaha.org
The information contained in this email contains confidential information
from the Omaha City Attorney’s Office that is intended solely for the
recipient set forth above. Any redistribution, copying or other
dissemination of the contents of this transmission is prohibited. Please be
advised that the contents of this email may be intercepted or diverted
through transmission over the internet and therefore the security of this
email cannot be guaranteed by the sender.
-
0616 17 Brian Smith - OIS details 061617
From: Alexander Cartwright and Jennifer Dirmeyer
Thank you very much for the information. We sincerely appreciate it.
Respectfully, Alex Cartwright
From: Alexander Cartwright and Jennifer Dirmeyer
I am writing to follow up on my original request made on 8/14/17.
Thank you very much for providing the information we requested. I am writing to ask for some clarification regarding the data on officer-involved shootings you provided us with. What constitutes an officer-involved shooting in your department? For example, some departments do not count misses while others count all discharges; some include shots at animals. Other departments include intentional and accidental shootings; others do not. Some include all discharges and some exclude missed shots. Please explain to us how your department classifies the OIS included in the numbers you sent to us.
Very Respectfully, Alex Cartwright
From: Omaha Police Department
The table of officer involved shootings (OIS) involved those incidents when
an officer fired their weapon and struck somebody. Some instances were
fatal and some were not.
*Bernard J. in den BoschDeputy City AttorneyCity of Omaha - Law
Department1819 Farnam Street, Suite 804Omaha, NE 68183Telephone: (402)
444-5022Facsimile: (402) 444-5125*
*E-Mail: *bernard.bosch@cityofomaha.org
The information contained in this email contains confidential information
from the Omaha City Attorney’s Office that is intended solely for the
recipient set forth above. Any redistribution, copying or other
dissemination of the contents of this transmission is prohibited. Please be
advised that the contents of this email may be intercepted or diverted
through transmission over the internet and therefore the security of this
email cannot be guaranteed by the sender.
From: Omaha Police Department
The table of officer involved shootings (OIS) involved those incidents when
an officer fired their weapon and struck somebody. Some instances were
fatal and some were not.
*Bernard J. in den BoschDeputy City AttorneyCity of Omaha - Law
Department1819 Farnam Street, Suite 804Omaha, NE 68183Telephone: (402)
444-5022Facsimile: (402) 444-5125*
*E-Mail: *bernard.bosch@cityofomaha.org
The information contained in this email contains confidential information
from the Omaha City Attorney’s Office that is intended solely for the
recipient set forth above. Any redistribution, copying or other
dissemination of the contents of this transmission is prohibited. Please be
advised that the contents of this email may be intercepted or diverted
through transmission over the internet and therefore the security of this
email cannot be guaranteed by the sender.
From: Alexander Cartwright and Jennifer Dirmeyer
Does this include discharges of animals? What about accidental discharges?
From: Omaha Police Department
It does not include when an animal was shoot. We define officer-involved
shootings to be of people.
I am not aware of any accidental discharges that struck somebody and as a
result, it does not include accidental discharges.
*Bernard J. in den BoschDeputy City AttorneyCity of Omaha - Law
Department1819 Farnam Street, Suite 804Omaha, NE 68183Telephone: (402)
444-5022Facsimile: (402) 444-5125*
*E-Mail: *bernard.bosch@cityofomaha.org
The information contained in this email contains confidential information
from the Omaha City Attorney’s Office that is intended solely for the
recipient set forth above. Any redistribution, copying or other
dissemination of the contents of this transmission is prohibited. Please be
advised that the contents of this email may be intercepted or diverted
through transmission over the internet and therefore the security of this
email cannot be guaranteed by the sender.
From: Alexander Cartwright and Jennifer Dirmeyer
Hi,
Thanks so much for your help with this request! I really appreciate it.
Sincerely,
Alexander Cartwright and Jennifer Dirmeyer
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