Azle Malinao-Alvarez Emerald
Marshall Russell and Sherry Franzen participate in a mid-August meeting for the Independent Police Review Project, a new commu
nity watchdog group. The IPRP is planning for its second SpeakOut! to be held Oct. 22 on campus.
Citizen-run police review board
wants to get students involved
■The Independent Police Review Project, a sounding board
for activists with complaints about police misconduct, will
present findings to the Eugene City Council
By Kristina Johnson
Oregon Daily Emerald
Last April, Human Rights Al
liance member Randy Newnham
was arrested when he refused to
leave Johnson Hall during protests
over the Worker Rights Consortium
issue. Newnham said the Eugene
Police Department used a “pain
compliance hold” — twisting his
arms and strategically applying
pressure to pressure points — to re
move him from Johnson Hall.
d We want to have a bet
ter relationship with the
ASUO and fraternities,
groups that we’ve had ad
verse relations with in the
past.
Sgt. Rick Gilliam
Eugene police officer
According to Newnham, the po
lice use this type of hold to quiet
protesters.
“They make you very uncomfort
able in an excruciating way,” he
said. He said that while the police
“were not especially rough” with
him during the protest^, another
student, Nolan Brewer, still suffers
from injuries allegedly sustained
during his arrest at the same event.
“This [event] was internal busi
ness of the University,” Newnham
said. “Here we are in our own
building, and we’re told we don’t
have a right to be there, and they
call in the EPD — a group of peo
ple whose brutality has been de
cried by Amnesty International.”
In an effort to address growing
complaints of police misconduct,
Eugene activists Carol Berg and Tr
ish Binder have established the In
dependent Police Review Project,
which aims to educate the commu
nity about what constitutes police
brutality and advocate for those
who have specific complaints of
misconduct by the EPD.
“We’re a community advocate
and watchdog,” Berg said. “Our
main role is to act as a conduit and
present complaints to the City
Council.”
The IPRP plans to focus on Uni
versity students this fall. Its second
SpeakOut! against police miscon
duct will be held on campus on
Oct. 22, International Police Bru
tality Day. The first SpeakOut! oc
curred at the EWEB building in
July and was attended bv 73 peo*
pie, of which 27 came forward
with complaints against the EPD,
according to Berg.
“We hope that by the second
SpeakOut! in October, we’ll have
more student involvement,” Berg
said.
Binder added that students are
particularly vulnerable to police
harassment, because “they don’t
want their parents to know what’s
going on, so they try to deal with it
by themselves.”
Sgt. Rick Gilliam of the EPD
pointed out that the majority of po
lice interactions with students are
related to alcohol, not activism. He
said in general he thought relations
between students and the EPD
were improving.
“We’re making some headway,”
he said. “We want to have a better
relationship with the ASUO and
fraternities, groups that we’ve had
adverse relations with in the past.
We try to make ourselves available.
We’re reaching out, doing presen
tations.”
Fart or that approach involves
distinguishing acceptable and un
acceptable behavior.
“Free speech is a good thing, hut
you know ... demonstrators should
respect other people, too,” he said.
“We see activist groups marching
through the halls while classes are
going on. Activists forget that the
purpose of the University is to get
an education.”
He said one major problem with
student demonstrators is commu
nication.
“A lot of times, activist groups
don’t want to communicate what
they’re doing,” he said. “When
we’re on site, if they would be will
ing to communicate their intentions,
it would give us a better indication
of the number of staff necessary, of
whether we could cut back.”
Since June 1997, when police
clashed with activists at an urban
tree sit-in downtown, the relation
ship between the EPD and activists
has gone from strained to near-cat
astrophic. Evidence of this were
the anarchist rallies of June 17 and
18, in which more than 100 police
officers arrested roughly 60 pro
testers, drawing charges of exces
sive use of force.
Citizens with specific grievances
have traditionally sought justice
through the EPD’s Internal Affairs
Department, while complaints
about EPD’s crowd control policies
were directed to the-Police Com
mission. But Berg said that rather
than evaluating police practices,
the Police Commission has fo
cused on promoting ballot meas
ures that increase funding for the
police department.
She said EPD’s Internal Affairs
Department is ineffective because
police are unlikely to uphold com
plaints against their colleagues.
She pointed out that Internal Af
fairs meetings were closed to the
public, unlike the IPRP meetings,
which she said will be open.
Gilliam said if students think the
EPD has treated them unfairly, they
should file complaints with the In
ternal Affairs Department.
“We have a well documented
complaint system,” he said. “There
are forms they can fill out. If it rises
to that level, there will be an inves
tigation. And if they don’t trust the
EPD, they can go to the Human
Rights Commission, and they’ll fol
low up on the complaint.”
Eugene’s Human Rights Program
provides trained advocates to help
complainants through the Internal
Affairs grievance process. Human
Rights Program manager Greg
Rikhoff said they try to make them
selves available to all parts of the
community, including students.
“We do a ton of outreach,” he
said. “We table at events, we do
dozens upon dozens of workshops,
but-people still have to find us
when an incident occurs.”
Rikhoff said the Human Rights
Program distributes its “Tell Us
About It” brochure to organiza
tions throughout the community in
hopes that people will contact the
Human Rights Program with com
plaints.
Newnham said student activists
don’t consider the police an ene
my.
“They’re a symptom of the prob
lem,” he said. “They're here not to
protect us, but to protect the inter
ests of a certain class of people
who own Nike and use sweatshop
labor — the same people who run
this school.”
Sgt. Gilliam said there is no spe
cific police policy for dealing with
student demonstrators.
“The policy is the same;
whether they’re students or not
students,” he said. “It boils down
to whether the University staff
wants the EPD to come in. If they
don’t want us, we don’t get in
volved. We won’t take action un
less somebody from lohnson Hall
wants action taken.”
In addition to its October event,
the IPRP plans to create a guide to
the existing channels for address
ing police grievances. We’re going
to put the pedal to the metal for
groups that aren’t following
through,” said Trish Binder. “We
can let people know: This is what
these groups sav they do.’.’. .
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