One fired, one suspended, one retired, and one cleared after a blogger exposed officers’ racist, Islamophobic and derogatory Facebook posts last summer.
posted on Facebook by former and current San Jose Police Department officers, two of the four officers investigated have been disciplined — one was fired and the other suspended, law-enforcement sources have told the Bay Area News Group.
But the department cleared two other officers involved in the scandal that rocked the SJPD during the height of the George Floyd demonstrations last summer, underscoring concerns among civil rights advocates about a lack of police accountability.in a June 2020 blog — written under a pseudonym who multiple sources confirm is the partner of an SJPD officer, came during a summer that saw the department embroiled in high-profile controversies, including backlash over its The San Jose Police Department refused to comment on the officers investigated after the Facebook posts surfaced, other than to confirm whether they were still with the department, and would point only to changes made to the police duty manual in March addressing officers’ “personal online presence.” Those changes included barring speech “that adversely reflects upon the department” or “inhibits the department’s ability to operate efficiently and effectively.”ffered additional details, revealed here for the first time, about the status of the four officers who were placed on leave in the wake of the scandal. All but one of the officers either could not be reached or declined to comment for this story. Officer Mark Pimentel was the most severely punished, and his Facebook posts on the defunct 10-7ODSJ SJPD alumni group page were the most recent messages investigated. Most of the group members who posted derogatory comments were not investigated because they had either retired or were no longer with the police department.by a Ventura County Sheriff’s Office deputy in 2017. “Hell, I would have pulled it over her face,” he wrote. In another group thread referencing the Black Lives Matter movement, Pimentel is associated with a comment stating that “black lives don’t really matter” on a public thread, which had been started by a retired officer weighing in on a rash of shootings in Chicago.A second officer, Ryan Welch, was issued a four-week suspension after the June 2020 blog lifted a 2010 Facebook post in which he commented in a thread describing how a Jihadist inadvertently killed himself with an improvised explosive device in the Middle East. Welch stated in the decade-old post: “Does that mean they don’t get their 40 virgins? Maybe like 20 who just lost their virginity.”surfaced in which he shared a meme photo comparing Nazis to “Islamic Muslim terrorists.” While Sciba was cleared, sources in the department said the fallout has led to him being passed over for a lieutenant promotion.Bellini wasn’t investigated for any social-media comments, but for claims made in the blog post connecting him to a commemorative coin referring to San Jose’s police district L as “Stinkin’ Lincoln,” surrounded by the inscription, “To Hell and Back.” The district’s population is largely Vietnamese and Latino. In an interview with the Bay Area News Group, Bellini asserted that the coin was an internal token to signify the shared experience of officers who worked the district, and was not meant to demean the people who live there. Still, Bellini said that after the experience, he felt a lack of initial support both from the department and his police union. Combined with nagging physical injuries, he declined a full-duty return and chose to retire after 23 years with SJPD. “That’s not the department I joined,” he said in a May interview before moving out of state. “But I’m not bitter. It was the best experience of my life.” Zahra Billoo, executive director of the San Francisco Bay Area office for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said she was not surprised to hear about officers that were cleared or remain with the department.A few months after wide public condemnation of the social media posts by civic and elected leaders, the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s OfficeIn a statement, the San Jose Police Officers’ Association emphasized that two of the officers were cleared and that the city manager’s office “objectively evaluated these cases and upheld the exonerations.” The statement added that the arbitration decisions for the other two officers will be made public because of new contract language between the union and the city aimed at increasing transparency of the arbitration process., a California bill authored by San Jose Assemblymember Ash Kalra to compel police to vet a police candidate’s background for any evidence of “membership in a hate group, participation in hate group activities, or public expressions of hate.” Kalra credited some agencies including SJPD with already instituting the practice, but he wants to see it become mandatory across the state. “We can’t stop folks from being racist and White supremacists,” Kalra said in a February interview. “But we can stop them from becoming law enforcement.”No criminal charges for California police who killed man holding a water bottle, not a gun William Armaline, a professor and director of the Human Rights Institute at San Jose State University who helped with the bill’s framing, said it would be a “common sense” solution to help stop problematic officers from being hired and later protected.He added that accountability extends well beyond any individual officer’s consequences. “I think the bigger question is, how can the agencies demonstrate to the public that they reject these kinds of behaviors, whether it’s juvenile-level actions and violence of officers during protests or really disturbing expressions of White supremacy in the ranks?” he said. “This is a problem that’s been kicked down the road long enough.”Dear Abby: I just wanted to sit in their house for a few hours, and they wouldn’t let me inHarriette Cole: I'm seeing a huge red flag in my new marriageThousands of planned homes could vanish as 'builder's remedy' sweeps Bay Area citiesPhotos: Ex-49ers QB Trey Lance selling Morgan Hill mansion for $2.9MHarriette Cole: All the doors were locked, but there she was in my kitchenSouthern California has 33 of priciest US ZIPs for homes
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Meta will stop forcing your Threads posts onto Facebook and it can’t come soon enoughMeta appears to be working on a new privacy setting so Threads users can opt-out of having their posts cross-posted to Facebook and Instagram feeds.
Read more »
The Social Network True Story: Everything The Facebook Movie Got WrongDavid Fincher's The Social Network chronicles the founding of Facebook, and while it got many things right, it changed a couple of details.
Read more »
Send Ben: Jacksonville woman victim of ‘Scamdemic’ after Facebook hacker demands ransom, posts pornAction News Jax Ben Becker is investigating after a Jacksonville woman was the victim of a growing ‘Scamdemic’ trend when a Facebook hacker demanded ransom and posted porn on her popular cat meme page.
Read more »
White House calls on Fox News to apologize after top host’s ‘sickening’ Islamophobic rantFox News is showing its true colors, yet again.
Read more »
Europe to extend ban on targeted ads for Facebook and InstagramIzzy, a tech enthusiast and a key part of the PhoneArena team, specializes in delivering the latest mobile tech news and finding the best tech deals. Her interests extend to cybersecurity, phone design innovations, and camera capabilities.
Read more »
SJPD cop who wounded hero in taqueria shooting no longer with dept. after racist texts revealedAnother racist texting scandal has hit the Bay Area, this time in the South Bay. An officer, who has now resigned according to the East Bay Times, is accused of making racist comments about Black people, including the use of slurs and generalizations. In an exchange, one text blatantly reads, 'I hate black people.
Read more »