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title: "Not only should all officer convictions be public, they should be…"
date: 2019-03-01
source: facebook
type: Archer T. Ships shared a post.
---

# Not only should all officer convictions be public, they should be…

*March 1, 2019 · Facebook*

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Not only should all officer convictions be public, they should be collected in a nationwide database so that the public can tell if their local department is hiring bad eggs.\
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\"Thousands of California law enforcement officers have been convicted of a crime in the past decade, according to records released by a public agency that sets standards for officers in the Golden State." Just don\'t write about it, talk about it, or publish a news report about it.\
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California keeps a secret list of cops who have been convicted of crimes, but doesn\'t want anyone to access it or know who the bad cops are. The California state Attorney General is warning reporters that it is illegal to possess this list of thousands of police officer convictions.\
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Some police officers on the list are murderers. Some cops were convicted of crimes that included sexual molestation of children, child pornography, and beating wives, girlfriends, children, or others at home. Other cops on the list had been convicted of shoplifting, or embezzlement. Many are DUIs, or other drug and alcohol related crimes, some of which involved a drunk cop killing an innocent person under the influence. Some of the cops were drug dealers. One of the police officers robbed a bank wearing a fake beard. Some of them sexually assaulted people they arrested and detained. Others took bribes, filed false reports or lied in court.\
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The revelations are alarming, but the state's top cop says Californians don't have a right to see them. In fact, Attorney General Xavier Becerra warned two Berkeley-based reporters that simply possessing this never-before-publicly-released list of convicted cops is a violation of the law.\
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The California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training --- known as POST --- provided the information last month in response to routine Public Records Act requests from reporters for the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley and its production arm, Investigative Studios.\
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But when Becerra's office learned about the disclosure, it threatened the reporters with legal action unless they destroyed the records, insisting they are confidential under state law and were released inadvertently. The two journalism organizations have rejected Becerra's demands.\"
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