This past March, Jamie Wilson received a letter from the San Diego Police Department, notifying her that her 17-year-old son had been added to CalGang, the state’s gang database. It didn’t give reasons — Wilson would have to appeal the decision to find out why he’d been added — but the timing seemed suspect. Only a few weeks earlier, on Feb. 14, the ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties had filed a lawsuit on behalf of Wilson and her son, challenging when San Diego police can collect DNA from minors.
“I feel like they are punishing my son for filing this lawsuit,” Wilson said.
The lawsuit stems from a March 30, 2016, incident involving Wilson’s son, a minor referred to as “P.D.” in court documents, and four friends who were leaving the Memorial Park rec center after a basketball game. According to court records, detectives with the Police Department’s gang unit stopped the teens because the day was considered a gang holiday and some of the boys were wearing blue (P.D. was wearing red and blue). The boys, all of whom are black, were detained, handcuffed, questioned and patted down. In a duffel bag P.D. had been carrying, officers found an unloaded gun. According to court records, the gun was registered to one of the boys’ fathers.
The teens were photographed and told to sign a form to allow officers to collect a DNA sample via a cheek swab. P.D. was arrested, taken in for questioning and charged with carrying a concealed weapon. In a video of the interrogation, conducted prior to police notifying Wilson that they’d arrested her son, two detectives tell P.D. he’s an “underperforming person” who came from a “broken home” and attended a school for kids “who fuck up.” He was then taken to juvenile hall where he spent eight days before being placed on house arrest.
In June 2016, a juvenile court judge dismissed the charges against P.D., finding that police based their decision to stop the teens on race and lacked probable cause to search P.D.’s bag.
The ACLU’s lawsuit, filed in federal court, makes a similar argument: that police targeted P.D. because he was black, and violated his Fourth Amendment rights when they detained and searched him. The lawsuit also asks a judge to find the department’s DNA policy unconstitutional. Under state law, only minors who’ve been found guilty of a felony or convicted of a sexual offense are required to provide a DNA sample. The San Diego Police Department gets around this rule by maintaining its own database — one that’s not linked to state or federal DNA databases. Department policy requires officers to get a signed consent from the minor, but doesn’t require them to notify the minor’s parent or guardian.
The policy “contains no protections to ensure a child’s consent is given knowingly and voluntarily,” the ACLU’s lawsuit argues, and “permits officers to obtain a minor’s consent in the same manner that they obtain an adult’s consent.”
Experts I spoke to earlier this year said they were unaware of any other law enforcement agencies in California that collect DNA from juveniles in the field. They questioned why police can’t wait and get a warrant if a minor’s DNA sample is critical to a case.
The lawsuit isn’t the first time the department’s been sued over improper DNA collection. In 2013, the city agreed to pay a $35,000 settlement and destroy DNA samples police had collected without cause from the family of a parolee.
In July, the lawsuit involving P.D. was close to being settled. Both parties were scheduled to finalize things in mid-August, court records show. But then the city withdrew from settlement talks.
“We thought we had reached an agreement on how to resolve many of the issues in the case,” Vakili said, “but the Police Department reconsidered its position.”
A spokesman for the city attorney’s office, which is representing the Police Department in the lawsuit, said he couldn’t comment on the case.
A Police Department spokesman said he couldn’t comment on the case, or confirm or deny that P.D.’s name was entered into CalGang.
For the full story visit: https://www.voiceofsandiego.org/topics/public-safety/teenager-sued-sdpd-documented-gang-member-soon/