Fairfield police release body cam footage of arrests at council meeting
Nine individuals, including one minor, were detained by police after a civil disturbance at Tuesday's city council meeting.
(Still frame from Fairfield Police Department footage/Graphic by Solano News Update)
The Fairfield Police Department released body camera footage on Wednesday that shows the arrests of several protesters at a heated city council meeting one day earlier.
The agency said the release of the footage was done the police department wanted to prove that “trust, transparency, and accountability are some of our highest priorities.”
Two video files released on Wednesday are from the same incident but show the arrests from different points of view, the agency said.
In one of the videos, an officer tells a protester that she’s being detained after refusing their request to leave the city council meeting.
“You're under arrest," the officer said.
“That's fine,” the activist responds. “Why didn't you arrest the other protesters? There were other people chanting, too.”
In total, nine people were arrested, including a man who repeatedly said he was not part of the protest and was in attendance speak about an unrelated incident at his employer Clorox. Court records reviewed by Solano News Update showed the individual has a pending harassment claim against the chemical company.
Earlier in the week, the grassroots organization Fairfield Change called for protesters to attend the regularly-scheduled meeting after learning that the police department had hired an officer who had a problematic past during his time with a neighboring agency.
The officer, Dustin Joseph, worked with the Vallejo Police Department prior to joining the Fairfield agency. He was one of two involved in the shooting death of 23-year-old Mario Romero in 2012. One year later, he was connected to the fatal shooting of burglary suspect William Heinze.
Joseph’s involvement in the shootings resurfaced earlier this year when his photo was used in an Open Vallejo report that exposed a secret fraternity of Vallejo officers who ritualistically bent the tips of their badges after they killed criminal suspects. His name was not mentioned in the report, but a photo published alongside the news story showed Joseph wearing a badge that appeared to have at least two bends.
At the start of Tuesday’s meeting, Fairfield Police Chief Deanna Cantrell was allowed to make a brief statement about Joseph’s career in Vallejo and his subsequent hiring in Fairfield. She said Joseph was cleared of criminal wrongdoing in connection with the shootings, and hiring managers in Fairfield were not aware of the badge-bending scandal because it only recently came to light.
"I understand this is concerning to the community, and it is equally concerning to me,” Cantrell said, adding that an outside agency contracted by the City of Vallejo had launched an investigation into the badge-bending issue.
“Officer Joseph is not currently working the streets,” she said.
Cantrell’s statement was offered as a presentation at the start of the meeting, but her name did not appear on a list of presenters published before the meeting in the council’s agenda, suggesting her statement was more of a public record than an actual presentation.
This upset more than a dozen activists who were inside the meeting after Fairfield Mayor Harry Price announced the remainder of the public comment session would be moved to the very end of the meeting. Typically, public comments are held at the start of council meetings.
After the mayor moved the public comments portion to the end of the meeting, the activists began chanting in the council’s chambers. Hoping to restore order, Price called for a recess. When the activists continued chanting, Fairfield City Manager Stefan Chatwin ordered police officers to clear the room and arrest the activists, according to a city official who spoke with Solano News Update on background.
The nine people arrested included one minor, according to a late-evening press release published on Tuesday. All but one of the activists detained by police were from Fairfield; one lives in Suisun City. Solano News Update is not naming the activists who were arrested because it is not clear if the District Attorney’s office will prosecute any of them.
On Wednesday, a spokesperson for the Fairfield Police Department justified the arrests by saying the activists intended to disrupt the meeting from the start. The agency pointed to a social media post on Facebook that said in part: “We will not allow the meeting to proceed if our questions and concerns are not answered.”
The agency said protesters were arrested on suspicion of violating Section 403 of the California Penal Code, which prohibits the purposeful disturbance of meetings.
In a statement posted on Facebook, Fairfield Change accused the police department and the city manager of “lying about last night’s events.”
“They tried to repress public comment,” the group said. “These tactics were clearly oppressive and intentional. The point remains, the city would rather jail eight people than answer questions about one killer cop.”
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