LA official used LAPD for 'personal security' at cost of $100k while demanding $150M cut from police budget
A top city official in Los Angeles has faced flak for using the city police department as her "personal security" for the last two months costing $100,000 to the city. She did this even while filing a motion to slash the police department’s budget by $150 million. Nury Martinez, president of the LA City Council, was slammed after it was revealed that LA Police Department cops were stationed outside her residence at the time she was introducing the force’s defunding motion. The US has seen the demand for defunding and disbanding local police departments rising in the wake of the death of George Floyd, a black American, in police brutality in Minneapolis last month. In Minneapolis, the city council has vouched for the dismantling of the police department.
Martinez, who took over in December last year as the first Latina to become President of the council, joined other council members like Herb Wesson, Monica Rodriguez and Curren Price last week seeking the LAPD's budget to be slashed by millions of dollars. “We need a vision for our city that says 'there is going to be justice'. American society is founded on a racial hierarchy, one that is born out of slavery, followed by Jim Crow segregation and corporate abuse of labor,” the motion reads. “As such, police departments are asked to enforce a system of laws that are designed to reinforce and maintain economic and racial inequality.”
Jamie McBride, chief of the LAPD union Los Angeles Police Protective League Detective, took a dig at Martinez as he calculated that her security set the city back a staggering $100,000 -- that too in the middle of a budget crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic. “It’s disgusting. For two officers in front of a residence since April, you're probably over $100,000 of the people's money,” he told Spectrum News 1.
It's ironic, says LAPD union official
“It's kind of ironic. Here she is demanding $150 million be reallocated from the police budget, but yet she has security at her house by the Los Angeles Police Department," McBride said. He added that the council official should have used private security instead of using taxpayers’ money to protect herself and her family. According to Spectrum, Martinez first started receiving round-the-clock guard with two cops deployed outside her home back on April 4. Her spokesperson told the news website that the security arrangement was put in place after Martinez and her daughter received death threats. It was reported that from May 6, the 24X7 security was lowered and the cops were stationed from 7 am to 9 pm with regular nightlong patrolling.
It was only on Thursday last week that the security ended when, according to Spectrum, it contacted Martinez’s office over the claims. The spokesman told Spectrum the detail had been omitted since publicizing the security meant the protection was being compromised. McBride was though not convinced as he said the security would have remained in place had the threat been credible. The LA Mayor recently agreed to channelize $250 million from the police department and other city programs towards youth jobs, health events and ‘peace centers’ for the back community. A reduction of $150 million from the LAPD would constitute around eight percent of the force’s annual budget of around $3.1 billion.