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LA Police Commission seeks report on bomb squad training deficiencies
Los Angeles Mar 01, 2022
| Photo courtesy of Terry Miller/Hey SoCal
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The city’s Police Commission voted Tuesday to have the Office of the Inspector General draft a comprehensive report on the LAPD’s bomb squad training following a report that found problems with staffing, training and supervision during the detonation of a cache of illegal fireworks in South Los Angeles that caused a huge explosion, displacing numerous residents from their homes.
The commission reviewed a report from the Inspector General into the June 30 detonation on East 27th Street near San Pedro Street, which sent 17 residents and first responders to hospitals, destroyed a bomb squad truck and damaged 22 residences, 13 businesses and 37 vehicles.
In addition to the aforementioned problems, the report found that bomb squad personnel ignored the warnings of an expert team member who said the cache should be broken into smaller portions.
The expert, identified as “Bomb Technician C,” expressed concern about the amount of explosives “on several occasions” before the detonation, according to the report conducted by the Office of the Inspector General of the Los Angeles Police Department.
“Based on my experience and everything, I said, `Uh, this is too much to do one shot, we’re gonna break them up, right?”‘ the technician reported saying to a colleague, according to the report.
The technician believed that both the quantity and weight of the fireworks being placed into the department’s “total containment vessel” was too powerful for the vessel to control.
“This is too much material to (dispose of) in one TCV shot,” he said, according to the report. The expert said his warnings were dismissed by both his colleagues and his supervisor.
“They basically told me that they had already done the calculations, that they were well under the net explosive weight that the TCV could handle,” he told investigators.
The report found that the LAPD Bomb Squad’s standard operating procedure “does not address specific requirements for physically weighing explosive materials” or any requirements or circumstances for when a disposal product should be taken to a designated safe area for detonation.
It also found there was a “lack of active supervision” at the scene and that one of the detectives “took a hands-off approach to his duties in an attempt to make his subordinates feel more comfortable.”
Councilman Curren Price, who represents the neighborhood, said Monday in response to the Inspector General’s report, “Since day one, I have asked for accountability and continue to insist that the individuals responsible for this disaster face appropriate disciplinary action.
“The latest development clearly establishes that what occurred was preventable and is highly inexcusable,” he added. “I expect LAPD to follow through with policy changes so that this catastrophe never happens again anywhere in the city. We must learn from this epic failure. LAPD must do better.”
The report issued several recommendations, including having the department review its training policies and schedule to ensure that all personnel have received the minimum annual training requirement.
It also said the department should require that appropriate measuring scales be included in each bomb technician utility truck, and update its policy to mandate comprehensive documentation of evacuations.
The report also recommended that the department assess whether fatigue played a role in the bomb squad’s decision-making process leading up to the explosion.
“All of the bomb technicians assigned to this incident had been working since the early morning, prior to responding to the 27th Street scene,” the report states. It recommended the department implement adjustments to employees’ schedules to minimize fatigue when appropriate.
The report’s final suggestions were for the LAPD to work to instill a culture within the bomb squad that allows technicians to fully share dissenting opinions while in the field, encourages supervisors to take an active role in the planning and decision-making process and emphasizes and reinforces precision and technical expertise.
Deputy Chief David Kowalski said the LAPD is taking steps to implement all five recommendations. The bomb squad also has a new supervisor and all members are up to date on training, with a new tracking system to monitor all members’ training status, he said. Eight new officers have been added to the squad, but a timeline for when it will be fully staffed is not known.
Kowalski added that recommendations made in the department’s own after- action report have either been fully implemented or significant steps have been taken. Those steps include revising the notification process for the department to update council districts on local bomb squad activity, requiring a command or staff officer to be present for any incident that may require a device or an item to be rendered safe, revising the bomb squad’s standard operating guidelines to include clarity and specificity on the usage of the total containment vessel, and adopting a formalized system to document and verify all calculations for rendering safe procedures with supervisory review and approval requirements.
Police Chief Michel Moore told the commission that the department is in its final days of disciplinary proceedings for the personnel involved in the explosion, which will be presented to Moore for a recommendation soon.
According to Inspector General Mark Smith, the report was conducted using all relevant documentation about the incident, including the Bomb Squad’s standard operating procedures, a list of all vehicles, equipment and maintenance logs used by technicians, and bomb technician training records going back five years.
The Office of the Inspector General also interviewed city staff and submitted questions directly to the LAPD and U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
The police commission also requested a more comprehensive report into possible training deficiencies within the department’s bomb squad.
