Oakland Sued Over Records on Secret Police Union Meetings
A lawyer for the city’s police union dismissed claims that his client used confidential labor negotiations to obstruct police reform as “nonsense.”
Read more
Oakland
Judge Orders Oakland Police to Release Misconduct Records ‘Promptly’
For two years, journalists have waited for the city of Oakland and its police department to make required Public Records Act disclosures of police misconduct files. Alameda County Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch just significantly shortened the waiting period with a ruling that requires a response within six months.
Read more
Report Clears Fired Oakland Cops in Fatal Shooting of Homeless Man
An independent review stands at odds with an oversight board’s decision to fire five Oakland police officers who shot and killed an armed homeless man as he awoke from an unconscious state in 2018.
Read more
Rental Scooters
A federal court in California preliminarily approved a settlement between the city of Oakland and a class that claimed the city allowed rental scooters to block sidewalks and driveways.
Read more
Toxic Culture Persists in Oakland Police Department, Lawyers Say
Civil rights lawyers say the Oakland Police Department’s reluctance to investigate troubling social media posts with suspected links to its officers represents a “cataclysmic failure of judgment and leadership.”
Read more
Oakland A’s Stadium
An Alameda County judge ruled California Governor Gavin Newsom has the authority to certify plans to build a new stadium for the Oakland A’s baseball team.
Read moreScooter Trouble
The city of Oakland, California, will settle claims it has allowed rental scooters to run amok on the city’s sidewalks and driveways by requiring the scooter operators to respond to complaints of dumped scooters and riders to take photos of properly parked scooters as part of closing their ticket.
Read more
Defendant in Deadly Ghost Ship Fire Dodges Second Trial With Guilty Plea
Derick Almena, a man who converted an Oakland warehouse into an artist collective where a 2016 fire killed 36, pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter Friday.
Read moreRent Control
A federal court in California certified a class of disabled, low-income renters who say they were unable to participate in Oakland’s rent control program because many of the residential units are not accessible for them.
Read more
Judge Signs Off on $1 Million Settlement in Ghost Ship Warehouse Fire
A California judge on Tuesday approved a settlement that calls for the city of Oakland to pay $32.7 million to the families of 32 of the 36 people who died in a fire at a music party at the Ghost Ship warehouse in Oakland four years ago.
Read more
Ghost Ship Settlement
Putting a cap on what amounts to a total $33 million in settlements, the Oakland City Council agreed to pay $399,000 to the 12 remaining plaintiffs in the Ghost Ship warehouse fire.
Read more
Judge Proposes Deal to Get More Help for Oakland During Protests
A federal judge offered to tweak an injunction against the Oakland Police Department Tuesday after the city’s policing partners refused to provide aid during protests unless restrictions on tear gas and rubber bullets were lifted.
Read more
Landlords Press Ninth Circuit to End Oakland Tenant Relocation Payments
Three Ninth Circuit judges heard arguments Tuesday over the constitutionality of an Oakland ordinance requiring landlords to pay relocation costs for tenants displaced by evictions when property owners move back in.
Read more
Retired Federal Judge Reflects on Long Career, Tackles Racial Bias in Courts
You can’t sit back and wait for things to happen. That’s the advice offered by retired U.S. District Judge Thelton E. Henderson, who oversaw a series of pivotal cases that helped improve conditions in California state prisons and combat racial bias in the Oakland police force.
Read more
Oakland Activists Say Police Shirked Court-Ordered Safety Measures
Months after a federal judge ordered police to issue vocal warnings before deploying tear gas at protests, a new motion for sanctions says the directive has gone ignored at recent demonstrations.
Read more
Appellate Court Shuts Down Oakland’s Speech Protection Suit Against Coal Exporters
A state appellate court chided the city of Oakland Thursday for bringing an anti-SLAPP motion against developers of what stands to be the largest coal export terminal on the West Coast on the site of a decommissioned army base in West Oakland.
Read more
Journalists Fight Foot-Dragging by Oakland Police on Records Requests
Citing a pattern of consistent stonewalling, investigative journalists have taken the Oakland Police Department to court to force it to comply with state public records laws.
Read more
Ninth Circuit Greenlights City’s Suit Accusing Wells Fargo of Racist Lending Practices
Wells Fargo cannot dodge claims that its allegedly racist lending practices caused Oakland to lose millions of dollars in property taxes resulting from widespread foreclosures and a steep decline in home values, the Ninth Circuit ruled Wednesday.
Read more
Fired Oakland Police Chief Files Whistleblower Lawsuit Against City
Fired Oakland Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick followed through on a promise to sue the city of Oakland for retaliation, filing a federal lawsuit Wednesday that claims she was booted from the job for reporting corruption and misconduct in the police commission.
Read more
Oakland Police, Mayor Slammed for Handling of Shooting Death of Homeless Man
The Oakland Police Department and its former chief handled the 2018 death of a homeless man in a hail of police gunfire with “an appalling measure of incompetence, deception, and indifference,” the department’s independent monitor said in a withering report released Monday.
Read more