CHC 1979-07-03 - Laserfiche WebLink

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MR. ODA: Could you read that again? MR. TRULSON: I ' ll do better than that, sir. (gave Communication #15 to Mr. Oda) MR. ODA: Do you want some comments on that? MR. TRULSON: Please. MR. ODA: With the caveat that I am looking at this for the first time, this proposed provision that says that the prosecuting attorney may appoint investigators who shall have all the powers and privileges of a police officer of the county, I have some reservations about that, in all due respect to Mr. Ono' s concerns and requests. In fairness to him, I didn ' t hear what he had to say, previously. But, just on the basis of this provision as I read it, now, what it amounts to and is tantamount to is that the investigators who are in his office will have the right to arrest people on the probable belief that they in violation of any laws of this state. fthink that to make investigators equivalent of police officers, I really don ' t think it is necessary to the extent that I think the wording of this thing really projects it to be. If you want police officers to do anything with the powers of police officers, or anybody to have the powers of a police officer, the Prosecuting Attorney' s Office, all they have to do is to pick up a. telephone to get the assistance of the Police Department. ,- I am especially leery of giving too many people powers of police officers who do not undergo the kind of training and the kind of supervision and the kind of overall daily, you might say, concerns of every other police officer and I am not sure whether we are opening a Pandora' s box by doing this. I am really not sure why this is really necessary. MR. ISHIDA: I think the reason is that although you have to--right now, if the prosecutor doesn 't have an they with that type of power t ey have to work in conjunction with the Police Department. . .and, generally, there is no police officer assigned to an office. If there is one assigned to that office, I don ' t think you will have that much of a problem. I don' t think the purpose of it is for the purpose of any arresting any individuals. It is generally for serving subpoenas, mainly because it is a more practical thing. While the individual would have more power than serving subpoenas, however, the essential, practical effect is to just have this investigator available to the prosecutor whenever, for trial purposes, they need a subpoena served right away, the investigator is there. To get a police officer to do that, they always have an inter-departmental problem. It is a relationship problem, I think. -16-