Judge ends federal oversight of Oakland police after 23 years, the longest in US history
A federal judge has ended 23 years of federal monitoring of the Oakland Police Department, capping the longest-running oversight of a police department in US history.
A federal judge on Tuesday ended federal monitoring of the Oakland Police Department after 23 years, capping the longest-running oversight of a police department in US history.
US District Judge William Orrick, in San Francisco, dismissed the case after the department complied with all 51 court-mandated reforms. “I’m particularly grateful to the men and women of the Oakland Police Department … for achieving substantial compliance,” he said. “May it ever be thus.”
The oversight began in 2003, after a 2000 scandal in which a rookie officer reported abuse by a group of officers known as the “Riders”. Four officers were charged with false arrests, planting evidence, using excessive force, falsifying police reports and assaulting people in west Oakland, a predominantly Black area. Three were acquitted after two deadlocked juries; the fourth is a fugitive believed to have fled the country. In 2003 the city settled a class-action police abuse lawsuit involving 119 people for $11 million.
Federal monitor Robert Warshaw reported in May that the department had complied with all 51 reform tasks. “This is the first time in 23 years that OPD has achieved each of the 51 tasks in the settlement agreement,” Orrick said at the May hearing.
The department has seen 16 chiefs in two decades. LeRonne Armstrong was fired in 2023 after a probe found he covered up officer misconduct; James Beere took office in July.
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