Lost Weapons Prompt Halt of Military Gear to Some Sheriff Departments [View all]

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The San Mateo and Napa County sheriff’s departments are suspended from a federal program that provides hand-me-down military equipment to law enforcement agencies because the departments are unable to account for some missing assault weapons.

The departments are two of nine law enforcement agencies in the state currently suspended from the Defense Department’s 1033 program, according to documents provided to KQED by the California Office of Emergency Services, which facilitates the federal program in this state.

“A suspension is not like a school suspension, where it’s punitive, where you’re in trouble,” said Kelly Huston, deputy director with Cal OES. “It’s that we are not going to have you acquiring additional gear if you can’t account for that which you are already assigned.”

Huston said sometimes the weapons are stolen, or there’s a record-keeping problem that causes the law enforcement agency to lose track of equipment.

full: http://blogs.kqed.org/newsfix/2014/09/11/lost-assault-rifles-suspension-1033/

See also San Jose Mercury News, Bay Area police departments got millions in military surplus, records show

Law enforcement agencies throughout the Bay Area have received more than $14 million dollars worth of decommissioned military equipment, including grenade launchers, armored vehicles, and an 85-foot speed boat armed with machine guns, records show.

The acquisitions by local agencies include a $4.4 million fast patrol boat, given to the Alameda County Sheriff's office in 2005 to patrol the waterways around the Port of Oakland, a $685,000 mine resistant vehicle for the Antioch Police Department and an armored vehicle known as the MAMBA, which can withstand land mines and IEDs, for the city of Concord.

The acquisitions are part of the Department of Defense's 1033 Program, which since 1995 has given more than $5 billion worth of military surplus to police agencies across the country. Although the program has been in place for nearly two decades, information about what individual police agencies received was made available for first time last week by the California Office of Emergency Services, which oversees the program in the state.

The data was released amid growing concern over the militarization of local police departments in the wake of a shooting of an unarmed black teenager in Ferguson, Mo., and a strong law enforcement response to the protests that followed.