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March 11, 2006
When the Police Come Unannounced
Pomona College is a small, well thought of, liberal arts school. Both our children have degrees from Pomona College. Today the Los Angeles Times has a chilling story of a Pomona College professor who, along with his students, was questioned by Los Angeles County Sheriffs' deputies about his relationship with the government of Venezuela and the Venezuelan community. They came to his office without an appointment. The deputies said they were working for a federal task force.
"They cast the Venezuelan community as a threat," said Tinker-Salas, an outspoken critic of U.S. policy in Latin America who was born in Venezuela. "They asked me if the Venezuelan government had influenced me one way or another. I think they were fishing to see if I had any information they could use."[snip]
"They asked me about the Venezuelan community. Where do they congregate? Do they have a leadership?" he said. "They asked about the consulate and the embassy. They wanted to know if I had contact with the Venezuelan government."
Tinker-Salas said the deputies also questioned waiting students about him and examined cartoons on his office door.
"They asked them about my classes," he said. "My students were intimidated."
Sheriff Lee Baca said his deputies "were not working on any particular case." If they were not working on any particular case, then there was no urgency. An appointment might have been a good idea. Being questioned by the police without an appointment is always intimidating. Having an appointment conveys respect and communicates the goal of information gathering rather than intimidation.
Baca "said he would discourage workplace interviews in the future, especially with members of academia." Baca now favors calling ahead and avoiding on campus interviews of this kind. For the Times' article, he says all the right things. But come on. His officers should have known better than to pull a stunt like this. They work under instructions from superiors in the department or the agency for which they were doing the inquiry.
If this wasn't done to intimidate, why was it done the way it was? It takes either planning or wasted time to catch a Professor in his or her office. Generally, they spend less than half of their time there.
Rightly, Pomona College's President, David Oxtoby, is appropriately outraged and is seeking legal advice on how best to communicate that outrage. Everyone else should be outraged also.
Posted by Duane Smith at March 11, 2006 8:27 AM | Read more on Current Events |
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