"Shit Magnets"

Hey, repeat listener, you are about to hear the fifth episode in this six part series. I highly encourage you to listen in order. So if you've missed one of our 1st 4 episodes, I suggest you stop listening to this one and go back and get caught up. Thanks for listening. Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputy Michael Coburg says he knows how to catch guys with guns. He's proud of it.

So that was our thing. And for a while, the department really like this, taking guns off the streets. It's good for, you know, the Oh, sorry, it's loud.

Coburg tonight talked outside a Starbucks and unincorporated East L. A. What's known as a busy patrol area. We kept getting interrupted by sirens.

You know, your violent gangs are, you know, the neighborhoods and whose warring and shooting at each other. So you focus your time and energy in those areas doing traffic stops. Informants. You read the graffiti, you know, and it's really not that hard to figure out who's battling who. And then you just start making your context contacting, contacting, You know, eventually you're gonna run into somebody's carrying a gun, doesn't want to go Joe. So they run. They tossed

Kobrick said he worked hard, won a spot on the department's elite gang unit. He did what he was asked to Dio, and he was asked to get criminals and guns off the street. He loved it the way you love something you feel good at, but he had to stop, he said. It wasn't his choice. It was his department's. He got benched

Right now. They don't want guys out there chasing down bad guys because of the force or potential shooting. Or, you know, black lives matter who, God forbid, a white cop shoots a black guy. They're more worried about the fallout of, you know, a racial issue or a political issue rather than serving community that needs help.

You think that was part of it?

Yeah, I've been in four shootings. Do I think that was part of it? Yes, no. So again, they just want guys because my partner and I developed a skill of finding the worst of the worst, were just really good at it and the potential of us to get in a another shooting. It was probably I don't want to say hi because you don't go in the streets looking again. She That's the last thing you want to go home to your kids. But when you're finding guys with guns, I don't want to go home, so I don't care.

you're listening to repeat, I'm Annie Gilbertson. This is Episode five shit magnets Cover told me, Quote. I've been called a shit magnet my entire career. It's the type of proactive officer that makes more arrests, finds more guns, catches more gang members. It's always been a compliment, he said, and in co breaks case, he's also shot more people. Most officers go their entire careers without getting into a shooting. Coburg has had four shootings.

I mean with police work, especially in L. A county, especially in these faster cities. Use of force is an everyday occurrence for just a station. In general, everybody thinks that cops are heavy handed. But really, we're not. I mean, seems like we use way less force than what's actually needed in most cases way should people should be looking at these bad guys terrorizing these towns. They should want guys like me who will walk in a dark alley and confront this bad guy face to face.

Yeah, I think the deep side is that for too long officers were too aggressive on these communities, often communities of black and brown people on. And so so, yeah, it seems like it seems like a lot of the pressure shoe be less aggressive is coming from that

viewpoint. Yeah. I mean, there's always room for improvement when it comes. The tactics are physical aggression, and in some cities there is. I mean, if you have ah, city that is low has a lower crime rate, the forces, and there's almost no force. But when you're in a city where these gang members are terrorizing people, they don't live by a force policy. You know, I gotta tell you, it's hard for me to think of a time where I thought it deputy went too far.

Then Coburn's life changed. E. I told you he'd been pulled out sidelined. It happened when he caught a case that's Deputy Speak for going under internal review being investigated by your own department, something you've done has raised a flag at work. Colbert came under investigation after doing some side work off duty and 2015 you're supposed to tell the department if you work side jobs. According to Internal affairs records provided by Coburg, he did not.

Anyways, they flexed on me. They called and told my lieutenant, my lieutenant contact my sergeant. My starting asked me about it.

Eventually, the case landed on the desk of Internal Affairs, which, according to the records Coburg gave me, found Coburg had broken rules by acting as a private detective rules about professional conduct outside employment and unnecessary interference, the report noted. He had been disciplined twice before. This time his judgment was called into question. Colbert thinks it was a non issue that really the department no longer wanted his aggressive approach to the job

They did a lot of bad stuff to me. When they pulled me out of the field, they knew I was going through a divorce. They pulled me out of the field, took my take home car, told me I wasn't allowed to work overtime, and they made me drive to Inglewood every day, 46 hours a day in the middle of traffic for eight or nine months. I mean, it was pulling my hair out.

I've heard of using traffic as a punishment for officers. It's a thing in L. A. It's called freeway therapy. Well, kind of work. Did you have

to be? Oh, I was entering information into one of our systems where we track, you know, if I cards stuff tedious and it's, you know, yeah, but they try to write me up cause led 20 in a month and I'm like 20 AM Like I took a couple days off and then I clean their entire arm, rail washed clean like 300 guns. You know, the old joke, the marine peeling potatoes, you know, they were just give me they're trying to break.

According to records, Coburg was still being paid as a deputy around $100,000 in 2015. The shares department would not talk to me about Colbert's complaints, said that what they could say was limited because officer personnel files are private. Coburg returned to the field for a stent, but then was transferred off the gang unit ousted from the job.

I'm helping with Equipment way outside of what I was paid to do. I mean, I'm washing trucks. My career went from gang unit for the largest sheriff's department in the world. In Compton, South Central. The washing trucks, it's It's a joke.

I asked the sheriff about assigning deputies this type of work. L. A County Sheriff Jim McDonnell said they do not give deputies work outside the scope of an officer's responsibilities. When I told this to Coburg. He sent me a cell phone video of him walking into a long shipping container cluttered with sagging cardboard boxes in a tangle of equipment.

And I've been assigned to go through and clean it and get inventory of all this gear, and it's a ton of gear that need to be inventoried. I think my life, this is what I do.

The thing that struck Hobart that infuriates him now is that if all this was really about how he handled himself in the field and his shootings, Kobrick said, it seemed unfair. He told me I didn't have any shady shootings. All my stuff was legit. The Los Angeles County district attorney's office agreed, found all his shootings to be within the law. When it comes to shootings, the law gives officers lots

The sheriff's department is a political organization. Okay, um, the facade is deputies in the streets doing police work. Oh, we're just Oh, it's just the deputies doing their job where there's so much behind the scenes that are going on politically and so that's how we're used. So as the political agendas change, they'll come at us officers differently. So what? One year was amazing. Police were, you know, getting guns off the streets.

I've heard opposing ideas of what to do with deputies who get into multiple shootings. The crux of it lies and how you view police shootings. Generally, do you accept that some officer shootings are inevitable? That shootings are more prevalent among deputies who get dangerous assignments? That is part of the duty something no officer wants to dio. But every officer must be ready to dio. Or do you believe that multiple shootings should be considered together?

sorry, I don't talk to allowed. Sometimes

I think you're good, I think, just like just for Lana joined the sheriff's department in 1994 the job could be demanding. He missed birthdays, holidays, special events, Sundays with his kids. And it could be gruesome. According to records, he once saw a child whose head was severed into pieces in a car crash for Lana train for patrol at Century Station. He told me I had no idea how violent the world waas you don't realize how evil people are for Lana. Went to work in Compton, then the east L.

officers? Um, my perception is yes. Like, I can't even count how many guns that have taken off the street. Hundreds. There would be some individuals you'd find two or three guns on. You know, you don't know,

like in our car.

Oh, on their person in their car?

Yeah, guns heading anywhere.

Yeah, but then the same. There's the guys that you work with, it that find dope all the time. You're like, how did they find dope all the time? It just happens that way. The guy that's always finding a stolen car, you know, it was somebody in it. And there in pursuit. It's like this guy gets stolen cars, like almost all the time. It seemed it just works out that way. It's, I don't know, this no rhyme or reason to it just, uh it happens

the first time we talked for a lot of put it this way. Quote. I happen to be a shit magnet with guns. There's another way to look at shit magnets, that dangerous encounters. And by extension, the shootings that might result are not so much dictated by the deputy nor by the department, but by the actions of the suspects. One department employees explained it to me as Call a good luck. Call it bad luck. It happens that is, should happens on since you can't always control what's around you. Well,

You don't want toe hurt anybody or kill anybody. But it's unfortunate whoever it is that you stop or come across that they're going to dictate how the rest of the the stock goes if they become violent and it ends up becoming violent. If they're cooperative, it's cooperative. Uh

huh. Talk to me about, um, the most recent, um, shooting incident. You're a part of what happened that day.

That night I was working overtime in East Los Angeles, and there was, ah, call of a female screaming.

Solano and his partner responded. According to D A records, a witness told them he had seen a young Latino man riding a skateboard with a gun. Vermont ominous partner found a man that fit the description for Alana noticed a dark object in his hand, which he later realized was a cell phone. He ordered the suspect to stop drop what was in his hands, according to the D A record. The suspect ignored the commands

I was holding one wrist and my partner was holding the other risk trying toe get him on the ground and had cuff him. And as his hands brushed over his pocket, you could feel the silhouette of a gun inside of his pocket. And he was able to get in his pocket. And that's when he produced the handgun. He pulled it out of his pocket.

Romano had his own weapon raised.

Why is he doing this? Why is he not saying anything to us? Why is he forcing me? You know, into the situation.

According to D, A records for Leno shot the suspect ran away. The partner deputy said the suspect reached towards his pocket and he shot to the man, died for Lana, told me he was devastated. He thought faq why me? Why me again?

he dictated what what occurred. So now I have to live with it.

Questions about the shooting were to be expected. This was not for Llanos first shooting. This was his seventh. But this time for Leno said, was different

by far. Is way different is very political.

A man named Michael Janak. Oh, got involved. It was 2013 at the time. Janaka headed the Office of Independent Review. It was his job to scrutinize Los Angeles County Deputy activity, the department's practices. So what's your your attention to this one particular deputy and his record?

Ah, well, clearly, the number of shootings that the deputy had been involved in um caused him to be an outlier, as we learned. Um, most officers who are out on patrol do not get in in any officer involved shootings during their careers, Um, or one at most.

So does it raise red flags when a deputy has 23 more than three officer involved shootings. It

raises all kinds of flags. Um, even if in isolation, each shooting is quote justified under the law. Um, it does call into question decision making by the

deputy for Janak. Oh, it was not always about chance, not always about fate. It was about choices, the choices of the deputy, the choices of the department, Janaka found. The department returned for Lana to the field after his first and second and his third and fourth and his fifth and six shootings. This after the department had found issues with his six shooting, according to court records.

There is always going to be a reluctance to move a deputy from a patrol assignment, and it has to be done thoughtfully. And it has to be. You know, it has to be done based on evidence and concern and risk management issues, potential liability. It is not a decision that should be lightly made.

The pieces together can tell a story. Janaka says it could show the officer may be more sensitive to potential danger. They may be perceiving threat when there's not one a jumpy deputy or they could be too aggressive. Janak Oh, said an officer. Maybe putting themselves in harm's way,

they get into deep. They do not perform consistent with principles of officer safety, and then they are find themselves in a situation or situations where they then feel the need toe use deadly force to shoot themselves out of harm's way.

It can be the difference between taking cover and closing in keeping options open or limiting them and their consequences for failing to recognize or even consider that there may be patterns.

Well, the concern with returning a deputy to the field who's not ready is obviously it may increase the chance that there could be another deadly force incident. Obviously, that's the ultimate concern.

More shootings can mean more lawsuits and MAWR $1,000,000 settlements. So cutting back that's risk management life and death kind. So when Janaka notice for Llano, he made a lot of hay. He wrote a letter to county officials. That's when for Llano Story hit the news.

Seven shootings, all linked toe. One Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy and the deputy had been assigned to desk duty in East L. A. After shooting number six in 2011. Remove

emotions ran high when the oh leave, a family came face to face with sheriff's deputies in the East l. A. Sheriff's station tonight. The Sheriff's department was under pressure around this time. 2013 the department was still under heat for the jail scandal a couple years before the allegations of deputies using excessive force and the department's responsibility to correct behaviour. Falling short. The sheriff at the time, Lee Baca, was under pressure to step down

They put me inside. They wouldn't allow me to wear uniform. Being a black and white around a black and white. They wanted me to goto work, custody or courts, which I didn't want to work either one after the shooting. So So then what were

you Um what kind of tasks were you assigned right in this new job they were trying to place you just I can get a sense of like, you

know, well, at first when they benched me, I was still accomplish Borough. And like I said, I wasn't allowed to wear uniforms. So I stayed in the office all day. I had to keep busy. I was told, do paperwork and paperwork only takes so long to do. And then I was told like Well, you know, it was a small building there in Lakewood County building and clean up outside or sweeper mop, but cut the hallways or clean the bathrooms or something. All this menial work,

records show for Alana was still being paid. Is the deputy around $100,000 per year? The D A. Reviewed the shooting said it was within the law. Same is the six. Before the department still had to complete its internal affairs review for Llano, Felt persecuted fell. The department headed out for him, wanted to fire him. It struck me Many people. I have talked to question the level of scrutiny given to officer shootings, the practice of law enforcement investigating their own.

Yeah. Uh, well, generally, if you hit your third deputy involved Shooting triggers an automatic shooting review analysis.

This is Anthony Lubbers. He's the undersheriff, number two in command, he said. Yeah, the department is tracking. Repeat shooters now have been examining their cases. The accumulation of incidents they started in 2015

eso we looked at was the environment they're working in, what commonalities of these shootings. They went to some training that that have any actor in the second shooting or not, and then we'll make a recommendation as to what we take this best for the employees and the community. You know, we don't want toe have, ah, employees working in on in the community to where the committee feels unsafe around this individual. So that's

And the birds said it doesn't always mean having to take a deputy out of the field. Sometimes what's needed is more training or a shift change

worked all shifts, I could tell you Working day shift. You know your activity is dramatically different. You're taking more reports. You're handling different types of calls. You may be hailing a call of a truancy. Ah, child nickel act on issue at a school on

according to D A records, both Coburg and for Llanos. Most recent shootings were at night Coburg sometime after 10 p.m. for llanos after 1 a.m. Not everyone thinks the sheriff's department is changing for the better. The officers I talked to say the potential internal affairs cases or being pulled from the field is creating a chilling effect that deputies are reluctant to go into that alley to run after the suspected bad guy for fear of punishment for what they see as good and necessary.

know, the term I used at the time was to restore the luster to the badge. Ah, I believe that now, in little over three years that we have been successful in in, uh, going a long way toward doing that. Ah, you know, people

often ask, isn't officers were being held accountable?

They think there were some in the organization that were not being held accountable appropriately and that, um, did things they they certainly should not have done. And I think the indictments we saw showed the extreme on that continue. But the vast majority of members of the organization are doing a very difficult, complex and dangerous job exceptionally well every day.

Those indictments included former Sheriff Lee Baca and more than 20 other department employees. I mean, not all said under his leadership officer shootings have gone down. According to department records. In the five years prior to 2015 McDonald's first year in office, the L A County Sheriff's Department average 41 shootings a year. In 2017 the number was eight. And so we have

dramatically reduced shootings and continue to do so. However, we don't decide, um, on the number of shootings, we respond to radio calls to situations in the field where we're confronted with issues that sometimes require a use of force, including deadly force. And that's the nature of the job.

We've also heard from deputies and from sheriff's personnel that, um, you know, under your leadership, your you're benching or reassigning deputies with multiple shootings. If What you say is the case that shootings are the fault of the suspects

or the circumstances. Then why pulling from the field? Well, we look at each one individually. We don't do that generically. We look at the merits we look at the, uh you know, the details of each use of force is significant use of force. We we tear these things apart down to a level where I think most people don't have an appreciation for that at all. We hold our people accountable to a very, very high degree.

There's a lot of people that depend on McDonald to get this right. The people of the county that felt the department needed to change. And his deputies he told me he sees it as his obligation to reduce force where possible. And I know he also needs the buy in from the men and women who work for him, not all of whom appreciate deputies being taken out of the field. You know, if they get reassigned, its assignments where they're doing data entry or they're mopping or washing buses, but

that way. Don't have people doing maintenance duties, or are the washing buses of those kind of things that were taken on the field for a use of force? We do. We take very seriously the value of each employee within the organization. We don't give them a demeaning job or a job that's not within the parameters of what a deputy sheriff should be

doing. You know, when I was reporting this story, I came off this turn. I came across this term and I heard from several Sheriff's Department of Blaze. And the term is shit magnets, um, of your that Yeah. McDonald. Grand amused. How are you separating? Sort of the troublemakers from, like, you know, the hard working Well,

that's what the investigations for we, as I mentioned, we tear them down. We look at him from every angle. We try and get to know everything we can about the individual, about the circumstances, about the way the use of force and the scenario played out. So it kind of

sounds like what you're saying is, is that in some ways it is the circumstances of what the deputy encountered in the field, but that there's also some responsibility from the sheriff's department. Do as you say, mitigate risk or potential the potential for more shootings where possible? Absolutely Both our troops

were both are true,

absolutely, and the department seems to be tracking deputies with repeat shootings. There's a list. The list includes the deputies, most recent shooting and whether they had been in a previous shooting and if so, how many? My colleague data reporter Erin Mendelson found it on a county website. The thing is, the list is anonymous. You don't get the officer's name. Erin found the names anyway, cross referencing the shooting dates

you go see a psychologist for the shooting, talk to them for about an hour. That's no another area that the department fails in, Uh, you know, just going to talk to someone for an hour after having to go through, Ah, deadly situation like that, you know, And very, very unfortunate to take someone's life. And even when you they're the person does leave if you still go to that, but you're still having to deal with that in your head.

Do you ever use guns anymore? No, not even just like a shooting range. No desire is that because of the shootings

or because you're not interested? Uh, better. Both never really been into guns. And in the sound and the smell, everything brings back memories.

The year for Lana left the department 2015. It was tough for him. He was in a road rage incident, according to D A records. A man driving his son to school called 911 saying that for Llano had pointed a gun at him. Falana said no, that it was the other driver who pointed a gun at him. The d A. Decided not to prosecute. Two months later, court records show, for Alana was convicted for driving under the influence and Riverside County. He declined

I was, I don't know. I'd say lucky, but unfortunate. It's still with me today. Nightmares I cry about it messes with me emotionally. Sometimes I don't want to talk to people or be around people. It's ruined relationships. Yeah, so yeah. So if it's like this way now, pretty sure it's gonna be like this the rest of my life, you know, Till I could figure a way. Teoh deal with it.

How does how does it, like still manifest itself in your life now, like with what are you thinking? Or how does it come up

our sights or smells or, you know, something like said site, you know, vehicle. I'll see your you sound all hear loud noises, you know, startle very easily. Kind of takes you back to a situation whether it be a shooting that you were involved in or we're a shooting that you're at. And you know, there's somebody laying on the ground dying. You're the last person they talked to. Yeah, You don't forget those things.

It sounds kind of haunting.

Yeah, could be hunting. I guess you could say that. But yeah, it's definitely something that doesn't go away.

The few times I've talked to for Llano about his shootings, he shifted between formal use of force terminology and raw emotion like a leak slow and pungent from a tear in the flesh. Officers are trained to articulate use of force, but the emotional weight of it for Lana told me I still deal with it now. I don't sleep well. I cry. I'll shut down. He pulled up the collar of his great T shirt and covered his eyes. He held it there.