CCSD Police called to explain actions before Nevada Senate

By Hillary Davis (contact)

Thursday, March 23, 2023 | 2 a.m.

Clark County School District Police Chief Mike Blackeye gave a rundown to state lawmakers Wednesday of departmental policies on arresting, referring, searching and using force against the people they encounter in and around schools — many of whom are minors.

But, Sen. Dallas Harris said after the chief’s presentation, “I did not hear the term ‘student’ once.”

“The court cases that you train on all involved adults and their decision-making capacity, not children at school,” said Harris, D-Las Vegas. “We’ve got to treat children a bit differently. I think your policies could equally be Metro’s policy, and I believe that that’s a problem.”

Blackeye, along with CCSD Superintendent Jesus Jara, appeared at a joint hearing of the Nevada Senate Education and Judiciary Committees to discuss school police procedures in the wake of a February incident in which cellphone video was captured of a CCSDPD officer slamming a Black teen to the ground and kneeling on his back outside Durango High School.

The meeting started with the video, but the hearing wasn’t to scrutinize that incident as it remains under internal investigation, said Education Committee Chair Roberta Lange, D-Las Vegas. It was, rather, to get a general picture of existing protocols.

Blackeye said officers receive training on use of force, deescalation, crisis intervention training, implicit bias, racial profiling, interacting with people with mental illness and restorative justice.

Officials are on track to investigate far fewer use of force incidents this year, he said. Last year, the first full year of in-person learning since the coronavirus pandemic closed campuses in spring of 2020, police recorded 90 uses of force, 52 of which involved pepper spray.

So far this year, police have investigated 38 use of force incidents — the drop being almost entirely because officers have used pepper spray only eight times so far. Blackeye said the department reviewed pepper spray use after last year’s peak.

Blackeye told lawmakers that CCSDPD has investigated about five officers in the last three years for excessive use of force, but he could not reveal the outcomes of the investigations.

Nor has the department said what will become of the officer at the center of the recent incident outside Durango High.

That incident, which has kept public pressure on CCSDPD since it happened after school on Feb. 9, involved a takedown and restraint.

The video clip, which is just under a minute long, shows a uniformed CCSDPD officer walking in the street to a police vehicle, detaining a male teen with his hands behind his back. As he leaned the teen against the hood, another male teen walked through the frame, holding out what appeared to be his phone.

The officer then followed him and they exchanged words, which were largely inaudible over the voices of several other people, although the second teen told the officer what sounded like “don’t touch me.” Within seconds, the officer wrapped his arms around the second teen from behind and took him to the ground, pinning him in the gutter with his knees on the young man’s back.

The officer also shoved another teen who approached and yelled “back the (expletive) up” several times.

Although Wednesday’s hearing wasn’t to dissect the Durango incident, and he framed the question generally, Sen. Edgar Flores, D-Las Vegas, asked if students can record school police.

CCSD Lt. Steve Hewitt, who joined Blackeye in answering questions, said that anybody can openly record police — “from a safe distance.”

“If their investigation is being hindered or obstructed at all by the person that’s recording, which is putting the officer at risk or any other students at risk, or the student that is recording or the person that is recording at risk, (by) being too close to a police interaction where use of force may be an outcome — that is obstructing our investigation,” he said.

Blackeye has said that a weapons investigation preceded the Durango incident. The department has not said that a weapon was found that day.

The School District and police department have said the officer, whom they have not identified publicly, is on administrative duty away from the public as internal affairs reviews his conduct. The district has otherwise been tight-lipped about the internal investigation, and has declined to release related reports.

The district and department have said that they planned to form a diverse community committee to work with school police to better understand each other’s needs.