Feb. 10 meeting held with LAPD Senior Lead Officer Brian Espin and Sergeant Scott Alpert
By Dolores Quintana
Senior Lead Officer Brian Espin and Sergeant Scott Alpert met with the Pacific Palisades Community Council to discuss a number of topics on Feb. 10 as reported by the Palisadian Post. During the meeting, which was held via Zoom, the Senior Lead Officer and the Sergeant discussed the issues facing the short staffed police contingent that patrols the area and counts on the help of Palisades residents to stop crime.
Sergeant Alpert said, as quoted by the Palisadian Post, “When it comes to fighting crime, we can’t do it as well without you guys,” Alpert said. “When it comes to your emails, your phone calls, it really depends on the community to make those phone calls because sometimes we are not in the area.” Alpert also detailed what is called the Minimum Patrol Plan which dictates how many units are available during different times of the day and night. Day watch hours call for a minimum of five patrol units that carry 10 officers, the Mid Watch hours have three patrols available, Mid PM Watch has two patrol cars available and Night Watch has six patrol cars available. The LAPD detective’s unit in the Palisades has “tables”: auto, robbery, burglary, theft and juvenile tables and special units devoted to Major Assault crimes like domestic violence and Crimes Against Persons.
The two officers talked about the “hot topics” of the day on the Westside that included issues that their officers make sure to watch out for while on patrol like homelessness, fire hazards, drinking in public and narcotics. They noted the work of the Pacific Palisades Task Force On Homelessness and praised their efforts. SLO Espin said, as quoted by The Palisadian Post, “Venice had a large encampment problem. We have a few areas in West LA that have encampments,” Espin said. “One thing I have to say is kudos to the Task Force. We in the Palisades do not have that, most of our people experiencing homeless are transient. Some are residents but we don’t have anything like a lot of the encampments we see through the city.”
SLO Espin said that the officers in the Palisades do work with security companies in the area and named Apollo Security and Gate Security specifically. He said, as quoted by The Palisadian Post, “We communicate with them quite often, especially with the crime maps I send out. So that we are all on the same page of where the crime is occuring. We do a lot of information sharing and try to cover the area as adequately as we can. We heavily rely on the community but also the security companies.”
