Palo Alto Police Holding Community Briefing

PALO ALTO — The Palo Alto Police Department will host its third community briefing on the topic of arrest and search and seizure laws on Wednesday afternoon.

The 2 p.m. event is part of a virtual series that started in the beginning of July, with weekly one-hour community sessions to offer insight into the department and law enforcement to the public.

The briefing is part of an effort to address racial equity, the city wrote in a Medium post.

The Palo Alto Police Department announced the virtual series on its Twitter page earlier this month.

"With a goal of engaging the community on various elements related to race and equity, the City's Race & Equity framework and action plan is an evolving comprehensive effort underway to address systemic racism and bias in Palo Alto," the city's Medium post read.

"The efforts range from an immediate comparison of police policies against '8CantWait" principles, leading to a deeper review of police transparency and accountability, and evaluating police data and public safety models, to launching a Black Lives Matter mural on Hamilton Avenue."

This week the discussion will be led by Assistant Chief Andrew Binder, who will share detailed information on the state's laws of arrest and when police have the legal right to conduct searches and seizures.

He will also outline the difference between consensual encounters, detentions and arrests. The first briefing was an overview of the Police Department, where Chief Robert Jonsen shared the departments operations and various divisions, use of body cameras, response times and crime statistics.

Capt. James Reifschneider led the second briefing, which outlined the department's use of force policy and use of force investigations.

The final police community briefing for this month will be on July 22 and will discuss accountability within the department.

The briefing can be viewed on Zoom or found at the Palo Alto Police Department's YouTube page.

— Bay City News contributed to this report.