Today event: multi-agency probation sweep

COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

PROBATION DEPARTMENT

NEWS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: OCTOBER 21, 2010

Kerri Webb, Public Information Officer

(562) 315-3388

Kerri.Webb@probation.lacounty.gov

 

 

 

D.I.S.A.R.M. conducts 117 Probation and takes guns/drugs off streets

The Los Angeles County Probation Department led a multi-agency sweep this morning in “Operation Increase Safety” which included 117 probation compliance checks in the County’s 5^th District.

 

The Probation Department led a team of 315 officers from 10 federal, state and local agencies in the operation to ensure that active probationers, who have a history of weapon possession violations or violence with weapons usage, were in compliance with their probation conditions. During the operation, 34 probationers were arrested; 18 weapons, numerous rounds of ammunition and drugs, including cocaine and marijuana, and drug paraphernalia were confiscated, as well as 3 children were referred to the Department of Children and Family Services for child endangerment.

                                     

The Los Angeles County Probation Department’s Developing Increased Safety through Arms Reduction Management (D.I.S.A.R.M.) Unit, led “Operation Increase Safety” in a multi-agency effort that included 27 teams made up of Deputy Probation Officers and officers from the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement, United States Secret Service, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Division of Parole Covina Police Department, Glendale Police Department, Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services, Los Angeles County Sheriff Department’s Community Oriented Policing Services, Monrovia Police Department, Pasadena Police Department and San Gabriel Police Department.

 

The Probation Department’s D.I.S.A.R.M. program was initiated by 5^th County District Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich in February 2000 following the tragic August 1999 shootings at the North Valley Jewish Community Center and the murder of a postal worker by Buford Furrow, an armed felon on probation from Washington State. 

The D.I.S.A.R.M. program entails pairing Deputy Probation Officers with local law enforcement personnel to perform unannounced searches of probationers and their homes, as a condition of probation, and targets the confiscation of guns, drugs, and other contraband.

 

Since its implementation in February of 2000, the D.I.S.A.R.M. program has seized 6,767 weapons and more than $205 Million in illegal drugs and drug money, resulting in 13,462 arrests. Fifty percent of probationers were found to have been out of compliance with the conditions of their probation. Today, the number of probationers found to be out compliance has dropped to ten percent.

##END##