Garden Grove Police Lt. Mike Handfield sends me a message about Theresa Dang

On Wednesday, June 15th, a couple hours before I found
out that my good friend Theresa Dang received a letter
from the Orange County District Attorney's Office
charging her with a misdemeanor offense for something
she allegedly did at the May 25th demo against
Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist, I sent an email to
Garden Grove Police Chief Joe Polisar clarifying a
quote that was published in The Orange County Register
that same day to make him fully understand what some
of my main concerns were regarding police behavior
during the night of the protest.

In this same email, I also notified Polisar that I was
very much "interested in obtaining copies of all
rules, procedures, policies, and protocols [the Garden
Grove Police Department] follows regarding the
handling of demonstrations and protests." I gave him
two choices: either he send these documents to my home
address via U.S. mail; or that I submit to him a
"formal request" for them under the California Public
Records Act. In other words, I was politely telling
Polisar that if he doesn't freely cough up the
documents I want, I will use state law to force his
department to release them to me.

As was expected, Polisar just brushed me off like a
fly. He didn't bother to email me back. That's fine. I
had a hunch he wouldn't be too interested in talking
with me anyways especially since I had succeeded in
getting The Orange County Register to cover the Garden
Grove City Council meeting that took place the
previous night. During public comments, several people
-- including Theresa Dang -- criticized the behavior
of the police.

But on Wednesday evening, I learned from Theresa via
telephone that she got a letter from the District
Attorney earlier that day informing her that they were
going to prosecute her on a "petty theft" charge. Then
on Thursday, June 16th, another person left a message
on my answering machine informing me that Garden Grove
Police had raided Dang's home in search of a
flashlight that apparently fell out of the pocket of
one of their officers on May 25th.

So what did I do? On Thursday evening, I decided to
interview Dang and write the article entitled, "GG
Police pursue phony criminal charge against woman hit
by Minuteman supporter". When I finished it early the
next morning, I proceeded to post it to dozens of
listservs and websites that reached tens of thousands
of people across California and throughout the United
States. I also sent this article to all my friends in
the corporate media as well.

Later that same morning, emails started coming into my
inbox from press people asking me to contact them.
Daniel Yi, a reporter for The Los Angeles Times, told
me his editors were fully committed to running
something the next day about the Garden Grove Police
raid on Dang's home. Great news, I thought! And The
Times did in fact publish an article: it appeared in
the Saturday edition. End of story? Nope. It's just
the beginning.

On Monday afternoon, I suddenly receive an email out
of the blue from a Garden Grove Police Sergeant asking
me to call him so we could meet personally and discuss
some of the matters I addressed in the message I sent
to Chief Polisar the previous week (something which I
have no intention of doing, incidently). Wow! Isn't
that remarkable? After ignoring me for days, the
Garden Grove Police Department had now decided they
wanted to talk. Wanna bet something printed in The Los
Angeles Times over the weekend spurred their newfound
interest in communicating with me?

But wait! It gets even better! On Tuesday, June 21st,
I get yet another message from the Garden Grove Police
Department. This one is very caustic, however. Lt.
Mike Handfield, the Public Information Officer, sends
an email to me basically condemning the article I
wrote about the raid on Dang's home which I posted all
over the internet last Friday. (an article which I
estimate has been read by tens of thousands of people
just in the Southern California area alone)

After careful thought, I've decided to make public the
message that Lt. Handfield sent to me not because I
agree with what he wrote, but because I'm rather
astonished by some of the things he says. The last two
paragraphs of his email are somewhat bizarre, in my
opinion. I've never seen something like this ever come
out of the mouth of a high-ranking police official
before. But I guess we all learn something new each
day, don't we?

Now if Lt. Handfield doesn't like the fact I posted
this email on the internet, too bad. The message he
sent me is not a state secret to be kept from the
general public. It's freely available to anyone who
files a California Public Records Act request with the
Garden Grove Police Department. In fact, almost
everything he writes is a matter of public record. If
you pay taxes, he is your servant. (although I know
that in reality, things don't tend to work out that
way)

And besides, it's quite clear to me that the Garden
Grove Police Department want people to begin listening
to their side of the story. O.K. I'll be fair with
them. So here is what Lt. Mike Handfield, one of their
own employees, writes about Theresa Dang. Please
understand that I have reproduced the text of his
email as I received it in my inbox without any editing
or alteration whatsoever! Make of it as you wish!

Sincerely,

Duane J. Roberts
duaneroberts92804@yahoo.com



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Mr. Roberts,

I just read one of your articles on the Teresa Dang flashlight incident
and I see that you don't let the truth interfere with telling a good
story. This has never been a personal issue to the Garden Grove Police
Department, but you continue to try to further your cause by making it
one.

Clearly, Theresa Dang did steal the officer's flashlight (on video)
which lead to the filing of charges against her. Clearly, she and
several others have lost perspective in their issue. When it comes to
these types of issues, you can be sure that we will enforce the law
equally, no matter the value of the loss. This flashlight is valued at
$100.00 not $10.00. We work and prosecute cases all the time for less
than $100.00. Most of these incidents are not captured on video like
this one.

The decision to apply for and obtain a search warrant was based upon
Ms.
Dang's lack of cooperation and the strong possibility that she would
not
allow us to search her home for the evidence if we politely asked her.
I
guess we were right based upon poor attitude when we contacted her by
telephone.

As for leaving her home a mess. We took before and after pictures of
the
residence and I am told that Ms.Dang would not receive any good
housekeeping award. Infact, I am told that the investigators left the
residence in better shape that they found it. Again, because we knew
that Ms. Dang would most likely make this type of claim, we took that
extra step and took before and after pictures to disprove her false
allegations.


Lieutenant Handfield
Public Information Officer
Garden Grove Police Department