LBPD Sergeant Arrested for DUI

Stephen Downing

On Dec. 20 the Beachcomber received information from multiple sources that Long Beach Police Officers arrested LBPD Police Sergeant Timothy Luke Everts for DUI after crashing into a parked car.

The Beachcomber’s initial information was that the sergeant had attended a Friday night retirement party at the POA Park prior to his arrest.

The POA Park is a large section of Long Beach Parkland with an adjacent parking lot that was placed under the management control of the Long Beach Police Officers Association (LBPOA) by agreement with the city in April 1976.

The contractual agreement allows the POA to use the park for member-related events and to “collect reasonable picnic site fees from members of the public who are not members of the association…”

According to documents obtained by the Beachcomber, the LBPOA charges the public as much as $1,800 per day for use of the city-owned park.

LBPD Asked to Confirm Reports

On Dec. 20 the Beachcomber asked LBPD media relations via email to confirm our information that the Sergeant had attended a retirement party at the POA park, crashed into a parked car after leaving the party, was uncooperative with responding officers and that tactical measures – including use of spike strips – were deployed during the arrest incident.

LBPD Doesn’t Respond

Having received no response, the Beachcomber wrote a follow-up to the LBPD at noon the following day asking for “an update as to when we will receive a response.”

That evening the LBPD issued a press release that contained the following information:

“Long Beach Police Sergeant Timothy Everts was arrested at approximately 11:29 p.m. on Dec. 17, 2021, near the area of East 8th Street and Coronado Avenue by Long Beach Police Department officers.

“Sergeant Everts was off duty, driving a personal vehicle at the time of the incident, was booked at the Signal Hill jail for Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol and was released on his own recognizance. Sergeant Evert remains employed by the City of Long Beach.”

Don’t Ask Any More Questions

A few minutes following the press release – and its broadcast by regional media – this reporter received an email from the LBPD with the same information but with the following introduction:

“Please see the below statement regarding your inquiry. This is the only statement that will be provided regarding this incident, and we will not be providing further comment.”

Social Media Response

Since that time the dearth of information in the LBPD press release has been the subject of considerable discussion across social media.

A Facebook post from Long Beach resident Megan Monique was often repeated: “LBPD better release a better statement with more information. The next chief must be more transparent.”

We Fill In the Blanks

Beachcomber sources inside the LBPD – all whom fear retaliation if identified – confirmed that Sgt. Everts attended the POA Park retirement that featured a “free flow of alcohol.”

This newspaper’s best source related to events following Everts departure from the retirement event said, “A citizen called in about a white pickup truck that had collided into several parked cars and the driver was passed out behind the wheel.”

She said, “When the officers arrived, they approached the truck and saw that Everts was unresponsive with a large knife on his lap.”

The Beachcomber source said that the “officers deployed a spike strip almost right away in case he tried to drive away when he woke up.”

She continued, “He (Everts) eventually came to but was uncooperative and refused to come out of the truck so the officers formed a team, got out a ballistic blanket and got a 40mm less lethal launcher ready due to his uncooperative attitude and the knife in his lap.’

It was then, according to the source, that a sergeant who knew Everts arrived on the scene and got him to “become more cooperative.”

Everts was then transported to the Signal Hill Police Department for booking, which the source said is “standard procedure when we arrest one of our own.”

Although the LBPD reported, “Sergeant Everts remains employed by the City of Long Beach” a source relying on hearsay said that the sergeant “filed his retirement papers on Monday.”

The Beachcomber has been unable to confirm the hearsay information.

Is Overtime a Factor?

According to the most recent earning data published by Transparent California, Sergeant Everts earned a total of $318,532 in 2019 with $112,894 of that total earned working overtime.

The Beachcomber was unable to determine his overtime earnings from the eight prior years as his name was redacted as “not provided” for safety reasons, due to the nature of his assignment.

Overtime reporting in the “not provided” category in Long Beach is consistent with the practices of the LBPD to enter into programs using overtime as a financing model rather than increasing the size of the department.

According to a review of literature on the impact of excessive overtime on police officers the “fatigue factor results in poor decisions, alcoholism, vehicle crashes, a breakdown in family relations, divorce and suicide.”’

The POA Park

Three years ago, the Beachcomber undertook to determine if the city manager or city auditor exercised their responsibility over the past several decades to oversee the POA’s use of the park and how it expended funds raised from rental of the city parkland.

At that time the city reported that neither the city manager nor the city auditor had ever conducted an audit, as provided in the contractual agreement executed April 6, 1976.

Recently two Long Beach residents informed the Beachcomber that they had made inquiries to the city about the POA’s management of the park and use of funds.

In researching this article the Beachcomber visited the LBPOA Park Rental website and found the posting: “Due to recent policy changes, the LBPOA will no longer accept rental reservations for the LBPOA Park from the general public. We appreciate your support and understanding.”

The posting was followed by a notice in red font: “For existing contracted rentals, you may make payments for your rental below.”

PRA Filed with City Manager

On Dec. 23 the Beachcomber filed a Public Records Act request with the city manager stating:

“The Beachcomber requests all documents associated with all audits, books and records obtained by either the city manager or the city auditor over the past 20 years related to their responsibility to insure that the Long Beach Police Officers Association accommodate the provisions of the “PICNIC SITE MANAGEMENT AGREEMENT executed on the 6th day of April 1976 as related to the association’s contractual responsibility to maintain an account, segregated from the general funds of the association that lists all fees collected by the association in connection with management of the picnic site, identifying the source of all funds and the identity of all the association groups or individual using the picnic site, and listing all expenditures relating to the management, maintenance and improvement of the picnic site, together with the identity of all persons to whom such payments are made.

“Please include in this request the current balance sheet related to the POA Picnic Site Management Account.”

On Dec 28 the City responded: “The documents you requested cannot be produced because they do not exist.”

Stephen Downing is a Long Beach resident and a retired LAPD deputy chief of police.
stephen.beachcomber@gmail.com

 

 

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Comments

When a citizen is arrested LBPD provides as much info as it can, including the color of underwear they were wearing but LBPD does not provide information when a corrupt cops is arrested, how transparent of them. Was this dunking corrupt officer charged with resisting arrest? Is the PD going to investigate why this officer was over served, just like it does when a person get drunk at a city establishment? Am sure they would do this if a LB citizen was involved. They was not because it happen on a property that they don't want us to know about. The only reason they even put out a press release was because people began to ask about it.

On another note the corrupt PD is using money generated by renting out LB city property to enrich themselves and at the same time use that same income to donate to city officials campaign coffers. How is this not an illegal act? receiving city property for FREE, using this tax payer property to generate personal income and use it to influence city decision making since 1976!!!!! at the minimum this is a conflict of interest. This park should be return to the citizen of the LBC to use, not to be used as a money maker for corrupt police and city official. SMH this could only happy in the LBC

Try as I might to decipher the above grammatical and spelling train wreck, I now formally surrender.

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JAY BEELER, PUBLISHER

While president of the Belmont Shore Resident’s Association, I was an outspoken critic of the Long Beach Police Department’s non-policing of crime and late night bar disturbances in my Shore community. In an attempt to shut me up, the Long Beach Police Department released all of the details of my previous 3-year-old DUI which the Press Telegram published as a headline story in their Sunday edition. I’m not making excuses. What I did was wrong, driving the eight blocks from a bar in Naples to my home on LaVerne Avenue. I should have walked. I am/was sorry, ashamed and pled no contest to the charges.

But what is even more wrong are the city employees, Councilpeople, police officers and firefighters who have since been charged with DUI’s and worse crimes while the details of their crimes were never ALLOWED to go public. The FACT my 3-year-old DUI made front page news in retaliation for my criticism of the police department while the city continues to protect its own criminal employees by refusing to release information about the crimes they are charged with is criminal in itself.

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