SPO Data DC

DC Special Police receive 1/20th of training required by PFPA

torso of police office officer with heavy jacket, jun, and gloves

An individual employed by Pentagon Force Protection Agency, licensed by the US Department of Defense, fatally shot two men on Wednesday, April 7. The PFPA employee, off-duty — and far from the Pentagon, in Takoma Park, MD — suspected the victims of a property crime and reported that he shot them while they were fleeing. WUSA briefly reports on the individual’s lack of authority to commit such an act. The officer has since been charged with murder, according to Takoma police.

Black Lives Matter: Dominique Williams, 32, of Hyattsville, and James Lionel Johnson, 38 of District Heights were killed in this incident.

It is worth noting that DC Special Police receive 1/20th the training PFPA requires. Visit DC Justice Lab for more on this.

Cover of Disarm Special Police report from DC Justice Lab. Shows torso only of officer with heavy police jacket, gloves, and guns.

Special Police Complaints: 2021 Update

UPDATE 5/19/21: As of late April, a link to a PDF complaint form has been added at this link: Look under “Consumer” and click on the hotlink to download a PDF form. This is a form for documenting a contract dispute of some kind. It is NOT SUITABLE for any kind of complaint regarding violence or misuse of power on the part of an SPO.

On October 15, 2020, Beverly Smith and Virginia Spatz testified to the DC Council about the difficulty of filing a complaint against special police officers in DC. (Files below.) Shortly thereafter, the entire “DCOPLA” website, referenced in that testimony, was removed. (Internet Archive shows the referenced content as last seen on October 28, 2020; the site now returns “404 Not Found” error message.)

DC’s Security Officers Management Branch STILL LINKS to the non-existent site, however (screen shot below just for the record), and a newer DCRA page for occupational and professional licensing is not linked anywhere on SOMB page.

Neither the SOMB nor the DCRA page now offer any options, however confusing, for filing a complaint.

Left: screenshot, 4/9/21, from DC MPD’s SOMB showing link to http://www.dcopla.org/security. Right: Wayback Machine screenshot showing last http://www.dcopla.org instance on October 28, 2020.

Please see original post, pre-Council testimony, for more on the difficulties in filing a complaint. Also see testimony from V. Spatz and B. Smith (PDFs):

Spatz Testimony Oct 15, 2020 written version Download

Smith Testimony Oct 15, 2020 written version Download

See also: Private Security with Badge (and Gun) 2019 update