[Editor’s note: What follows was submitted to the Jerusalem Press by an officer from the El Paso Police Department. As we continue to expose the flaws and dangers of EPPD, more officers continue to reach out to us. We thank those brave men and women who have submitted information to us, and we applaud those officers who strive to work within the constraints of a corrupt administration.]

21 April 2024, El Paso, Texas, An EPPD Officer – At one time, I believed in the commitment of putting on my uniform and polishing my badge, buttons, and name tag to start another day serving my community. I used to believe that my job was one of nobleness and tolerance of people. I once thought that the people who were awarded the top positions of the El Paso Police Department were members of an elite team of knowledge, experience, empathy, and, above all, the highest standards of ethics. However, I was wrong.

The deterioration of a Police Department is not purely by accident. It takes many years of ignorance and arrogance to maintain the strict guidelines of self-destruction within an establishment that prides itself on the “highest standards.” The El Paso Police Department has become a legacy of detrimental “wrongs” within its ranks and regions. The vast importance of being one of the many positions labeled as a Chief of Police is the mechanism of working for oneself instead of having a teamwork mentality. The aspect of a chief of police should be demonstrated by their ability to make decisions based on moral ethics instead of just going with the “trend”; this is not a Chief of “Fairness” but a Chief of Biasness in all aspects.

The El Paso Police Department was once a thriving industry that corrected unlawful acts with the utmost judicial and lawful punishments. Now, we have Police Officers who meet the Academy standards of “Quantity instead of Quality” due to desperate attempts to fill positions to compensate for the failures of retention and recruitment.

It’s known throughout the department that unless you are a Political pinhead (stripe) or one of the good old boys, you will never make it off the streets unless you are rewarded for an illegal act that happens to be in accordance with the Chief’s personal means of his own “Policies and Procedures.” 

Most Officers who patrol the El Paso streets are hardworking, ethical people who join the service to provide the fundamentals of protecting and serving their community. The average statistics for any Police Department are that 1/3rd are Lazy, 1/3rd are Corrupt, and 1/3rd are hardworking. This is evident in the El Paso Police Department, from the structures of commands to the very call-takers of the streets.

The El Paso Police Department fails to care for its Police Officers. In fact, it is well known amongst regions that “they don’t care.” Nothing has changed except people get away with “murder.” If you are in the Chief’s pocket, you are “safe.” Should you go against the Chief’s Office, you are labeled, “benched, or 8 Balled,” and this is a most concurrent act that strives today!

Educational standards should be a vast investment in any organization. However, the EPPD lacks the fundamentals of a person’s educational standards or life experiences during the initial process of being considered a potential recruit or for any promotional means within the Department.

The aspect and verbal words of Officers, Ranking Officers (Sergeants and Lieutenants) are If you have a College Degree, you will be useless on the streets, you won’t last, college boys are entitled” This is the atmosphere of your Police Department. The promotional aspect of any organization is to consider the element of educational means to benefit not just the individual wanting to promote but the organization as well; it’s an equal basis of equality, and it looks good for any organization to be educated members of society reigning the ranks of a leadership role. This is not the case for the EPPD; they just lowered their educational standards to meet minimal requirements to be considered as a recruit in the Police Academy. This is not good business!

If the EPPD values its members, why do they scoff at a person’s education? Why are people promoted based purely on their years of service, senior points, and assessment criteria to climb the ranks?  Why isn’t a person’s degree worth something to consider against a person who has no education? Why does it take a person to be expired on an 18-month list awaiting a promotional chance when the people being promoted are often illiterate and have no educational means whatsoever, yet a person who sacrificed their family life to better themselves to go to college to gain a Degree or a Masters Degree and is in the same position of a person without an education who sits and expires off a list when others get bumped up in rank, position, and pay?

How is this even a “gain” for any establishment? When was it a form of embarrassment to have education in the Police Departments? The same token could be emphasized as going to a dentist without formal education; would you trust someone without formal education to work on your teeth/ mouth? Then why do we allow this to happen in a Police Department?

The Police Department has written a thesis of endless tree-killing papers on uniform policies in great detail about a chief with personal biases against people not up to the dress code! I understand that one must look the part, but when the dress code of policies outnumbers the use of force policy, there is something wrong with this chief! The Chief (Inciriaga) has taken strict bias against persons with tattoos, which are detailed as tattoos that must be covered up. However, I wonder if this rule is enacted against Chiefs as I believe Chief Inciriaga has ink on the webbing of her hand near her thumb and index finger (2-3 ink dots). Will they be covered up? Is there any formal discrimination associated with a person with tattoos? This is a form of expression, the creative art of tattoos on one’s body! Does the Department have the right to discriminate? Or is this “Do as I say, not what I do”? This is also the “normal” aspect of the EPPD.  Yet, the actual crime being done behind the scenes are people who have been chained behind a desk and barking out orders of how to be a cop when they couldn’t be cops; now, we are being directed and told how to be a cop from desk slaves. Radio transmissions are working intermittently, causing “black spots” where you cannot transmit; officers are now in a vulnerable situation of crackled transmissions that cannot be deciphered on the radio, which means Officer’s safety is now at high risk!  Our antiquated software system for report writing, “WebRMS,” is the cheapest bid for Police work that cannot be trusted. It is slow; it takes forever to write a report, which causes endless overtime for Officers who are already burnt out and at their breaking point, but no one cares; you are told to put up with it or find another job!

You have high-priority calls being left to fend for themselves. In contrast, you have a Commander dictating to hold off on calls and proceed with writing tickets and chasing ghosts in various districts because the Chief’s Office demands positive patrols despite having three bodies out in the community handling calls for 10 hours, which soon will be 12-hour shifts!

Then you have good Officers and supervisors who risk their own lives to protect their officers from serious bodily harm. A good example is a Supervisor in the Northeast who saved a life by disarming a gang member who had a pistol pointed at his own head! That Sergeant is known to stand beside and behind and is very evident in front of Officers, willing to put his own life on the line for his Officers and the community. Yet, the Department is spending taxpayers’ money on a witch hunt by the authority of the Chief of Police (Chief Pacillas). This is truly sickening, and the aspect of the words from the same chief stated:” There is no crime if someone kills themselves.” This comes after a question relating to personal body shields for Officers to use, which this video demonstrates how serious and deadly a call can be for Officers. I am glad this video was shown. This is vital for all officers, and I hope this video goes viral because it needs to be shown!

Instead of spending good taxpayers’ money on body shields, are officers now equipped with PR-24 sticks or the Rodney King Sticks? Who thought equipping officers with these complex, non-uniform-friendly sticks was a good idea?

There is one answer for all this: we have the wrong people making detrimental decisions without any tangible form of experience, education, or true fairness. I pity the state of this Police Department and the longevity of the community. There has to be a need for an outside agency/department/authority to investigate the El Paso Police Department before we are on the brink of absolute collapse.