Local Advocacy Group Demands More Transparency Around Redding Police Department’s Arsenal of Military Grade Weaponry
The Shasta Equal Justice Coalition has issued an open letter to the Redding City Council with recommendations on how the police can better communicate with the public about the use of military equipment.
As required by a California law known as AB 481, on May 20 the Redding Police Department (RPD) provided its annual public presentation outlining all of the military-grade equipment local law enforcement has in its arsenal. A similar presentation has occurred every year since 2022 when the law was passed.
In response to this year’s presentation, an organization known as the Shasta Equal Justice Coalition (SEJC) is asking that RPD also provide additional quarterly reports on the use of this equipment. In a letter to the council, SEJC noted that “neither law enforcement officers nor the public can make informed decisions about the impact of using such weapons on human life without access to additional information.”
SEJC formed in 2020 in response to the murder of George Floyd. The organization focuses on issues of equality within the local criminal justice system. Four members of the organization’s steering committee – Eddie McAllister, Denise Peters, Myriam Kalmogho and Tom O’Mara — have signed off on an open letter to the Redding City Council which proposes changes in how the police disclose information to the public about the use of military equipment.
RPD’s 2025 report details a number of items classified as military equipment under California law, including specialized firearms and ammunition, stun grenades, tear gas, drones, and a $300,000 LENCO BEARCAT, an armored vehicle initially designed to sustain roadside blasts during the U.S. occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.
The department’s stock of military weapons also includes “less than lethal” ammunition, which are also known — in even more technical terms — as “kinetic energy launcher and projectiles”. More simply put, these are rubber bullets and “bean bag” weapons. Though they are known as “less than lethal,” these kinds of weapons have killed and maimed civilians when deployed in the West Bank, Indian-administered Kashmir, and here in the United States during racial justice protests in the summer of 2020. However, “when used properly,” as RPD notes in its annual report, LLW weaponry can be a means of de-escalation are “less likely” to result in death.
Slides shared by RPD document items that California law defines as “military equipment”.
Though AB 481 was a transparency measure intended to inform the public about the militarization of the police, the law requires very little to be disclosed about the effects of these weapons – whether they be positive or negative – on community safety.
That gap in the law is what led SEJC to issue its open letter. SEJC is suggesting that the council require the police department to go beyond the requirements of state law and publish online quarterly reports on the use of all of RPD military equipment, including data on “the sex, race, gender, and age of suspects” the equipment was deployed in response to, and whether or not charges were ultimately filed against the suspects.
The organization is also advising that RPD’s reports on military equipment should detail “situations in which such weapons can be employed,” those “for which weapons should be prohibited” and independently sourced information about the adverse effects of the weaponry.
SEJC’s letter acknowledges that this kind of data would come at a financial cost. But so too does the purchase and maintenance of military grade weapons. Last week when RPD presented their 2025 annual AB 481 report, the Council authorized the police to buy up to eight more Def-Tech 40mm kinetic energy launchers, at a taxpayer expense of $2,225 each.
SEJC’s open letter to the council referenced a statement made after RPD’s latest military equipment presentation by Council member Dr. Paul Dhanuka. Responding to the sole public commenter on the issue, who took issue with the city’s acquisition of this weaponry, Dhanuka said he was challenged to know the right way forward.
“(This is) truly one of the most difficult moral issues, and unfortunately I don’t have the answers,” Dhanuka said, slowly, appearing almost at a loss for words. “We try to balance public safety and security with human rights… but sorry I don’t have the perfect answer.”
SEJC says increasing reporting requirements around the use of military equipment is “a means of informing ethical, moral approaches to ensuring equitable public safety.”
6.2.2025 5:10 pm: We have updated the story to include an additional quote from SEJC.
Do you have a correction to share? Email us: editor@shastascout.org.
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Empathy to any criminal is an injustice to every victim! Don’t concern yourself with what tools law-enforcement uses! Stop with this nonsense and if you think that my information is false, prove me wrong!
What if I label you a criminal, Jon?
Then I guess no empathy for you when you protest your innocence…
Decades ago it was mostly a single LE officer,’ that was in charge of ‘keeping the peace’, in the rough area between Bella Vista, Burney, Big Bend and Oak Run. Everyone knew the officer, who might change from time to time, and the officer always extended himself to the community in conversation and community events. The officers I remember from those times were part of the community and no one feared them because they were not out to ‘get’ anyone and whenever those officers needed back up from the citizenry they got it. Placing LE in a position of dominance over the citizenry is a terrible idea.
Randy: this is an interesting perspective. Thank you.
Thanks, Nevin, for the excellent article. I wonder if a CPRA has been filed with the RPD to see just what equipment and the total cost of the equipment has cost Redding Taxpayers? I’m not too sure the militarization of local community peace officers is the way to go. Just as Trump is using ICE, almost as a private-political military force that in some cases is has tried to deport American Born Citizens, and violating other established laws, violating the Federal, and even the U.S. Supreme Court, and the Constitutional right of a habeas corpus, local peace officers can also be at risk of becoming a political tool.
It has been proven that Community Policing, where community members and police officers work closely with residents to build relationships and address local concerns, crime rates can decline. On the other hand, the militarization of local community peace officers is not only costly, but military tactics, equipment, and training by law enforcement agencies often lead to an increase in the use of force and a shift away from traditional community policing.
When we look, act, and think like soldiers fighting wars, the potential for war increases. Are we at war, like in a civil war? Seems to me that the extreme far right (Trump and Stephen Miller) seem to throw the gas of lies, law breaking, and propaganda daily, hoping people will light a match. But, is that the job of Community Peace Officers?
Not to mention, anyone following current events knows that the Floyd Affair is turning out to be more bullshit! His cause of death was a fentanyl overdose
The coroner’s report states that cause of death was asphyxiation.
Stop putting out disinformation!
Jon: please do not post blatant disinformation. Your perspective sharing is allowed but just sharing disinformation is really inappropriate here.
I much prefer the lethal and non Lethal weaponry of today! The challenges we face of criminal activity is 10 fold now! If you’re not a criminal you should celebrate the acquisition of such great equipment! Left leaning acronym groups have absolutely no business in knowing what the police have!! I see no good reason that any group other than Shasta County officials and law-enforcement officials need to know a damn thing what they have!
The crime rate is less here in Shasta County than the average in the US.
It is not 10 times higher than last year, for instance. STOP making false statements!
After searching a definition for a “kinetic energy launcher” it was shown that such equipment may be purchased by anyone for less than $200 each. What is so special about the one for $2,225? They are stated to be non-lethal in the ads.
Too bad to have missed this presentation. I am not a regular visitor to RPD on Facebook. Thank you SEJC.