Lynette Sweet Let me just say good afternoon and I more than anybody else-- well I'm disapointed that we're actualy here today. We knew that we wanted to put someting together after what happened in 2009 so that we wouldn't have directors like myself stanidng in front of you, but unfortunately we did have another shooting on July third and we're here today. The first full week for our new Independent Police Auditor actually happenend on June 27th. So, talk about trial by fire, he came on board and before he could even find his way to the restrr-- I mean the restrooms on the force, he was thrown into the midst of what's going on right now. But, I don't think the people of the Bay Area are in bad hands, we have an independent and I do mean totally independent police auditor on board. The Auditor and the 11-member citizens board are a direct result of the community input and demand following the tragic 209 shooting of Oscar Grant. We want to do a better job of insuring that the public really knows what it is our police department's doing and what's going on. So, we have Mark in place and the 11-member body and Mark are going to do all they can to insure that the-- investigations are handled in a parallel manner and theyr investigation will be independent. The lead on this is always going to be our auditor who will be reporting directly to the BART Board of Directors. But first, let me introduce someone to you who is a member of our 11-member citizens review body. His name is William White and he comes with some very strong creditials I don't know how many of you know this, but Berkeley, California had the very first police reveiw commission in the nation and we get Mr. White as a member of that commission. So, without further adoo, I'd like to introduce you to William White who's also a member or our civilian review body. Mr. White? William White: Thank you, Lynette. Again, my name is William White and I was appointed to the BART Citizens Review Board in March. I’m representing District 3, and what I bring to this board, is that since I have been, since 1997, a member of the Berkeley Police Review Commission and I have served as chair of that commission on three different occasions. I also have served on other boards in Berkeley, specifically with BAS and Salvation Army. What we will be providing at BART will be an oversight into the investigative instrument of any complaints that are filed against the police department of BART. We will review the police auditors’ investigation and we will either agree or disagree with the findings that he will present to us. We will also make recommendation of policy changes and procedures for the police department. These are policy changes and procedures will be given to the BART board for approval or rejection, but most important, we want to create a vehicle for the citizens of the Bay Area to have a direct impact on the BART police policies and procedures. I’m pleased to be part of BART’s efforts to open its doors and create transparency to their process of complaint and procedures review. And with that, I would like to, next introduce, Mark… okay, okay. If you have any questions, I will be able to answer them after the other speakers. Lynette Sweet: And just to be clear, Mr. White is a member of an 11-member body. There are nine BART districts, so there are nine different districts where there was a civilian chosen. The BART police department then had a member placed on this body and then there’s just a member at large. So that’s the 11-member body as it stands today. They will be meeting tomorrow, so we should be getting some information from them relatively soon. What we promised the public after the 2009 incident is that we would never, ever do what we did, and that is not be forthcoming with information. So, we wanted to improve the way we provided services and the way we provided information, and we committed to doing that by holding a series of public meetings where input was gathered from everyone. And then we went to the state Legislature in order to get an enabling bill passed so that BART could create this new body. And then we embarked on an exhaustive, and I do mean exhaustive, nationwide search trying to find just the right person. And as a member of the BART Board of Directors, I do think we did just that. We found the right person in Mark Smith. He’s BART’s first-ever independent police auditor, and we all had a role in choosing him. But, as chair of the police review committee, I actually had a lot to do with it, because I wanted to make sure that we had somebody who was committed to dealing with the public the way that I thought we should have done back in 2009. I have great confidence in Mark, I have great confidence in his qualifications, and while we wish incidents like this, especially shootings, would never ever happen because the loss of human life isn’t something we can replace, I do think going forward that we have the mechanism in place to ensure that there’s transparency, there’s integrity, there’s honesty, there’s all the things that seemed to be lacking back in 2009, and with Mark at the helm and his 11 independent members, 11 totally different personalities, in place to work with us on getting that information, we’re gonna do it. So, without further adieu, I’d like to introduce you to Mark Smith, BART’s first-ever independent police auditor. Mr. Smith? Mark Smith: Thank you very much, Director Sweet. And I’d like to maybe start by echoing her comments. Everyone finds it terribly unfortunate when a police action ends in a fatality, when there’s something as serious as a police shooting. And that sentiment is certainly the same here at BART with this recent officer-involved shooting. However, the purpose of my office that’s been created by the Board of Directors is to make sure there is integrity in the system, accountability, so that when these events do happen, the people of the Bay Area know they have a place to go where they can get questions answered, they can file complaints if someone has committed misconduct, or a police officer has committed misconduct against them or if they think they’ve been mistreated by the BART police. And that’s the main focus that I have here. As you heard, I’m starting just my third week on the job. As you can imagine, its been very busy the first couple of weeks. But, I came here ready and able, I came here with a lot of positive experience that I can draw on to make sure we’re that performing a service to the public that we need to be. I’ll give you a little bit of background and then I’ll describe my role with regard to police shootings such as the one that took place on July 3rd. Most recently, I was first deputy chief administrator of Chicago’s independent police review authority. There, as at BART, I was responsible for ensuring that investigations into officers’ conduct were completed thoroughly and fairly. After that, I’m sorry, before that, I was a special investigator with the Los Angeles Police Department’s office of inspector general. I worked both in the use of force section where I dealt with all levels of police uses of force, as well as the complaint section reviewing complaint investigations and dealing directly with the public to do intake of complaints of all different types. These are both functions that I am now responsible for at BART. I received my Bachelor’s degree nearby from Cal, my law degree from UCLA. My role is public service. That’s why I was brought here. I’m of service to the people of the Bay Area. My role is guided by the oversight model that was publicly adopted by the Board of Directors, specifically with regard to officer-involved shootings. I’m authorized to monitor all aspects of the BART police department’s investigation into an officer-involved shooting. That’s what I’ve begun to do already, it’s what I continue to do now. Once the BART police department’s into an incident such as a shooting is complete, I will complete a report of my own with recommendations for what was done right, what was done wrong, it will address tactics, it will address levels of use of force, and the outcome of the BART police department’s investigation into whether that outcome was correct. I’ll present to the citizen review board my report, and eventually to the Board of Directors. That’s the main role. I’m very happy to make a return here to the Bay Area. It was a great opportunity for me to come back to a place I call home, and I’m looking forward to playing an important role in making sure the BART police department is providing the best service it possibly can to the people of the Bay Area. Linton Johnson: Any questions for Mark? Reporter: Mr. Smith, can you talk about in this case, what immediately comes out to mind in terms of question you have? Smith: Sure, I think with any shooting, there are a lot of questions that leap to mind. And that’s because, again, of the seriousness of such an event. You want to understand the justification for the use of deadly force, whether proper procedures were followed, and if not, what should have been done and what can be done better. That’s the result of the evidence that’s being gathered and it’s a determination that’s being made. Reporter: When do you expect your report to be completed in this case? Smith: I am a person who would never sacrifice timeliness for accuracy or thoroughness. However, I also understand that members of the Bay Area community want to know what exactly happened. And they have a right to know what exactly happened. I don’t have a specific date. I think it would be disingenuous to name a date. The date is when we know we have collected all the evidence properly, that we’ve been able to analyze it thoroughly and fairly, and as soon as possible once that is done, our report will be completed. Reporter: Do you think weeks, months, years? Smith: I don’t believe it’s feasible to simply name a date. The report that will be completed on any major incident will be guided by the amount of time it takes to do a proper, thorough investigation. I just don’t think it serves anyone’s purpose to come out with a result that’s based on partial evidence. Reporter: Will you be able to conduct your own interviews as well as with witnesses to supplement to fill out your report? 
Smith: Part of my authority within the model of oversight that was adopted which is a very positive thing is to monitor interviews that are going on and also to submit questions to be asked during those interviews. Again, those are of the BART police department’s investigation. I think that’s a good part of the oversight role that I provide here. I think it would be an important function for this office. Reporter: When you say monitor, does that you’re able to sit in on these interviews or sit in on some of these meetings? Smith: Basically, it’s the ability to oversee the BART police department’s process. Reporter: What does that mean? You’ll be getting reports or you’ll be sitting in……? Smith: I will make sure I have every piece of evidence that the BART PD is collecting. That being audio interviews, I can be present when interviews are being taken, and I can submit questions to an interviewer. The ramifications, specifically, of my presence, where I would sit, how that would go, remains to be worked out. Reporter(s) Can I clarify that in the timeline the-- before you do your full investigation, you're going to wait until the BART Police Department completes it's investigation then you start working on your report-- you don't really get going on you r report until that process is completed, is that correct? Mark Smith My process is to begin my review immediately as the BART Police Department is beginning it's review and that's what I've already begun to do. I have reviewed evidence that the BART Police Dept if in possession of and has collected and I will continue to do so and I have been receiving updates and basically checking every day what new evidence has been uncovered, what new evidence is available, and I will continue to do that and I think that there's still a lot more to be uncovered but I'll continue that process. Reporter(s) But once the police department completes its investigations you will continue your work to make sure they-- Lynette Sweet Can I help you on that one? Mark Smith Sure Lynette Sweet It's a simultaneous process. Mr Smith is going to be conducting an investigation as their investigation is ongoing. When he says he's submitting questions, basically-- the way the police department is set up, only certain people can ask questions, so he can give them questions to ask and as an investigator or an investigative piece, he's allowed to do that and it's any kind of question so if they haven't asked a question that's come to his mind, he has the right to ask that question so it's an ongoing simultaneous process and if you recall, San Francisco has a piece right now, BART has a piece right now and Mark also has a piece, so we're all working together to do this investigation. Reporter(s) Mr. Smith, to whom do you report? Who oversees you and your body? Mark Smith I report to the BART Board of Directors and again I believe that's a positive part of this oversight system. It is one more function out of many functions that provide the citizens a voice in this process I report directly to the board who is elected by the public. The results of my reports get seen always by the citizen review board who again are there to represent the public. The focus of this oversight system is making sure that we provide an effective system of review for the public. Reporter(s) Can you talk about what in your report can be made public. Remember from the Oscar Grand shooting there was a lot of comment about police officers bill of rights putting some restrictions on what can be said about will your full report be made available to the public at some of it, none of it. Mark Smith Transparency is something that is obviously a huge commitment for BART and for the office of the independent police auditor there are as many of out there recognize there are state laws in place that often times dictates what information can be shared publicly particularly when it pertains to personnel records that belong to police officers. My goal and intent is to remain as transparent as I possibly can within the bounds of the law. Reporter(s) As a practical matter, what can and cannot be released to a reporter, now or in future reports down the line? Mark Smith The answer to the question is-- what can and can't be released in police reports or reports about the police department, is something that will often times depend case to case. It's difficult to speculate on what specific items, facts, what specific things can or can't be named in a given instance without looking at a case particularly. Again, the goal for my office is to remain transparent otherwise I would not be serving the interest of the public. However I will make sure that that transparency is within the bounds of the law. Reporter(s) If you decide ultimately that the officer should have done something different will that-- that will not be a available to the public? Mark Smith The fact that I have that recommendation I imagine would be available to the public, however again, I don't want to miss state something because it's difficult to determine without knowing what can and cannot be released to the public. Lynette Sweet If you guys remember, during the Oscar Grand shooting, there were a lot of things that the BART Board of Directors couldn't even know. Background on their personnel, I mean those were things that the police officers bill of rights prevented us from knowing. Fortunately, we now have an independent body that can find out all the information that even we can't find out, so when you talk about what can be re-- we can't talk about past personnel issues, we can't talk about their backgrounds, we can't talk about-- he won't be able to release any of that, but what he will be able to release, once the citizens review body does their work and they either come up with a recommendation yay, nay, good, bad, whatever they come up with, that will be released, that was the whole point of the board doing this. If, let's say the police department comes up with an investigation that says everything was handled according to proper procedure, and Mark does his investigation and comes up with something different and the citizens agree that Mark's assessment was different and it should have been done a different way, the public's going to know that. That was the whole point of putting this group together, we needed independent eyes to look at this, we didn't need BART Police policing itself anymore, we didn't need anybody else policing them other than people who had no vested interest in what was going on. We needed that independence. That way the public would know, the citizens of the Bay Area would know and the BART Board of Directors would know because if you guys remember, last time we got kind of caught there too, we got caught with not having accurate information and so this way we know we have eyes that are looking at all of the background stuff that are looking at everything. We may not be able to see it, but our independent body will and our auditor will so we have the mechanism in place to get eyes and ears on everything that our internal affairs-- BART Police Department's Internal Affairs are looking at. Reporter(s) Lynette, can you talk specifically about what leaps out to you, the questions you have that you would like to see Mr. Smith answer. Lynette Sweet Well, Mr. Smith and I have had some great conversations about this because, again, one of the charges of this review body would be force. Was the right type of force used, was it excessive, those are the kind of things that they are going to be charged to look at and that's actually number one on his list, is-- was it the right type of force for this incident? We don't know and, not being a police officer, I don't know, not being there for that one minute, I don't know. So, that's what they're going to be charged with and again, their report, what they come up with is a report that is for the public we're not going to hide anything. Reporter(s) One of the complaints or questions that's coming up among the protesters who are gathering this afternoon is that one minute time span that you just mentioned, can anybody here shed any light on what happened yet, during that one minute that led to this shooting? Lynette Sweet And that's something that's going to come out during the investigation because, I myself had that exact same question, what can you assess in one minute, but then again, I'm not there, so I don't know what happened in that one minute-- we've go to see, and the hope is that there are more witnesses out there who can come forward and shed some light on it unlike our past where we had several cell phone cameras that were doing the recording, we haven't gotten that this time, so I guess my answer to that question is if anybody out there was on the Civic Center platform that night and has footage, let us see it, because that's going to tell us a different story or that may tell the same story, but one of the things that we know is that our cameras were working, it's just unfortunate that they didn't get every angle. So, we're looking for more information and we're looking for more witnesses and I've shared with Mark that when people call, listen, talk to them, let the police talk to them, but make sure that we're getting anybody who was there and no, we don't want people will just say they were there to give us a story, we want actual people who were on that platform, because the police weren't able to get to everybody that night, the police weren't able to talk to patrons who had somewhere to go and got the heck on out of there. Reporter(s) Can you address, when I spoke to you last week you said that, in terms of the interview process there was still a small, a lot of the witnesses had been talked to, but there was a small amount remaining to be questioned are there-- is that process still undergoing or close to being completed? Lynette Sweet Well the hope is that we'll have more people come forward. The problem is without getting a lot of names or a lot of names or a lot that night, we're kind of at a disadvantage, the people who were willing to stick around and talk to us, we got, but the people who left, we didn't, so the hope is there are still more people who walked away from that station that night to go somewhere else to catch their train, will come back and say, "I was there that night and here's what happened and here's what I saw." Because we'd either love some corroborate or not, I mean tell us what you saw. Reporter(s) Can you, just in terms of the timeframe, the question was asked earlier, I mean, there's the police investigation and then there's the independent investigation I mean if it's going to take months before any-- I mean is there going to be any-- Lynette Sweet I don't think it's going to take months. I appreciate Mark Smith in his response because it was a perfect response, we can't give you a specific date, but we can tell you that this is a high priority here at BART. It is hight priority in the sense that we want to get to the bottom of it too. Our police department as taken a lot of hits over the years and, ya know, when it comes right down to it, we're trying to make the changes to make it a great police department, we're not there yet, but we're getting there. So, any input that we can find that would help us get to that stage is what we're looking for, so we're not trying to rush to judgement, we're not trying to rush out there and say here's what happened, we do want to be accurate, we do want to be thorough and we also want to make sure that we get what really happened and not a spin. We don't want to spin this story, we want this to be the actual story. And you said you were a little confused over here-- Reporter(s) Yeah, earlier you said what happened in the Oscar Grant case didn't happen again and that was a lack of information coming through, it doesn't sound like, having an auditor is going to change that at all because-- Lynette Sweet Well, yeah it is, if you remember, nobody got information. One of the things that happened after the Oscar Grant tragedy is we were kind of in an information vacuum, the board didn't get much information. This-- Oscar Grant was shot on New Year's Eve slash New Year's Day, so that was a Wednesday going on a Thursday. Well, New Year's Day was on Thursday and we didn't come out with anything. The next day is Friday and we didn't come out with anything. On Saturday evening, you had KTVU coming up with this video that showed a totally different perspective on what happened. So, that's what I'm talking about-- we kept saying things ya know we're trying to find out what happened here, we're trying to assess it, but the bottom line was we had many witnesses there who we hadn't talked to, we had many witnesses there who had actual information, so that's what I'm talking about, we're trying to give you everything we have when we get it. Reporter(s) But, if I heard the description of the auditor's position correctly, he's only going to be releasing information after the police investigation is over-- Lynette Sweet Well, actually he-- it's a simultaneous investigation meaning ideally if things had gone well and he was up to speed and up and running, he would have been on the scene that night, he would have been one of the players who was there talking to folks, he had that that he could have done he could have given the internal affairs people a list of questions that he wanted answered by the police right there that night. I mean, those are the kinds of things that we want out sooner. If you remember, even with the Oscar Grand shooting, we couldn't come up and tell you that the police had been interviewed, I mean none of that happened, who knew that, nobody knew it. Reporter(s) But he's not saying he's going to tell us anything (inaudible) investigations. Lynette Sweet He's going to be able to give updates, I mean he won't give you his final assessment, but he will give you updates the same way we're doing it right now. Reporter(s) But there is no update. Lynette Sweet Well as of last week we gave you the latest update that we had which was that the suspect-- I'm sorry in this case it's the victim had been identified. So that really was our latest update, I mean you already know that our cameras didn't catch every angle, you already know that everything happened within a minute, you already know that it was a knife and a bottle-- I mea-- Reporter(s) Have you said how the officer was injured? Lynette Sweet Pardon me? Reporter(s) Have you said how the officer-- you said one of the officers suffered a moderate injury, but it-- it-- a minor cut, but we haven't heard how that happened because it sounds like there was actually no contact between the assailant and the officer can you release that-- Lynette Sweet Isn't that one of those questions that we'd want our auditor to find out because I'm sitting here as a board member and I still don't know. That's where he comes in, that's-- Reporter(s) Right. But I'm sure somebody knows already. Lynette Sweet Well, I'm sure they do, but-- Reporter(s) --just haven't released it? Lynette Sweet Ya know, because the investigation is ongoing and we want the District Attorneys and the police to say go ahead, release the video you have, go a head release all this stuff-- as soon as we get the go ahead to do that, we're going to. Because that's the one thing that will let the Bay Area know that we are being transparent-- if we go ahead and release the video even though it's limited what we have. Mark Smith The sense that everyone want's to know how did this thing go down, how did the officer sustain an injury, questions about the bottle and the knife that as Director Sweet mentioned, people heard about, they're all really valid, understandable, correct questions the-- and they're questions that deserve answers and that's part of what my function is. At the same time it's important for us the preserve the integrity of the investigation. I mentioned it before, and it's not just lip service it's crucial to the office of the independent police auditor as well as, in my opinion, anyone acting in the field of police oversight to make sure that you are not undercutting yourself by harming the integrity of an ongoing investigation. That's reason for sometimes the fact that we can't release evidence right when we have it-- the second we have it. It's understandable that there's a desire the get that information as quickly as possible, but again, the main focus for me is to make sure that uphold the integrity of every ongoing investigation to make sure that the conclusion that is reached is just and fair. Reporter(s) Where were you when you found out and how did you find out about the shooting? Mark Smith I found out rapidly after the shooting happened within, I believe one or two hours if my memory serves. I was actually at a family event out of town, but I immediately got in touch with the Chief of Police, I was in touch with a number of members of the BART staff, and getting updates on a quick basis. Director Sweet mentioned this, and I'm glad that she did, I've already been in conversation with Internal Affairs regarding questions that I have based on the evidence that I have which again is not complete evidence at this point. But we've already begun those discussion and I've already raised questions that I think need to be asked. They're in the process of gathering answers to those questions and that process continues. Reporter(s) What did you think when you got the news? Mark Smith The first thought about the news of the shooting was the really unfortunate fact that someone lost a life. That's somebody's brother, son, father, mother any loss of life, whoever it is a tragic-- a tragic event. The next thought, as I was just embarking on this position was to make sure that I fulfilled my responsibility and that was to be regularly updated to understand what evidence existed, to make sure that I had access to that evidence, and to work with the ongoing investigation to make sure that I'm monitoring it and verify that it's being done thoroughly and completely. Reporter(s) Linton, could we bring you up, and then I think some of us are going to head to the city to see about this protest at 4:30, are there any concerns about that-- Linton Johnson Are we-- are we done with Director Sweet? Reporter(s) I have a follow up question-- Linton Johnson Why don't we figure that out-- Reporter(s) --it's still not clear to me that there's any structural way that the information is going to be released any quicker because of the creation of an auditor position. It seems like there's a report that's going to be released at the end, but that's it. Linton Johnson What-- what is it that you want to see after an investigation that is different than in Oscar Grand-- I can tell you that I'm in charge of communications and as the Chief Communications Officer, of this agency, we are putting measures in place to be sure that we can release as much information and as fast as possible without jeopardizing the integrity of the investigation. That was what we committed to and that's what we're carrying out. Now, can we release every piece of information, no, because it jeopardizes the integrity of the investigation and sometimes that-- listen, you're all reporters, you've covered lots of police shootings, you know this. And I know that the public wants to know everything right up front, but it's not fair to the public, it's not fair to jeopardize the case, it's not fair to the people involved, it's not fair to the victim, it's not fair to the police, it's not fair to the police auditor, it's not fair to the public. We have to do what's fair to everybody and part of that is t-- preserving the integrity of the investigation, it will come out. But, as much information, as fast information-- as fast as we can we can release it, we're going to do it and that's what I did after this police shooting. I got out there, it was Friday, July 3rd, I got my call around 9:45 or so, dropped everything, wanted to have my 4th of July like everybody else, but I didn't, because this is important this is paramount to be able to deliver information as fast as possible to the public because they do have a right to know. However, they also have the right to know that their investigation is going to be thorough, fair and honest, and part of that is sometimes preserving the integrity by not releasing some information because you sometimes will pollute the witness pool by saying something that other people will repeat and that's not their honest assessment of what happened. So this may be-- Reporter(s) You're misunderstanding the question, the question is not whether information is going to be released quickly I'm just asking for clarity, there's nothing about this position that structurally releases any of the information any faster than what has been done before. Lynette Sweet Can I answer that, because it may not be faster, but it won't be you're standard here's the police response. What you're going to get by having the police auditor here will be an independent assessment of what happened which tells us, as a board, whether or not something different needs to go on. And I'll give you a hypothetical here. Let's say that everything that the police tell us about this incident is different from what our auditor finds out. The board then has a choice and that choice is clear, we've hired him for a reason, he's our eyes and ears, he's the one that's going to tell us what really happened. So, we can weigh the two investigations, but ultimately it's going to be the civilian review body and the police auditor who give the board the information they need to move forward. Now you've go to remember, this is a different kind of body because discipline actually comes from the civilian body now, not from anyone else. They're the ones who do all the recommendations and it's not just police shootings that they're going to be looking at I mean --racial profiling, sexual bias-- any of these types of incidents that come up --parallel investigations-- we take our lead from what the civilians come back and tell us and what type of discipline is going to be what they say needs to happen, it's not this positive discipline that was going on before. It's a whole new world here at BART and we're trying to get used to it and we're trying to bring people along, but you're question about will you get something faster? Maybe not. Will you get something different? Probably. You're going to get the vantage point of people who have no vested interest in moving up the ranks, moving somebody out of the ranks all their interest is is coming up with a fair, accurate assessment of what happened. That's what their investigations are supposed to yield for us. Reporter(s)Reporter(s) I was just hoping to hear from Linton very briefly just about this 4:30-- Linton Johnson Can we um- can we let them go? (Gesturing toward the other speakers.) Reporter(s) Yes. Linton Johnson What was your question now? Reporter(s) Your concerns about this 4:30 event that is supposed to be at the Civic Center platform. Linton Johnson Our concerns are-- first of all the mission of this district-- BART's mission is to keep our customers on time and safe. And everybody on the platform including employees, and the media safe if they're on the platform it is our responsibility to keep our customers, our employees and the media and any other guest on the platform safe. And that's why we've designated free speech areas, a program that I administered-- the free speech areas are outside of the fare gates in the free area where you don't need a ticket and regardless of your opinion of BART, we give you a free permit to say whatever you'd like to say outside the fare gates that's the legal area that the courts have designated as your ability to-- you have a constitutional right to free speech and we want to help you express it. Outside the fare gates is where the constitution allows you to do that. On the platform, there's a safety issue. We've got fast moving trains, we've got crowds of people and then we have protesters who, at least according to some of the documents say they want to disrupt the service-- that puts our customers at risk, it puts the protesters at risk, it puts our employees at risk, it puts the media at risk it puts our guests at risk, and we have a duty to keep them safe. And that's why the court said, "No, it doesn't happen on the platform, free speech can happen outside the fare gates. And so we hope that they will say whatever they wish to say about BART or anything else they want to say and we support their constitutional right to do that, but outside the fare gates, because that's the free speech area. And, ya know, they can say whatever they want, I fully support it, I wi-- I sign permits every single day to allow people to do that, but not on the platform and the reason for that is because I have a duty our customers and everybody else on the platform --employees, the media, our guests-- to keep the safe and with fast moving trains on a narrow platform and people who say in some of their postings that they are trying to disrupt BART service (pause) that combination just doesn't mix. Reporter(s) Have the gotten a permit? Linton Johnson No, they have not. But regardless, even if they don't have a permit, they can still-- they can still-- I would prefer them to have a permit, but they can still exercise their constitutional right to free speech outside the fare gates where the constitution allows them to. Reporter(s) Theoretically, would those folks come in for arrest for having any sort of action down on the platform? Linton Johnson Well, I mean, theoretically, they would be in violation of our policies. And certainly, they're putting themselves at risk, they're putting our employees at risk, they're putting the media who are covering them at risk, and they're putting our customers at risk. And we don't want to do that. If they want to exercise their free speech rights and they're creating a safety hazard, that-- those two things don't mix and we've got to be able to do that balance and we've provided that balance by allowing people to do their free speech activities outside the fare gates in the unpaid area where you don't need a BART ticket, and you're welcome to do that we have a permitting program that does it. In this case, you don't need a permit. I mean we'd like you to have a permit, but you don't need one, and we welcome you to exercise your right to free speech and we welcome the protesters regardless of whether they like me or don't like me or this agency or anybody else, they can say whatever they wish to say, we support their right to free speech. It's not about the content, it's about balancing safety and people's right to free speech, and that's how we do it. Reporter(s) So what's BART's plan today to make sure that there are no service disruptions? Linton Johnson BART's-- BART's-- well BART's plan every single day of the week and every service hour that we operate is to keep our customers safe, our employees safe and any of our guests safe and to keep our trains on time. That's our mission and that's what we're going to do and we're going to put the things that we need to in place to make sure that happens. Reporter(s) And then to move back to the area of the investigation there have been comments on how thorough the inve-- but Linton, sir, you as the public information officer, you were giving updates last week are further updates on hold until the investigation is completed or will you be (inaudible). Linton Johnson Well this is a little tough balance for us too because we would try to provide as much transparency as possible, but then we got criticized for saying nothing, first we weren't saying enough and now we're saying nothing, so we're trying to strike that perfect balance here again, so at this point it seems like a wasted effort for reporters to come out here for us to basically say, "Well the only new thing that we have is nothing." But we can reiterate what we've said in the last week. Now, I'm happy to do it if you guys want me to do it, but the complaint was that you didn't say anything, you brought us out here, but then the complaint prior to that was you weren't giving us enough updates. So, ya know, we're trying to strike that perfect balance and sometimes it's difficult to do. Reporter(s) And then just one specific or two specific areas that I know my editor was interested in: one, I think, is there any update on how many shots were fired and two on whether one of the officers fired or both fired or-- Linton Johnson We're still at the same point, we can't discuss the details of-- I mean if we had an update, I'd tell you, but we don't. Um-- we don't-- I can reassure just like Director Sweet did, reassure everybody here in the public that we will release that video. There is no reason for us to release that video after the two investigations are turned over to the D.A. Now if the D.A. wants to hold that video back, they can explain to the public why they want to hold the video back, but there's no reason for us to hold it back, we are going to release it, and make it available and the D.A. says, "No," well then we'll let the D.A. explain why to the public it should not be released, and I'm sure they'll have a perfectly good reason, it's just that it's not going to be us it will be the D.A's turn to tell you all why not. Reporter(s) And you don't know when that will be, right? Linton Johnson Say again? Reporter(s) You don't know when that will be. Linton Johnson Um, when the investigations are completed. Reporter(s) You mentioned last week, I mean you talk a fair amount of witnesses have been interviewed and there was just a small group that remained to be interviewed it sounds like that process could take a while to play out if you're still looking to contact some of the witnesses who have-- Linton Johnson Yeah, because when you get into these witness interviews they sometimes take you down another path and then they know somebody who may have been with them perhaps on that day and say, oh you should talk to that person too, they were also there, so we start off with a pool of roughly 35 to 40 people. Last-- late last week we were down to about 15 or so and that could have increased since then or maybe we've been able to get farther down the path of interviewing all the witnesses. I did talk with the Chief about 10 minutes before this started, and we're still interviewing, I can tell you that. Alright, thank everybody for coming.