Salinas Police Chief Responds to Call for Federal Investigation

Salinas Police Chief Kelly McMillin said the department has "nothing to hide" after civil rights lawyer John Burris called for a federal investigation into the department,

Earlier this week, the Oakland attorney asked the U.S. Department of Justice to review the Salinas Police Department, prompted by four fatal officer-involved shootings since late March. All four men killed were Latino.

McMillin said the department is not racist and is not intentionally biased.

"We weren't racially profiling anyone. We were responding in every case to calls for service because of the actions of these individuals," he said. "We did not seek them out. They identified themselves by acting violently and frightening, terrorizing the people around them."

McMillin said any federal review of the department would be premature because the investigations into the shootings are not finished.

"The overwhelming number of victims and suspects in violent crimes in Salinas are Latino. And I'm talking about high 90s in each category," he said, referring to a February police report to the City Council that broke down crime statistics in Salinas.

That report said 91 percent of homicide victims in Salinas were Latino, as were 82 percent of homicide suspects.

" That's not because they are Latino, but because they come from underserved, undereducated, impoverished and, frankly, communities where there's not a lot of hope and opportunity. Because that's where we know that crime and violent crime in particular tends to cluster."

On Tuesday, Burris called the four shootings "uncalled for, questionable and alarming."