Hemet Police Want Declaration Of Emergency

A fire damaged a Hemet police training building in a remote area west of the city, and police today said they need a declaration of an emergency from the city council because they and their police station are endangered.

The fire destroyed a building at the Hemet Police Department’s shooting range and was reported about 2 a.m., according to Hemet police Capt. Dave Brown. The frame-wood structure was badly-charred in the blaze, and arson squads from several agencies spent the day gathering evidence there.

The building flamed one day before the Hemet city council considers declaring an emergency because of the attacks on city facilities and threats to gang task force personnel. An outlaw motorcycle gang called the Vagos may be behind several attempts to kill or injure police officers and other city workers, police have said.

Thirty members of the Vagos were arrested, primarily in the Hemet area, last month. Law officers from 60 agencies also arrested Vagos members in Northern California, Arizona, Utah and Nevada during “Operation Everywhere.”

“Intelligence reports indicate that the police facility is the likely focus of future criminal acts,” Brown wrote in a staff report to the Hemet city council, released today.

The proposed ordinance is on the city council’s consent calendar for Tuesday’s meeting, slated for 1 p.m.

“A security assessment of city buildings indicates that the public access lobbies present a significant risk to city employees and resources,” Brown wrote in the staff report.

“Immediate action is required to harden these facilities and the delay resulting from a competitive bid process would result in increased exposure to criminal acts,” the report reads.

Connected or not, the fire is the latest in a wave of incidents involving police facilities or equipment, and police have asked the city council to declare an emergency and allow the department to purchase or improve whatever is necessary to combat the wave of attacks, without going through a bidding process.

According to Brown, the resolution, if passed, would give the city manager the power to order “any action required to harden city facilities in response to this emergency without giving notice for bids to let contracts.”

In late March, four city code enforcement trucks were torched in the Hemet City Hall parking lot.

On March 5, a member of the Hemet/San Jacinto Gang Task Force found an explosive device attached to his unmarked patrol car when he pulled into a filling station in Hemet.

On Feb. 23, a member of the task force opened a gate at its headquarters and was nearly struck by a bullet discharged by a homemade “zip gun,” rigged to fire when the gate moved.

Dec. 31, someone rerouted a natural gas line into the task force’s headquarters building, setting the stage for an explosion by a spark.

However, police stop short of blaming any one organization or even conceding that all the acts have been related.

“We will not speculate at this point until the investigators are able to complete their work,” Brown said.

The cause of the fire has not been released to the public.