The Richmond City Council on Tuesday adopted the changes to the police department’s critical incident communications policy and moved forward with plans to hire a consultant to review mental health services available to residents.
Richmond police Asst. Chief Tim Simmons and Lashonda White, deputy city manager of the city’s Community Services department, presented the updated changes, which now can be seen in the department’s handbook under policies for fatal and nonfatal officer-involved shootings and the release of audio and video footage from such incidents.
The next step, White said, will be for the city to meet with its unions, the Richmond Police Officers Association (RPOA) and the Richmond Police Management Association (RPMA), about how the changes will impact their work.
The new communications protocol, which was initially authored by Districts 5 and 6 council members Sue Wilson and Claudia Jimenez, was developed in response to two fatal shootings of suspects by police in the first half of 2025: Jose De Jesus Mendez, in February, and Angel Montaño, in August. The mental health services evaluation was initially inspired by the aftermath of the shootings, as it’s believed both suspects suffered from mental health issues, but it has been expanded to be more comprehensive.
Now, if there is an officer-involved fatality, the city must issue the initial press release within 24 hours and must make it clear which agencies are investigating the incident while also explaining the role of the city’s Community Police Review Commission (CPRC), which is responsible for investigating police misconduct and officer-involved shootings. The city also will be given updates at least every 30 calendar days.
Angel Montaño was shot to death by Richmond police in August after his family called for help, saying he was threatening them. They knew he had a history of mental problems and said they had hoped police would help him. Courtesy of GoFundMe
Simmons told the council that all of the changes are now in effect, such as the 30-day updates.
“We’ve already actually begun implementing that portion of the policy,” Simmons said. “I’ve been providing the council with the first 30-day update already and the next one forthcoming.”
Simmons, when asked by Richmondside on Wednesday if 30-day updates would be given to families, said he was referring to updates related to the Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office and California Department of Justice investigations that follow an officer-involved shooting. He said that typically the department defers to those agencies to communicate with families.
“The investigating agency typically maintains direct contact with (victims’ families) on the status of the investigation and when certain milestones are reached,” Simmons wrote in an email. “It can be difficult for impacted families to hear information from the involved agency. That’s not to say we can’t reach out to them, but rather who the family most likely wants to hear from, specifically, as it relates to an OIS investigation.”
It is unclear what information the department plans to share with the public during ongoing California DOJ and Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office investigations. Simmons told Richmondside that the department wouldn’t release information during active OIS investigations.
Richmond police Assistant Chief Tim Simmons (left) presented the new protocols for when the police department will update the public about fatal in-custody incidents. Police Chief Bisa French is at right. Credit: David Buechner for Richmondside Credit: David Buechner for Richmondside
“Once they are done with their investigation, the investigating agency will release the investigation to the public through their own transparency portals,” Simmons said by email. “The DOJ investigation can take up to two to three years to complete the review and report process. However, if there are concerning findings, then that time shortens dramatically. And the DA’s Office (timeline) is around six months.”
The city’s Community Police Review Commission’s interim investigator, Bill Whalen, speaking at the CPRC September meeting, a month after the Montaño shooting, that the commission is limited in what it can review during an active state investigation into an officer-involved shooting.
“That (DOJ review) limits our ability at this moment to conduct our own independent investigation. We’re really limited to what evidence is out there independent of the officers involved,” Whalen told the commission.
Because criminal investigations into those incidents are ongoing, Whalen added, internal investigations by the involved agencies and by the independent commission are typically put on hold until those superseding investigations are completed.
Richmondside reached out to Simmons, Lt. Donald Patchin, the department’s public information officer, and Sgt. Ben Therriault, president of the RPOA, for clarification who is privvy to the 30-day updates but did not hear back by publication time.
When asked about the 30-day updates on Wednesday afternoon, Jimenez told Richmondside that she was under the impression that the department would be sending out public updates to the community every 30 days even if there is nothing new to share.
“That’s what we voted for in that new policy,” she said.
In addition to the communication policy updates, the city will start seeking a contractor sometime in December or early January to conduct a mental health services assessment that will look at equity, access and how the city can support those efforts.
The city wants to assess available mental health resources, identify coverage gaps and gather input from residents. Based on those findings, White added, Richmond may later contract with organizations to provide trauma counselors and ongoing support for families affected by gun violence, ensuring services are accessible in multiple languages and tracking whether the help actually improves people’s lives.
White added that the city hopes to select a firm by February, with a contract executed by spring and the report completed by September.
One notable change in the approach: The city will more comprehensively examine mental health care citywide versus just looking at those impacted by officer-involved shootings (OIS) as had originally been proposed.
“As a city we understand there is a need to strengthen local mental health systems and ensure equitable access to Richmond residents,” White said. “This work will be done in collaboration with the Community Services Department, Sam Vaughn (of the Office of Neighborhood Safety) and Michael Romero of the Community Crisis Response Program (CCRP) team. We feel like there is strong alignment with the work there.”
District 3 council member Doria Robinson said she supports a broader approach to addressing the city’s mental health needs versus one that just applies to those directly impacted by officer-involved incidents. Credit: David Buechner for Richmondside
District 3 council member Doria Robinson said she supports the broader approach to mental health because she feels that once someone has been hurt or killed it’s too late to offer meaningful mental health support.
“The better thing to do is prevent it all together,” Robinson said. “In order to do that, we really need to understand, what do people have access to right now, where are the gaps and what could we do, how we could work with the county and other institutions? I’d much rather do everything in our power to prevent this from happening than just trying to make it better after it happens. At that point there is so much harm on all sides, I’d just rather prevent it.”
Jamelia Brown, District 1 city council member, also supported the broader approach and said there are mental health needs in the community in respect to all gun violence.
“Families impacted by officer-involved shootings experience unique and profound trauma. When an officer takes a life, the government is deemed the actor and rightfully so. It triggers all of these things: constitutional obligations, oversights, investigations, political scrutiny, etc.,” Brown said.
She contrasted the police shootings with resident-on-resident gun violence she witnessed growing up in the Iron Triangle and the seeming lack of priority the city has placed on those incidents.
“When a community member takes another community member’s life we tend not to move on those things really quickly. The names fade from public conversation, the grief becomes private and it’s back to business as usual,” Brown said. “That sends a dangerous message to the community and the public overall that gun violence is normal here or somewhat expected. It’s Richmond, right?”
Brown mentioned two recent homicides that claimed the lives of two men in their early twenties, Josue Cornejo and Griffin Hammond, and called for a citywide family notification process for all gun violence victims not only for just officer-involved shootings.
“Every Richmond family that loses a loved one deserves the same dignity, communication and support no matter who pulled the trigger,” Brown said.
District 1 council member Jamelia Brown called for a citywide notification process for all gun violence victims in Richmond. Credit: Maurice Tierney for Richmondside
City Manager Shasa Curl agreed with Brown and said she hopes to return to the council within a few months with a recommendation to implement a notification policy for all violent crime victims.
District 6 council member Jimenez asked for clarification on the mental health consultant bidding process and asked to speed up the timeline so that the council could allocate a budget during the next fiscal year.
“If the city council is serious about filling the gaps, we need to have a budget discussion about that because, if not, we won’t have money or we will miss the timeline for discussing this in the budget,” Jimenez said.
Curl said that city staff will look at the overall budget and suggest a “placeholder” dollar amount for next fiscal year, explaining that implementing any changes would happen in phases.
“After you get this assessment then the next step, as I understand it, would be that we would also, based on the assessment, put out a RFP (request for proposal) for the services that the council would want,” Curl said. “I think we can discuss during the budget proceedings (next year) about what the council wants to earmark as an initial amount but even with this first component done you would still need some subsequent follow-up work to have targeted interventions.”
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