OPCR reports hires and rising complaint volume; intake backlog remains a challenge

Russell Fuso, associate director of the Office of Police Conduct Review, told commissioners that OPCR expects two new investigators to begin work this month and mid‑December, which should make the office “fully staffed” by year‑end. He said staffing gains have helped but the office is facing growing demand: “As you can see here, year to date, we've already received 360 complaints,” Fuso said during the Nov. 13 meeting.

Fuso described the intake queue and compliance picture. OPCR has 143 complaints in the intake queue; 36 are under 30 days, while 107 are out of compliance with the settlement agreement timelines. He said 24 of those 107 are currently assigned to investigators and 83 remain pending assignment. He added that once a case is assigned the average intake review time is 22 days, but the overall volume pushes many matters outside mandated windows.

On investigative work, Fuso said administrative investigations have moved through the pipeline and that a small number of cases have been remanded by the chief's office, which can return them to an assigned status. He highlighted changes to the review‑panel structure (panels reduced from five to three members and run two panels concurrently) to help prevent a new backlog as cases move to panel and chief's office review.

Commissioners asked for clarification about charts showing incident‑date distribution. Fuso said the graph shows incident dates for complaints received in October (45 complaints total for the month) and that some complaints are for incidents that occurred in earlier months but were filed in October. He said the office will continue to monitor whether the uptick reflects more misconduct or greater visibility and accessibility of the complaint process.

The clerk received and filed the OPCR report; commissioners did not take additional formal action on OPCR’s recommendations at the meeting.