Palm Springs Police Chief David Dominguez says he won't be doing more sting operations using police decoys to curb public gay sex.

"I don't see us using decoys in this type of problem," Dominguez told the Bay Area Reporter last week.

Dominguez said he plans to deal with the problem of public sex through more uniformed patrols, education, and community outreach. Dominguez told the B.A.R. that his department is working closely with hotel owners in the city's gay Warm Sands neighborhood to install more motion sensor lighting and cut back overgrown bushes. Like most of Palm Springs, there are no streetlights in Warm Sands. Palm Springs has long had a policy against street lighting except downtown and at main intersections, to maintain the city's tranquil ambiance, and so that views of the stars would not be obstructed.

The city has been stung by criticism following the police sting a little over a year ago that resulted in 19 men being charged for public exposure. The men had been urged by a police decoy to expose themselves in a dark parking lot of a gay resort in Warm Sands. If convicted, the men would be required to register as sex offenders for life in a registry that is visible by law enforcement only.

"We are not homophobic and we are not a biased police department. Our history shows that," Dominguez said.

 The police chief added that the department has a history of reaching out and working with the city's LGBT community. Dominguez is participating in the Protect and Defend gathering this week of LGBT police, fire, paramedics, and military professionals in Palm Springs. The nonprofit group hopes to raise $30,000 during the week, with $1,000 going to local Palm Springs community charities. The chief also noted that all 140 employees of his department would undergo a two-hour LGBT sensitivity training.

The city has been criticized for not having any openly gay male officers on its force, which currently numbers 94. Dominguez said that there are out lesbian officers on the force and that he would welcome openly gay male officers. Dominguez stressed that the department has long recruited officers from the LGBT community.

Investigation continues

In the course of the sting in June 2009, an officer who was observing the operation from a police vehicle could be heard referring to a potential suspect as a "cocksucker" as another officer laughed. Dominguez told the B.A.R. that he was embarrassed by the remark and has apologized for it on behalf of the department and the city. The chief said that the police internal affairs department is still investigating the slur, which he first learned about last month.

The department is also investigating the statements made by a police sergeant and a lieutenant who had worked on the sting. Both said in sworn testimony that there had been a tacit agreement between police and the Riverside County District Attorney's office to prosecute the men with a 314 penal code charge and not allow them to plead down to a lesser charge as had been routine in the past. The 314 charge requires those convicted to register as sex offenders for life. Dominguez said it would be illegal for the department to make an agreement like that with the DA's office.

Dominguez had held a number of meetings with community representatives to discuss criticism over the sting.

B.A.R. contributing writer Robert Julian Stone, who uses the pen name Robert Julian, is on the advisory council of the Warm Sands Neighborhood Organization and he represents Warm Sands on the Palm Springs' Neighborhood Involvement Committee.    He attended one of the meetings with the chief.

Stone called the chief "pretty responsive" and said that for many in the gay community the use of decoys was a big issue.

"Entrapment is a nonstarter in the gay community because it has been used against us for decades," Stone said.

He added that the sting was the shock the city needed to induce change.

"In a way, good came out of this even though what happened was not good," Stone said.

He noted that the problem of public sex in Warm Sands as well as the traffic from cruisers is way down this summer. Dominguez echoed that observation.

Thomas Van Etten, a member of the Palm Springs' LGBT Police Outreach Committee, also attended a meeting with the chief about the sting. Van Etten has called on Dominguez to be fired over the sting and he told the B.A.R. that the meeting didn't change his mind.

"This backfired in his face and now he is protecting his ass," Van Etten said.

He added that he has spoken with hotel owners who have told him that gay tourism is down. Van Etten suspects that the bad press over the sting has tarnished the city's reputation as being gay-friendly and that may have ultimately hurt business. Van Etten, like Stone, agrees that the community itself, in cooperation with neighborhood hotel owners, is best suited to deal with the problem of public sex.

Van Etten said he supports the recommendation for the hotels to use more motion sensor lighting and changing behavior through education. He told the B.A.R. that when police catch people having sex in public, they should be issued a ticket or citation, not have to face charges that will require them to register as sex offenders for life.

Roger Tansey, a public defense attorney representing six of the men who were accused in the sting, is trying to get the cases thrown out of court on the grounds that the sting was discriminatory because Palm Springs never conducted a sting aimed at public heterosexual sex.

Last month, a judge ordered the Palm Springs Police Department to turn over to the defense two years of records related to complaints about public sex and enforcement of laws against public sex. Tansey said that those records show no complaints about public sex in Warm Sands and only two complaints about public sex involving gay men. Ten of the 12 complaints about public sex were for heterosexual sex, Tansey said. The attorney plans to use those figures to argue for dismissal of the cases in a hearing that will likely happen in September.