Full Notification

On the evening of September 28th, an off-duty ECPD employee saw a video of a racially charged incident posted to Instagram and Twitter. The employee immediately notified the department and an investigator was called in to open an investigation.

The investigator spoke with the victim and classified the criminal investigation as a hate crime involving impersonating a police officer and making criminal threats. The investigator researched the vehicle involved in the incident and identified a suspect. The suspect is not a former or current employee of the city of El Cerrito Police Department.

Today, a detective spoke with the suspect in this case and obtained his statement. The suspect in this case is not a police officer and is not an El Cerrito resident. We are forwarding this case to the Contra Costa County District Attorney's office for a decision on criminal charges.