Lawyer Loreal Arscott Picked To Chair County Independent Civilian Panel

Miami FL

18 November, 2021

7:12 AM

Description

A Miami Times Staff Report, the Miami Times Nov 16, 2021 The Independent Civilian Panel (ICP), a police oversight board tasked with investigating complaints against officers of the Miami-Dade Police Department, appointed attorneys Loreal Arscott as board chair and Pam Perry as vice chair. The appointments were made during the ICP's second meeting Nov. 15, 2021. Arscott was appointed by Commissioner Oliver Gilbert III. The University of Florida law school graduate is a former Miami Gardens assistant city attorney and past president of the Wilkie D. Ferguson Jr. Bar Association and Gwen S. Cherry Black Women Lawyer's Association. She's served on the board of directors of Friends of the Miami-Dade County Public Library, PACE School for Girls and KidSide. Arscott also has co-chaired the Dade County Bar Association's Diversity and Inclusion Committee. Perry, appointed by Commissioner Sally Heyman, is an attorney in private practice since 1984 as well as a Florida Supreme Court qualified arbitrator and certified appellate mediator. There are four lawyers on the panel, including two more appointed by Commissioners Keon Hardemon and Kionne McGhee. At Monday's meeting, panel members formed committees to write bylaws and to train members on police practices. Roughly half the meeting was spent discussing a police training conference in December and how to go about getting county commission approval for that expenditure. Very little was known about applicants for ICP's executive director position, which experts say will be the key to the panel's success. Consulting on the ICP formation is Rodney Jacobs, assistant director of the City of Miami's police department Civilian Investigative Panel (CIP). "Whoever is hired as director will be the lifeline of the department," he told The Miami Times in September. Jacobs also explained that the director will be hiring the investigators and staffers who "will be the ones who do the work." Plus, a good executive director can "make sure panel members work cohesively together." "We want to make sure we have good panel members," said Jacobs, "but at the end of the day, the director and staff are the most important." The Miami Times is the largest Black-owned newspaper in the south serving Miami's Black community since 1923. The award-winning weekly is frequently recognized as the best Black newspaper in the country by the National Newspaper Publishers Association.