Chamberlain became police chief of Colorado's third-largest city in September. He's the fifth person to hold that position in the last two years.
The Aurora City Council approved Chamberlain's appointment as police chief in late August, and he was sworn in on September 9. A couple dozen Justice for Kilyn protesters told the city council at the August meeting to reject his nomination because of the lack of community input before his hiring and his history with LAPD during racial tension in the 1990s. When council approved his appointment, protestors forced the meeting to halt after breaking out into loud chants in the chamber.
Chamberlain said that Tuesday's conversation came after he reached out to Shofner, who protested his appointment.
"I'm still trying to get to know Aurora," the new police chief said. "I'm still learning this city, and I need to find out who are the groups I need to talk to. I wouldn't be talking to you here today if I hadn't reached out to [Shofner]. That's something you need to keep in mind."
The conversation between Chamberlain, Shofner and other community members tackled a range of local issues between police and Aurora residents, from Lewis's death to the APD's recent recruitment at a Donald Trump rally, where Chamberlain posed for a photo with the Republican presidential candidate.
The Epitome of Black Excellence and Partnership hosted the October 29 event. CEO MiDian Shofner moderated the conversation with Chamberlain and a Q&A with the audience. Only about twenty people were in attendance in the small room at Aurora Fire Station Number 2, 126000 Hoffman Boulevard; Shofner wanted an "intimate, direct and honest dialogue," she said.
Shofner is also a part of the Justice for Kilyn movement, a group that has been disrupting and protesting Aurora City Council meetings to demand more disciplinary action after a SWAT officer shot and killed Kilyn Lewis, an unarmed Black man with a warrant out for his arrest, in May.
Before coming to Aurora, Chamberlain worked for the Los Angeles Police Department from 1984 to 2018. He was a commanding officer during the Rodney King beatings and subsequent riots in 1991 and 1992, and later was one of LAPD's first homeless outreach coordinators.
Before coming to Aurora, Chamberlain worked for the Los Angeles Police Department from 1984 to 2018. He was a commanding officer during the Rodney King beatings and subsequent riots in 1991 and 1992, and later was one of LAPD's first homeless outreach coordinators.
The Aurora City Council approved Chamberlain's appointment as police chief in late August, and he was sworn in on September 9. A couple dozen Justice for Kilyn protesters told the city council at the August meeting to reject his nomination because of the lack of community input before his hiring and his history with LAPD during racial tension in the 1990s. When council approved his appointment, protestors forced the meeting to halt after breaking out into loud chants in the chamber.
Chamberlain said that Tuesday's conversation came after he reached out to Shofner, who protested his appointment.
"I'm still trying to get to know Aurora," the new police chief said. "I'm still learning this city, and I need to find out who are the groups I need to talk to. I wouldn't be talking to you here today if I hadn't reached out to [Shofner]. That's something you need to keep in mind."
The conversation between Chamberlain, Shofner and other community members tackled a range of local issues between police and Aurora residents, from Lewis's death to the APD's recent recruitment at a Donald Trump rally, where Chamberlain posed for a photo with the Republican presidential candidate.
Justice for Kilyn protesters took over an Aurora City Counci meeting on July 8, calling on councilmembers to speak about the police shooting of Kilyn Lewis.
Chris Perez
Kilyn Lewis
Shofner and other Aurora residents asked Chamberlain about the Kilyn Lewis case throughout the night. Lewis was shot by an Aurora SWAT team that was assisting the Denver Police Department in serving an arrest warrant after days of surveillance on Lewis. Chamberlain had to answer questions about when police surveillance is necessary and whether he thinks the APD SWAT team should have been involved in Lewis's arrest.
Chamberlain said that he's already been turning down requests from other jurisdictions for help from the APD SWAT team.
"I've already been tested on this. I had to turn down a warrant for the SWAT team's help, and I said no based on the legality of where the warrant was at the time, the standard of the probable cause that they had established for the arrest, the high propensity of it going in other directions," he said. "That's what you're going to see, is much more scrutiny and much more attention to each warrant that comes in."
But he defended the use of surveillance, saying it's one of the few ways that police officers can safely get information to make the right decisions.
"With that [SWAT] warrant I turned down, there could have been more surveillance to establish that probable cause, which is necessary to get a search warrant for an individual," Chamberlain said. "Surveillance, to me, is an important tool. It can be used in the right way. It's a valuable aspect of law enforcement."
Chamberlain said that he's already been turning down requests from other jurisdictions for help from the APD SWAT team.
"I've already been tested on this. I had to turn down a warrant for the SWAT team's help, and I said no based on the legality of where the warrant was at the time, the standard of the probable cause that they had established for the arrest, the high propensity of it going in other directions," he said. "That's what you're going to see, is much more scrutiny and much more attention to each warrant that comes in."
But he defended the use of surveillance, saying it's one of the few ways that police officers can safely get information to make the right decisions.
"With that [SWAT] warrant I turned down, there could have been more surveillance to establish that probable cause, which is necessary to get a search warrant for an individual," Chamberlain said. "Surveillance, to me, is an important tool. It can be used in the right way. It's a valuable aspect of law enforcement."
Donald Trump Rally
"I've been in law enforcement for 35 years, and I've taken pictures with a ton of politicians," he said. "I've got pictures with Ronald Reagan, I've got pictures with governors, with all kinds of different people, and if someone is going to say, 'Thank you for putting your personnel in a position, thank you for supporting me as I support democracy,' it doesn't matter if they're a Democrat or Republican, I'm going to take a picture with them."
Chamberlain also had to answer why Aurora Police thought it was a good idea to recruit at the Trump rally. The Aurora Sentinel first reported that two APD officers were at the rally recruiting people from the crowd to their ranks. The police chief explained that it was the idea of a recruitment officer who went down there to "take advantage of the large crowd" and defended him, saying that APD needs officers, no matter who they vote for.
"We are down in staff, we don't have personnel, and if there is a political affiliation that eliminates someone from being a police officer, there's something seriously wrong with that," Chamberlain said. "That is not democracy. That is a failed system. That almost borderlines on fascism."
Chamberlain then offered a list of other places where the APD has recruited, including Global Fest, the Aurora Pride Parade, Cinco de Mayo events, the Juneteenth Music Festival, the Colorado Black Arts Festival, the Dragon Boat Festival, Taste of Ethiopia and Blue Angel air shows. He even invited everyone at the meeting to consider joining APD.
"They recruit in every venue, every location," he said. "They recruit from every ethnicity, every race, every sex, every sexual preference, every gender. Those are the people that make up a police department."
Auon'tai Anderson, CEO of the Center for Advancing Black Excellence in Education, asked Chamberlain about his thoughts on Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky pushing the story that Aurora has been taken over by Venezuelan gangs. He asked if he'll bend to Jurinsky's pressure to put more police on the issue considering previous Aurora police chiefs have had problems with the councilwoman, including interim police chief Heather Morris, who earned Jurinsky's ire for denying the gang problem.
"I didn't take this job to become a councilmember or to become the arm of the council," Chamberlain answered. "We are not held hostage by [the Venezuelan] community. There is nothing that is happening like that here. That is a narrative that is incorrect."
White Privilege
Members of the audience challenged Chamberlain on his stance about white privilege."I do know what it is, and I don't believe I do have it," he said in response to a question from Aurora resident Nichole Taylor. The audience reacted by laughing and shaking their heads at the answer, and two more attendees later told him that if he doesn't believe he has white privilege, he doesn't know what it is.
One attendee asked Chamberlain how the community can trust him "when you continue using white supremacist language like not even acknowledging your white privilege, like saying, 'I'm going to follow the constitution,' which we all know is racist." Chamberlain tried to answer several times, but after the attendee kept rejecting his answer, he simply said, "That's your decision to trust me or not."
"You're good at gaslighting," the attendee concluded.
The Aurora Consent Decree
The police chief also provided an update on the consent decree issued by Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser in 2022 to reform police recruitment and training at the APD after the death of Elijah McClain in 2019. The 23-year-old McClain died after he was aggressively restrained by Aurora cops and injected with ketamine by Aurora paramedics.The goal of the decree is to make the APD "more reflective of the community we serve," among other reforms, Chamberlain noted.
Chamberlain said that the consent decree requires the APD to hire a certain number of officers from Black, Asian and Hispanic communities, among others, and that right now the department is 83 percent in compliance with the decree's requirements. He said that it's also 73 percent in compliance with bias training, which teaches officers to recognize their racial or other biases.
"We need people," he said. "I need people who have never thought about being a police officer before."
During his time in Los Angeles, Chamberlain saw a consent decree "completely change the LAPD," so he believes Aurora's will be "a valuable tool" to creating lasting reform. In 2000, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a consent decree on the LAPD after investigating the police department for excessive use of force; the DOJ offered the consent decree in exchange for agreeing to not pursue a lawsuit against the city and ended the decree after the LAPD met the standards for compliance twelve years later, according to the DOJ.
What's Aurora's problem?
"There's too much yelling, and there's too much screaming, and that's a problem," he said. "Just because you're the loudest duck in the room and you scream the loudest, that doesn't help facilitate a conversation that can be beneficial. ... The fact that there's a consent decree kind of validates that, yes, there's a problem with this organization."
Chamberlain promised he would keep coming to community conversations and have the commanding officers in charge of Aurora's three police districts do the same. Shofner promised to keep offering a platform for them.
"I hope we can walk a mile in somebody else's shoes," he said. "And we aren't just trying to scream each other down, but we're actually trying to understand each other, that's what I truly hope."
