officers - The Black Vault

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Beating Incident Dogs
Bradley as He Goes Out
. - .. . . .. \
Into Community
By RlCH CONNELL
TIMES STAFF WRITER
The crisis over the Rodney G. King beating trailed
Mayor Tom Bradley on Thursday as he ventured from
City Hall for a day long sweep through schools, business­
.es and social service centers in the Harbor area .
. It was the mayor's most extensiv~ public appearance
smce the March 3 incident plunged the city, its police
force and its chief into the center of a national
controversy over police practices.
Normally, such "Area Days" are little-noticed
p~ochial a!fairs that offer Bradley a chance to mingl~
With constituents, confer with local business leaders
about their troubles and visit the myriad community
programs funded by the city.
But Thursday the Rodney G. King case kept
· resurfacing.
It dominated one of the mayor's first stops at
Banning High .Sc:jJ.ooJ iP. Wilmington.
Before a racially mixed audience of 300 students in
the school's auditorium, Bradley fielded question after
question-about the beating incident, about the history
of police misconduct in the department and about
his own experiences as a black Los Angeles Police
Department officer in the 1950s and 1960s.
The students applauded when Bradley reiterated his
- outrage at the conduct of the officers involved in the
King case and the need for changes in the department
to "get rid of any strain of racial animosity or abuse of
police authority." ·
Does -Bradley think Chief Daryl F. Gates should
· resign, one student asked.
"Only he has the authority and ability to say; 'I
·retire,'" the mayor responded. "No requests are going
1 to make any difference until the chief recognizes that
he, by staying on, may be damaging the department.
· That's a judgment he has to make. I hope that
judgment will be made by him in a conscientious
fashion."
Date: LOS ANGELES TIMES
Edition: FRI., MAR 22, 1991
FRONT SECTION, PAGE 42
Title:
Character:
BEATING INCIDENT DOGS
BRADLEY AS HE GOES OUT
INTO CONMUNITY:.:.
CIVIL RIGHTS
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Classification:
Submitting Office:
lOS ANGELES
8 0-3 3 B
Indexing:
SEARCHED·--- INDEXED·----1
SERIALIZED·--~ fiLEO·----t
MAR 2 7 1991
FBI -LOS ANGELES I
Responding to another question, Bradley said there
was racism in the Police Department when he was an
officer, including a kind of "unwritten rule that no
black was ever going to rise to a position higher than
lieutenant." Bradley was the department's first black
lieutenant.
Typically, there are no television news crews
in sight during the mayor's routine community
visits.
· But on Thursday they showed up in twos, threes and
fours at nearly every 011e of Bradley's 12 stops. Should
; Gates go? Can the Police Commission remove Gates? Is
the mayor going to name a high-level· citizens
, _commission to investigate the Police Department, as
The Times reported? What about the governor's
· remarks in support of the chief?
; By midday, the mayor was lagging nearly 45
· minutes behind schedule bec;ause of all the impromptu
news conferences.
While the con~rover~! trailed ~he mayor, his hosts
along the way ~ried to keep Bradley's attention
focused on their problems: the redevelopment of the
San Pedro waterfront; funding for a proposed trolley
through the San Pedro shopping district; and a plan to
. bring more tourism to the Harbor area to offset the
.. thousands of shipbuilding and other jobs lost in recent
years. · ·
·Although the news media pursued Bradley .throughout
the day, the public sometimes displayed little
interest in the controversy.
Longshoreman Juan Diaz, who was snapping pic­
: tures of the mayor outside his union hall, said the
· police controversy is not a big deal in San Pedro. "The
police are very well-liked in this area," he said. "We
' have no complaints."
Jerry Gains, president of a Harbor area homeowners
coalition, agreed, noting that the Harbor is miles from
Los Angeles and has its own police division. Many see
it as their own Police Department, he said. "We're
very supportive of the police," :Qe said
• ..
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