officers - The Black Vault

• •
all the time," said Margaret Bib-- - actions of his officers, -some quesbins,
a sixth-grade teacher at tioned the fairness of the commis-
Woodcrest Elemeptary School. ~ion's singling him out.
"Los Angeles has a history of · "i know that he is over [police
poli~e ~rutali~y." . officers] but he can't control them
Btbbt~s satd the ch1ldren she at all times," said Sophia J. Ward as
teaches ~~ South Los An~eles grow she sat on a bench and rested from
up knowmg that the pollee can be a morning of shopping. "I feel he
brutal. "One of my students saw ,
the police shoot a man. It's some- should ~ave a ~bane~. 1~ he s
thing you don't forget " she said wrong, I m sure he s reallZed It, and
Dwayane Hester,~ 21-year-'old i~ they'~ give him t~e chance, he'd
microbiology student at UCLA, make things better.
said that while Gates migh.t not be carolyn Bruce, who sells T-
?irectly re~ponsible for the beat- shirts with religious slogans in
.mg, the. chtef has set a tone that the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza,
all.~wed Jt.to happen. . · said the suspension was gooc~ be-
If thet ~ was no vtdeotape the cause it would give Gates time to
whole thtng would have been
swept under the rug by the chief of
. . .
reflect on h1s dutles and hts departpolice,"
Hester said. • ment, but that he should not be
"Gates has to go. It starts from forced out. .
the top and the only way to change "He's only one person. He can't
the department is to begin with the watch everybody," Bruce said,
chief."
But a black police sergeant in the
leafing through a newspaper on the
counter of her booth.
Southwest Division had mixed Bruce said that while she symfe;,ling~.
. , . . pathized with Gates, he needed to
.I thmk tt s tl~e f~r the chtef to heed the voices in the community
ret1re, but I do~ t t.hmk he should who believe it is time for change.
be for?ed to go, sa1d. the ~ergeant, . Most agreed with Elnora Cole
who d1d not want to gtve hts name. . . '
"The chief is not the larger who predicted that the suspensmn
issue," he said. ''The problem is wou.ld not slow down. the movedeeper,
and changing the chief will ment to recall the chief.
not change the attitudes in the "Gates should go," she said. "I
department." . lost faith in him as soon as he said
While few doubted that Gates
bore some responsibility for the
{King's beating} was an aberration.
We know it wasn't."