officers - The Black Vault

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PERSPECTIVE ON POLICE
fThis Is No Time to Play
-· -
·~the Mob
Over the years, Chief
Gates did what he had to
to earn· the respect of h~s
officers, at the expensepf
being impolitic in public:
By DANIEL M. SHAPIRO
~ u ••
·'
.• i, •.
~ ..
Edition:
LOS ANGELES TIMES
TUES APRIL 9, 1991
METRO SECTION, PAGE 7
TitleTHIS IS NO TIME TO PLAY
THE MOB
Character:
or
Classlfi~~ 3 3B
Submitting Office:
lOS ANGELES
Indexing:
CIVIL RIGHTS
SEARCHED ~,INDEX~ 2
SERIA\JZEO
FILED""' '"""
APR 1 5 1991
L
·The Police Commission's decision to
to p~ace Chief Daryl Gate~ on ,
administrative leave, combmed
with Mayor Tom Bradley's call for the
chief to resign, finally brought into the
open the mayor's not-so-hidden agenda.
.. Gates has received exemplary fitness
· ev:aluations by the mayor-appointed
commissioners for the past 13 years.
Suddenly, one videotape has vitiated
those evaluations and the 40-plusyear
career that goes with it. What
bas really happened, of course, is that
the composition of the commission
has changed substantially over the
past few months, with the . new
appointees having much closer ties to
the mayor than had prev~ously been
the case.
. However the court rules, Bradley's
and the commission's actions can
only be seen as political moves to
decrease pressure on the mayor from
the black and liberal communities. At
the same time, Bradley·is punishing
Gates for the adversarial positions
the chief has taken against the mayor
over the years.
What has Gates done to deserve
the heat? His crime is that he has not
; been sufficiently "politic" in a highly
visible and political ·job. Those who
· know Gates state that, in private, he
is sensitive, even caring. His public
persona is a different matter. Abrasive
is the least of the adjectives.
The reason for the two personas
may lie with the fact that when Gates
was appointed chief, he was not
viewed by the rank-and-file officer
as a "cop's cop," but as an administrator.
The street cop saw Gates as .
politically astute and carefully calcu­
·Iating his career to land him in the top
spot largely by· occupying administra-
• tive positions: ·
DUring his rise to the top, Gat~·-ha,d·
minimal "combat" experience and. ··no
·"combat" .commands. Thus, unlike his
immediate ·predecessor, Ed Davis, the
chief first had to earn the respect of his
~~- - ~ . - -
men. Noting the results of the
"sensitive" tenure of Tom
Reddin-who preceded Davis-Gates
saw what worked
in Los Angeles. Davis was
held in high regard by the
street officer. Reddin, who
quit after only two years, was
·' not ·held in t'he same high
esteem. To earn the respect of
· the street officer, Gates had to
project ·the "tough cop.'~ image. While
this image has cost him dearly ~ong
.some constituencies-including . the
mayor-it was and is necessary· to
maintain the morale of the police for.ce.
My own experiences with Gates have
revealed ·the two personas. In private
meetings, I found him to be courteous,
fBI -
LOS ANGELES
P~lice Chief Daryl G~tes
understanding and sincerely interested~in
trying to resolve problems. Public
sessions were another matter. During a
meeting to discuss budget cuts for the
department, I was shaken by his attitude.
He was aggressive and abrasive, so
much so that he ended up alienating
niany of his ~upporte~s on the pudget , ooJ
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