officers - The Black Vault

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LOS ANGELES TIHES
~~~~~~~~~~~~~!~~~~~~~~~~~~~~: TUES. ~R 12, 1991
( PERSPECTIVE ON POLICE Edition: !-1ETRO SECTION 1
PAGE 7
Unwrapping-the Chiefs
Cloak of Immunity
Los Angeles is unique in giving its. top cop
freedom from accountability to the
·public. That's not difficult to remedy.
By MEIR J. WE STREICH,
, R. SAMUEL PAZ and JOSEPH H. D~FF
0
n a recent talk show, ABC
correspondent Sam Donaldson,
discussing the Los Angeles Police
Department, wondered why there
appeared to be no public accountability
for the chief of police. This is indeed a
question that many city residents are.
now asking.
The incidents of public figures losing
their jobs . because of insensitive or
intemperate comments, or official ·
. wrongdoing: are well known. A baseball
executive was fired because of
public outrage over his comments th~t
African-Americans "lack .the necessities"
to be managers and lacks the
speciai""buoyancy" to make them good
swimmers. A gambler was dropped
from his network job as a sports
commentator when a public furor re-
. suited from his suggestion that African-Americans
are better athletes because
they have· been "bred" for those
characteristics. A secretary of the interior
was forced out because of public
anger about his racial jokes. .A judge
lost his job over making sexist remarks
about a rape victim. A President was
forced from office over spying on his
' political enemies and covering up his
involvement. ·
Here in Los Angeles, Chief of Police
Daryl Gates has suggested that the
anatomy of African-Americans is why
they died more frequently from police
chokeholds; that Latinos are lazier
than other people; that casual drug
i- -users should be shot; t!lat federal
immigration authorities ca~s.e the murders
of police officers by fall~ng to keep
undocumented immigrants from entering
the country. He has spied on
political opponents and ridiculed federal
judges and juries when they found
officers guilty ef civil-lights abuses.
'Despite this history, the people of
; ·. Los Angeles have been unable to hold
their chief of police accountable ~or
anything-not his racial slurs or racial
stereotyping; not his openly expressed
contempt for the public, juries and the
Constitution he is sworn to uphold; n~t
his tolerance of police abuse; not his
spying on his political enemies or the
cover-up of that espionage. Nor has_he
been accountable for his provocative
and intemperate comments presented
under the guise of "free speech."
These statements and attitudes, and
the law-enforcement philosophy they
represent, filter-thr?ugh t~e ranks a_nd
damage public confidence m the Police
Department. Thus there appears to ~e
mutual contempt between many officers
and members of the public, under­
··mining law enforcement. Los .Angeles
residents are routinely brutalized and
many minority neighbor~oods feel te~rorized
by police.' Many mnocent ?fficers
are tarred by those other officers
who abuse the public, and the dat;~ger
~:to officers is increased by a perceived
· warlike atmosphere. Taxpayers have
UNWRAPPING THE CHIEF'S
·Title: CLOAK OF Il\1J.\1UNITY
Character:
CIVIL RIGHTS
C~ifiC8tion: 80-33B
Submitting Office:
LOS ANGELES
lnde RiiCHED INDEXED·---!
SERIALitED•,.,.n........,...,......,.., fiLED•..,.......--
MAR 2 0 1991
FBI -
LOS ANGELES
.paid many ~illions of dollars
in legal costs, court
judgments and settlements.
In spite of these continu-
. ing problems, Los Angeles
residents and their elected
.;l'epresentatives are ·helpless
to take any cor~:ective
action. There is no recourse
·through the political .sys­
. tern because of the city's
unique charter provision
;that gives a chief of police
lifetime tenure ana com­
·plete protection from any
form of accountability to'
the public or constitutional
_ ·c'hecks and balances.
Virtually no other chief law-enforcement
officer in California or elsewhere
in the United States has the
t lifetime tenure that Chief Gates enjoys.
l 'Sheriffs are generally elected to terms
' of four years. Chiefs of police are most
1 ·often appointed to office by the local
chief executive and/or city council, and
serve at .their discretion; they in turn
are subject to the democratic will of the
people through regular elec~ions. .
Indeed, no significant pohcy-ma~mg
or chief-executive official in the Umted
States, whether in law enforcement or
otherwise, is beyond the pale of the
democratic process-except, it seems,
the chief of police of Los Angeles. .
Any .solution therefore must begm
with a charter amendment that would
.apply to Gates' successors. Specifically,
the amendment should provide for a
'fixed renewable term of office for the
. chier' of police, with substantial ~nd ,
,...',Jor.maljz~ public~ut at the earliest
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