Blame All Around For The LAPD Scandal

The stunning announcement by Los Angeles Police Chief Bernard Parks that he has called on the FBI to investigate the dirty cops in his department was greeted with much applause. Of course with fresh allegations piling up almost daily that LAPD officers beat and shot unarmed suspects, doctored evidence, gave perjured testimony, falsified reports, and covered up shootings of unarmed suspects, the embattled chief had to do something dramatic. But Parks's call for the FBI notwithstanding, the big question is how could the LAPD which seemed to be making progress in cleaning up its act since the beating of black motorist Rodney King nearly a decade ago come unglued again so easily?

The first impulse is to point the finger at Parks for the LAPD's problems. And he certainly must bear some blame for them. He has squabbled publicly with the Los Angeles city council over the role of the Los Angeles Police Commission's inspector general. This was a position mandated by the Christopher Commission established after the beating of King in 1991 to provide tougher civilian oversight over LAPD operations. Parks also bulked at cooperating with a roll out team of investigators established by L.A. County District Attorney Gil Garcetti to independently probe police shootings. And he has reflexively defended officers involved in several questionable shootings of civilians in the past couple of years.

This month the current inspector general, Jeffrey Eaglash and the Police Commission, ruled that one of those shootings, that of an emotionally disturbed, middle-aged homeless woman by an LAPD officer last May, violated LAPD shooting policy. Yet Parks continues to dig his heels in and insist that the officer was not guilty of any wrongdoing. He has come off as a thin-skinned autocrat more concerned with guarding his turf against meaningful civilian oversight than with punishing officers accused of the overuse of deadly force.

But dumping full blame for the LAPD's problems on Parks is the cheap and easy way out. City officials, the Police Commission, and the District Attorney, and yes, the general public, can't evade their responsibility for the problems. They have been more than content to take a see-no-evil, hear-no-evil stance on the allegations of police abuse and leave it to the LAPD to investigate itself. This doctrinaire belief that the department can and will clean it's own house is dangerous and self-serving. It prevents city officials from fully backing the Police Commission and the inspector general and providing the resources they need to conduct their own investigations of the use of force violations, citizen complaints, and officer discipline procedures.

The Police Commission in turn has taken the cue from the timidity of city officials and left it to Parks to exclusively determine and enforce policies and procedures within the department. The commission's failure to provide tough oversight over the LAPD has been glaringly evident in its rubber stamp of the chief on the use of deadly force and failure to aggressively monitor the action the department chooses to take on its investigation of civilian complaints of abuse.

Then there's District Attorney Gil Garcetti. Parks has taken the equally surprising step of accusing Garcetti of stymieing his efforts to clean up the LAPD mess by foot-dragging on prosecuting the rotten cops. Garcetti claims that he is moving full speed ahead with his own investigation into the Ramparts scandal and has dropped hints that some cops will be prosecuted. Yet the fact is that he has yet to bring any charges against any of the officers accused of wrongdoing. And he has given no indication when or even whether he will. Given his tepid, and cautious attitude toward prosecuting officers accused of misconduct there is no reason to expect that his office will initiate waves of prosecutions against the Ramparts officers.

Meanwhile, L.A. residents have expressed little outrage over the dirty dealings and have made no loud calls for city officials to clean the LAPD's house. Their inertia and indifference send the dangerous message that it's OK to rely on city officials and the LAPD brass to clean up the mess that they created. What is clear in this sordid affair is that the public must demand that city officials, the Police Commission, and Garcetti do more than cosmetic, public relations damage control in the Ramparts scandal. They must move fast to see that the lawbreaking cops are nailed. But they also must just as fast to put in place firm civilian controls over the LAPD to insure that scandals such as Ramparts will not happen again. If they don't they have no one but themselves to blame.

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