Officer Who Alleged LAPD Frame Wins $55,000 Award in U.S. Court

A veteran patrolman who accused the Los Angeles Police Department of trying to frame him on charges of stealing marijuana was awarded $55,000 in damages by a federal court jury Wednesday, the first time an officer has successfully sued the department’s Internal Affairs Division.

Officer James L. Tomer, 39, an 18-year veteran assigned to the Hollywood Division, contended that internal affairs was overzealous in June, 1984, in its attempts to make a case against him.

Tomer was accused of failing to book into evidence two of six small packages of marijuana that had allegedly been placed in a paper bag that Tomer had been ordered to retrieve from a television station in Hollywood. The bag had been planted there by an internal affairs investigator, Sgt. Raymond P. Lombardo.

Tomer argued that the bag never held more than four packages of marijuana. He eventually was cleared of departmental charges stemming from the internal affairs case, but not before being strip-searched and jailed for one hour.

On Wednesday, Tomer was awarded $5,000 in actual damages for the “humiliation and degradation” that resulted from his arrest and is to receive $50,000 in punitive damages.

Archetypical Good Cop’

“He’s clean as a whistle,” said Tomer’s attorney, Stephen Yagman. “He’s the archetypical good cop. . . . He’s a real quiet, straight guy, the kind of guy you want on the force.”

Officials of the Los Angeles Police Protective League, which represents the department’s rank and file, hailed Wednesday’s verdict as evidence of the league’s long-standing contention that officers of lesser rank commonly do not get a fair shake in internal investigations.

“Overzealousness (by internal affairs) is a complaint that we’ve made over and over again. It often forces officers to have to go through the trauma and stigma of defending themselves unnecessarily at board of rights hearings,” said David Baca, league vice president. “For these matters to reach these proportions--for an officer to have to resort to the federal civil courts--I think department management should be held directly accountable.”

Meanwhile, the deputy city attorney who defended the Police Department in the case condemned the jury’s verdict as “disastrous” and predicted: “It will have a very chilling effect on the Police Department’s ability to internally investigate and control its own employees.

“I think honest police officers everywhere are going to look at this decision and say, ‘well, we’d better not do anything anymore (about internal corruption) because we’ll get sued,’ ” said Philip J. Sugar. “I think corrupt cops might see this as license to do whatever they want to do . . . and if they get caught, not to worry about it.”

Contempt of Court

After the trial, Sugar was found in contempt of court by U.S. District Judge A. Wallace Tashima for having repeatedly asked a witness leading questions to which Yagman and the judge objected. Sugar was ordered to spend four hours in jail or write a letter to his supervisors explaining Tashima’s decision.

Sugar said afterward that he planned to write the letter.

Cmdr. William Booth, a Police Department spokesman, said Wednesday that the department’s administration had not yet reviewed the jury’s decision and declined to comment on the case. Neither Tomer nor Lombardo could be reached.

According to Yagman, the case against Tomer began after another officer, whom Tomer had chastised for using excessive force in arresting suspects, told the Police Department’s Internal Affairs Division that he suspected Tomer of failing to turn in small quantities of narcotics seized during street arrests.

Lombardo was assigned to the investigation and, according to testimony, set up repeated yet unsuccessful sting-type operations to see if Tomer would keep drugs if given access to them.

In two of the operations, paper bags containing small quantities of marijuana were placed in planters on Hollywood Boulevard, where Tomer patroled, and undercover policemen, posing as drug dealers, were stationed nearby to observe what Tomer would do.

Officers Arrested

In each case, however, other uniformed officers arrested the undercover officers before Tomer arrived.

Lombardo then arranged to leave a bag of marijuana with a cooperative receptionist at a television station in Hollywood. He said the bag had six packages--containing less than an ounce of marijuana--in it. After Tomer was sent out on what he was told was a routine “pick up evidence” call, he returned with a bag that had four marijuana packages.

Police eventually obtained a warrant to search Tomer, his locker and his truck; they found no narcotics.