A Courthouse Called ‘Fort Compton’ Lives on the Cutting Edge of Justice

The 13-story courthouse at Compton has occasionally stood out as something more than an imposing monument to justice. As the tallest building for miles around in the high-crime flats of southern Los Angeles County, it has also served as an inviting target.

A year and a half ago, people regularly blazed away at it with guns, breaking nearly 40 windows over a few months’ time.

Although no one was hurt, the courthouse’s regular occupants became jittery. And one night in the highly charged atmosphere, a bailiff asked courtroom spectators if they were armed.

The bailiff’s request surprised everybody.

“At first,” recalled Municipal Judge Robert Mackey, who was presiding at the night court session, “no one moved.”

“Then some guy got up with a big buck knife, which the bailiff tagged.

“While he was doing that, the whole courtroom lined up.”

Mackey looked at a pile of about 70 knives, scissors and razors on the bailiff’s desk and decided more security was in order.

His decision helped change the ambiance of courthouse life.

Windows were refitted with bullet-resistant glass--still not strong enough, as it turned out, to keep a projectile from crashing through and lodging in an interior wall above a witness stand.

Additional armed security guards were hired to patrol the lobby and corridors--supplementing the efforts of county marshals and sheriff’s deputies who provide security in courtrooms.

A metal detector and X-ray machine were rented to guard the door.

These changes have made the Compton courthouse, located in an area that is infested with street gangs, the most security conscious of any of the 33 state courthouses in Los Angeles County.

But the security measures also have earned a pejorative nickname for the courthouse, located at 200 W. Compton Blvd. Some lawyers call it “Fort Compton.”

Judges elsewhere in the county have been hesitant to follow Compton’s model, preferring a less obtrusive approach.

“We don’t want to over-respond” to security concerns, said Superior Court Judge Ronald E. Swearinger, who heads his court’s countywide security committee. “We don’t want a fortress courthouse system in L.A. County. There is no real need. We’d like orderly access by the general public without unduly harassing them.”

Employee Viewpoints

Although many people who work at the Compton courthouse approve of the metal detector, that may be in part because employees have their own entrance to the building and thus do not have to pass through the device.

Private attorneys and visitors are sometimes irritated by having to line up to go through the detector.

“Why should we be subjected to that kind of thing when it doesn’t go on in other courthouses?” said Katie Murff Trotter, president of the South-Central Bar Assn. “I believe that’s the general feeling of the attorneys who practice there.”

But the magnitude of the metal detector’s haul has stunned even veterans in law enforcement and provided a powerful argument for its use.

The detector spots one or two guns a month and about 140 knives--down from 180 knives a month when it was introduced a little more than a year ago.

Startling Numbers

Los Angeles Sheriff’s Capt. Al Mathews, who supervises security for half of the county’s Superior Courts, was one of those surprised at the numbers.

‘We had found (and) confiscated weapons from time to time during scuffles in the hallways,” he said. “But no one was cognizant of the number (being brought in).”

Because it is a crime to bring a firearm or a knife with a blade longer than four inches into a courthouse, Compton police said civilian guards who run the metal detector regularly make citizen’s arrests. Quite a few of those arrested are let go after a trip to police headquarters, but about three people a month are booked on weapons charges, said Police Department crime analyst Bobby McDowell.

One of those booked was an attorney on his way to argue a motion who was caught with a pistol in his briefcase. The attorney claims he was not aware the gun was in his briefcase and is awaiting trial in Municipal Court.

“There are a lot of people whose statement is, ‘I’d rather be caught with it than without it, judge,’ ” said Judge Mackey. The usual fine, he added, is $300 and loss of the weapon.

Not an Aberration

Whether there are more weapons brought into the Compton courthouse than into other state courthouses is impossible to say, given the lack of metal detectors at the others. However, there are indications that the situation at Compton is far from an aberration.

Security officers at the U.S. District Courthouse downtown have used metal detectors at entrances for the last four years or so.

“Initially, we were quite amazed at the number of weapons--speaking particularly of handguns--that came in,” said Inspector Gilbert Garcia, who is in charge of federal court security in Los Angeles for the U.S. Marshal’s Service.

“We were getting a minimum of three to four guns a month (when metal detection started a few years ago). That’s drastically stopped (as a result of prosecutions). Now we get a multitude of different types of knives.”

In addition, numerous portable metal detectors are available for use at state courthouses in the county whenever there is a hearing or trial that promises to be particularly volatile. Assistant Marshal Ronald C. Downing, whose county department provides security for Municipal Courts, said the portable detectors are deployed about twice a month.

Some Turn Away

When that happens, said James E. Payne, who is in charge of security and intelligence for the county Marshal’s Department, people are frequently observed approaching the detector, then turning away. Payne said he believes those people are headed back to their cars to leave their weapons before returning to enter the courthouse.

Mackey credits such reluctance to tangle with the machine with heading off serious violence at the Compton courthouse twice recently.

The first time, members of one area Crips gang arrived to testify against members of a rival Crips gang at a preliminary hearing stemming from a street fight between the two gangs.

When the Crips who were about to testify got off a courthouse elevator, they were jumped by their rivals who, according to court records, yelled, “You’re not going to testify. We’re going to kick your ass.”

Several hapless passengers on the elevator--including jurors and witnesses--were beaten.

Witnesses Are Wary

Although no one was seriously injured, and those who started the fight were successfully prosecuted, the melee, for a while at least, shattered the aura of the courthouse as a place to go for the peaceful resolution of disputes. One former county gang prosecutor, Anthony Gaston, said that after the fracas he had trouble getting witnesses to show up.

Still, things could have been worse.

“It is my opinion that if we weren’t searching everyone going into that building, they would have gone for guns instead of just fists,” said Deputy Marshal Payne.

Judge Mackey agreed, citing a second recent incident in which two gang members who were in custody overpowered a bailiff in a courtroom, then looked to their friends in the spectator’s section for help in an apparent escape attempt. The spectators, all of whom had passed through the metal detector, were unarmed, and made no move to help.

“The guys in the courtroom who were supposed to help . . . looked like signalmen on an aircraft carrier giving the wave-off sign,” Mackey said.

Problems Elsewhere

Despite these high-profile incidents, people who work in the Compton courthouse say the atmosphere there is not appreciably different than in other courthouses around the county.

They point out that windows have also been shot out in courthouses in Torrance and Santa Monica. A small bomb went off last year outside the courthouse in Van Nuys. A defendant in Torrance recently stabbed his attorney in court.

“Everyone smiles when a judge gets assigned to Compton, particularly the judges who haven’t served here,” said Superior Court Judge Nancy Brown. “They recommend that you get your car armored and equipped with bulletproof glass, that you get a gun and learn how to use it. But the fact of the matter is that in my two, going on three years here, we have not had an attack on a judge.”