LAPD Firearms Expert Tied to Alleged Sales of Gun Parts

An internal investigation into allegations that Los Angeles police officers pilfered and sold parts from hundreds of confiscated guns has implicated the department’s lead firearms examiner, who recently gained public attention for apparently botching a major murder investigation.

Sources said that Detective Jimmy L. Trahin, 42, a nationally known firearms expert, is one of two officers alleged to have been the most-active participants in the scheme to make outside money through the sale of confiscated weapons parts.

Trahin’s former commander, Lt. Jimmie J. Finn, has told Internal Affairs Division investigators that Trahin and Officer Joseph Pau, 45, were among a handful of officers in the firearms and explosives section who stripped guns destined for destruction and sold the parts at gun shows and swap meets.

Neither officer responded to telegrams and repeated telephone messages left this week at their office. Trahin has been in the department since 1970; Pau since 1976.

Finn, who served as Chief Daryl F. Gates’ personal adjutant before taking over the firearms section in 1986, has alleged further that Gates and other police administrators sought to cover up the potential scandal.

Only after Finn went outside the chain of command to the civilian Police Commission, which oversees the department, did Internal Affairs initiate an investigation, sources said.

Gates was out of town Wednesday, attending a seminar for department managers, and could not be reached for comment on the Finn matter. But a department spokesman, Lt. Fred Nixon, appeared to refute allegations of a cover-up, saying: “What we are seeing now is actually a re-investigation of the allegations. This is a second look at it.”

Nixon said he was not familiar with the initial investigation of Finn’s allegations, and he declined further comment.

Other sources told The Times that Finn’s complaints in early 1987 prompted an “audit” of the explosives and firearms unit by “inspection and control” officers, who report directly to Gates. However, sources said, the audit never addressed allegations of pilfered gun parts. Instead, the inspectors concentrated instead on what effect Finn’s hard-nosed personality and by-the-book management style were having on morale within the 20-man firearms and explosives unit.

Shortly after that audit, Finn was transferred to a desk job in the department’s records section.

Little could be learned about Pau on Wednesday, but records show that Trahin has been in the firearms and explosives unit for 10 years and has been the subject of controversy during that time.

Trahin most recently was in the news for his role in the high-profile case of Rickey Ross, a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy arrested by Los Angeles police on suspicion of murder.

Ross in February was formally charged with three counts of homicide after Trahin claimed to have matched the deputy’s semiautomatic pistol to bullets found in three murdered prostitutes. But after outside forensic experts reviewed the same evidence at the behest of Ross’ attorney, it was found that Trahin had incorrectly analyzed the evidence, and that tests to match Ross’ gun to the murders were inconclusive, at best.

The charges against Ross were dropped last month, much to the Police Department’s embarrassment.

In 1987, Trahin was accused of illegally possessing a machine gun and a stolen television set and of falsely reporting the loss of his badge and police identification card. A department tribunal cleared Trahin on the stolen TV charges, but determined that he had “improperly maintained an automatic firearm at his residence” and that he should have returned the badge and ID card, which he admitted having found after reporting them missing.

‘Distinguished Career’

The tribunal, citing Trahin’s “distinguished career,” suspended him for five days.

In 1980, Trahin and other members of the firearms unit were accused by others in the department of firing a pellet pistol and a BB rifle out their office window at homeless people. Trahin was cleared of the charges.

“You can overlook a lot of that stuff,” one officer close to Trahin said. “Jimmy’s a good guy. He lectures nationally, has testified as an expert in a lot of big cases and is good at what he does. He’s invaluable as far as Daryl Gates is concerned.”