Police Officials Accused of Playing Election Politics

High-ranking police officials have increasingly come under attack for alleged involvement in the city’s upcoming election.

Some City Council members this week expressed concern that police officials are involving themselves in election politics, saying such activities are inappropriate. The comments were made as the council reviewed a police commander’s memo that described the police union’s endorsements of candidates in the April 10 City Council election.

Critics have cited three other incidents of alleged political involvement.

Police Chief Lawrence Binkley was accused of removing the wife of a police officer as neighborhood watch captain because she was working for council candidates supported by the police union.

A councilman questioned whether the decision to beef up police patrols downtown was an attempt to support the district’s incumbent councilman, who is opposed by the police union.

Another council candidate who is backed by the union appeared before the council Tuesday to complain that he was being harassed by police officials.

The council Tuesday discussed the memo from a commander to Assistant Police Chief Eugene Brizzolara about police union endorsements. The union, according to the memo, which was stamped “confidential,” wants to “regain control and power in the police department.”

The endorsements were already public information. The memo noted that the union will hold a rally Sunday with the candidates, and it stated that the goal of the Police Officers Assn. is to unseat the police chief, the city manager and the mayor.

Councilman Tom Clark, a mayoral candidate who is listed in the March 26 memo as a union-backed candidate, complained that “the tenor of the memo was that we have to protect the incumbents.” The department, he said, should not meddle in politics, nor should it keep tabs on the political involvement of the Police Officers Assn. Several of Clark’s colleagues said they agreed.

City Manager James C. Hankla said he does not expect the incident to be repeated. “A matter of this nature should not be the subject of police correspondence now or in the future,” Hankla said, adding that there should be “no political activity or no obstruction of a political activity by police management.”

“That is something I’m committed to and I believe the police chief is committed to,” Hankla told the council. He described the memo from Cmdr. John Bretza as an isolated incident.

Binkley could not be reached for comment.

In February, Becky Bishop, an activist who is married to a police officer, complained that Binkley had ordered her removal as a neighborhood watch captain because of her support of two council candidates supported by the police union. After pressure by the council and Hankla, Binkley reinstated Bishop to her voluntary position in March.

The chief’s decision to assign extra police units to the downtown area has been challenged by Councilman Warren Harwood, who argued that the city’s crime problems “are everywhere.” Harwood said the added patrols are questionable when “coinciding with an election,” and he predicted that the patrols will cease soon after the election.

The incumbent in the downtown district, Evan Anderson Braude, is facing two challengers, one of whom is backed by the police union.

Binkley said recently that he placed extra patrols in the most crime-ridden parts of town, the central and downtown areas.

Harwood is unopposed in the election.

The harassment complaint was issued at Tuesday’s council meeting by candidate Bill Stovall, who is challenging Braude. Stovall has been endorsed by the police union.

Stovall accused the city manager and the police chief of harassing him and his son, a police sergeant.

Stovall, a retired police deputy chief, said Binkley sent a sergeant and a lieutenant to his home March 29 to ask him whether he knew of any information that would have linked the city manager to a 1978 theft case at the Queen Mary. Stovall, who was then chief of detectives and in charge of the investigation, charged that city officials were fishing to see what he might know that could hurt the city manager.

Stovall said he had “no knowledge of Hankla being implicated in the thefts.”

Hankla denied any involvement in the 12-year-old case. But he said he ordered the investigation himself after Binkley told him that “a credible source” implicated him in the Queen Mary thefts.

Hankla dismissed Stovall’s accusation of harassment, saying that an allegation accusing him of criminal activity was made, and “I think that should be pursued. Otherwise, it would look like a cover-up.”

Times staff writer Bettina Boxall contributed to this story.