Officers May Face Charges in Probe : Police: Gates says one will be indicted ‘for sure’ and others may be named as part of a federal investigation of alleged drug-money skimming. Six sheriff’s deputies already have been convicted.

At least one Los Angeles Police Department narcotics officer will be indicted and as many as three others may also face criminal charges in a federal probe of alleged drug-money skimming, Police Chief Daryl F. Gates said Thursday.

Gates told a City Hall news conference that one officer will be indicted “for sure” by the grand jury and “four at the most” may eventually be charged in a corruption investigation that has already led to the conviction of six Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies for stealing drug money confiscated in raids.

The money-skimming investigation of the sheriff’s deputies, which began two years ago, spawned a similar federal inquiry into the activities of narcotics officers in the Police Department.

Gates said his department has conducted a probe into the allegations against the four officers.

“There’s only one (officer) that we think is involved in the same way as the sheriffs. . . . The other three have other problems and whether or not they’ll be indicted, I don’t know,” Gates said.

The police chief did not identify the officers but said that the one who faces certain indictment had worked with sheriff’s deputies on a special anti-drugs task force.

That task force, known as the Southwest Region Distribution Crew, was formed by the Sheriff’s Department in September, 1986, to investigate mid-level drug traffickers in Southwest Los Angeles. After Police Department officers joined the crew four months later, the nine-member task force stepped up their pursuit of major rock-cocaine dealers, including a suspect named Ricky Donnell Ross.

During the seven-week trial of the deputies, former Sheriff’s Sgt. Robert R. Sobel--who once supervised the Southwest crew and is cooperating with federal prosecutors--testified that the deputies and police officers under his command routinely beat drug suspects, stole money from them, planted narcotics on Ross and others and lied in reports to cover up their activities.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Thomas Emmick, who has been overseeing the federal probe, refused comment on Gates’ statements or the grand jury investigation.

But the police chief indicated that his department’s Internal Affairs Division has cooperated with federal prosecutors.

“We pretty much completed our investigation some time ago and we have been supplying that information to the U.S. attorney and he, in turn, has been supplying it to the federal grand jury,” Gates said.

If the grand jury does not indict some of the police officers, Gates said the department may still seek charges against the officers under state law.

“We are certainly looking at that possibility,” he said. “There may be a statute (of limitations) problem here or there. . . . If the federal grand jury does not do anything, we will certainly follow up with the district attorney.”

A district attorney’s spokesman said that office is not conducting any current investigation into any of the police officers or sheriff’s deputies. But he said local prosecutors would review any case brought by the Police Department.

“If we feel it warrants prosecution then we will proceed vigorously,” spokesman Mike Botula said.

Prosecutors have already sent letters to defense attorneys in an undetermined number of pending and closed drug cases involving the Southwest crew.

But Curtis A. Hazell, chief of the district attorney’s major narcotics and forfeiture division, said the federal investigation involves “a very limited number of people who were believed to be part of a joint task force that worked with Sobel’s mid-level crew.”

Unlike the sheriff’s deputies who have been relieved of duty, the police officers under investigation remain on the job, although they have been transferred from narcotics assignments to other tasks.

Asked about Gates’ comments, a lawyer for the police union said none of the officers would respond.

“We’ll have to wait until the outcome of the investigation,” said Enrique Hernandez, associate general counsel for the Los Angeles Police Protective League.

According to sources close to the Police Department, the internal investigation has branched out from its initial focus on the task force officers to include other officers who have been involved in narcotics cases.

“They’ve turned the place upside down,” said one source, “but the other things they have found do not involve ripping off any money, or anything as serious as that--at least, so far.”