Officers Offer Support for Gates Amid More Attacks

The Los Angeles Police Department closed ranks around Chief Daryl F. Gates on Wednesday, blasting his critics, praising his leadership and urging him not to submit to the “lynch-mob mentality” by resigning.

In a powerful show of support, nearly 60 commanding officers--among them Assistant Chief Robert Vernon and at least three deputy chiefs--held a news conference at the Police Academy to vigorously defend Gates’ handling of the police beating of an Altadena man.

At one point, Deputy Chief William Booth defiantly held up an American Civil Liberties Union newspaper advertisement that calls for the chief to quit. Booth had drawn a red circle and a slash over the ad; waving it in front of television cameras, he urged residents to “tear it out and put your own little hieroglyphics on it and then mail it to Chief Gates.”

The high-ranking officers were joined by the Los Angeles Police Protective League, a union that has often been at odds with Gates. The league’s president, Lt. George Aliano, announced he is sending ballots this week asking its 8,200 members to issue a vote of confidence for the chief.

Gates was not on hand to hear the remarks, but he addressed the group afterward as the keynote speaker at the Los Angeles County Peace Officers Assn.’s annual “LAPD Day” luncheon. The chief, who was greeted with a 30-second standing ovation, used the platform to deliver a rousing speech that served as a morale builder for his officers.

Before the enthusiastic crowd of 300, Gates called the Police Department “the greatest department in the country” and ripped into his critics, particularly the press and the ACLU. He held up the department’s handbook on human relations and declared that the civil liberties group had “violated every precept of human relations that we set forth.”

Then, ticking them off one by one, Gates thundered: “Objectivity! Do you see any objectivity at all? . . . Courtesy! Anything courteous about them? Compassion! Have they shown one ounce of compassion? . . . Prejudice! They are so prejudiced against police. They hate us and clearly they hate me. I know that, and I don’t blame them for hating me, but I blame them for hating you.”

Meanwhile, civil rights leaders stepped up their attacks on Gates. With more than 200 letters calling for the chief’s ouster before them, the ACLU and other civil rights groups announced “Operation Overhaul,” a nine-point campaign to end police brutality and push Gates out of office. The first step, they said, will be to press for a blue-ribbon panel to conduct an independent review of the Police Department.

“We intend to keep up the pressure,” said Ramona Ripston, executive director of the ACLU of Southern California. “We think that Gates must resign. . . . And to those people to say to me that he has steadfastly said that he won’t resign, I remind you that Richard Nixon said the same thing.”

As the barbs flew back and forth, the Los Angeles County Grand Jury met for the third day to consider evidence against the officers involved in the March 3 beating of Rodney G. King. The grand jury, which may finish by the end of this week, met for four hours Wednesday.

The beating of King, an unemployed construction worker who is on parole after a robbery conviction, touched off a nationwide furor after it was captured on videotape by an amateur photographer. The tape showed King, who had been pulled over by police in Lake View Terrace after allegedly leading them on a high-speed chase, being kicked by several officers, who also hit him as many as 56 times with their batons.

King is scheduled to undergo surgery today at an undisclosed hospital to repair injuries he suffered during the beating. His doctor, Edmund Chein, said new tests show that bones at the base of King’s skull are broken in nine places on the right side and two on the left.

Chein said two of the five doctors who are treating King “have never seen this before. It’s unusual even to us. The force of the blows was tremendous.”

The Los Angeles Police Commission will conduct a special hearing today to gather community reaction about the King case. Commissioner Melanie Lomax said the panel, which has the authority to change departmental policies and practices, has been inundated with calls about the incident.

In their remarks Wednesday, Gates and the officers who supported him deplored the beating. The chief went so far as to apologize to other law enforcement agencies “because we have brought shame and dishonor on the police profession.”

Cmdr. Lorne Kramer, president of the Los Angeles Police Command Officers Assn., a 96-member group made up of officers who carry the rank of captain and above, said policemen and women “deserve the community’s support, for they too have been betrayed by a few of their own.”

Kramer and Aliano, the Police Protective League president, said they would fight attempts by Mayor Tom Bradley to make police chiefs subject to dismissal by the mayor after a five-year performance review. Kramer said such a move would make the chief a “puppet of political special interest and nepotism,” and Aliano said he was “appalled” at the mayor.

Gates, who also said he opposes the mayor’s plan, seemed clearly touched by the show of support, especially from the union. As the crowd clapped, he opened his speech by remarking on the press conference:

“How does the song go? The wind beneath my wings? That’s what you are. You are the wind beneath my wings. If I were a much stronger guy, I would break down and cry because that’s the way I feel.”

Times staff writers George Ramos, Lois Timnick, Hector Tobar and Tracy Wood contributed to this story.

VIEWS ON POLICE BRUTALITY CASE

One out of every four Americans say their image of Los Angeles has been tarnished by the beating of Rodney G. King, according to a Los Angeles Times national poll conducted March 9 through 11. Some findings from the poll: * The survey of 1,518 adults found widespread awareness of the incident across the nation, with nearly nine in 10 (88%) saying that they had heard or read something about the beating of King by Los Angeles police officers.

* Of those surveyed, about one-quarter (27%) of the public said the incident made them feel “less favorable” toward the city of Los Angeles. Half of the public (49%) said their feelings about Los Angeles were unchanged by what happened to King, while another 12% did not feel they knew enough about the situation to judge it. The other 12% said they were unaware of the incident altogether.

The survey has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.