Was Police Investigation an Empty Ritual, or Will It Bring Change? : The Times asked a diverse group of people, most of them Los Angeles residents, to comment on the report of the Christopher Commission. The following commentaries are taken from the interviews. : Get Up and Say It

The first thing is to acknowledge the problems exist. I’m not sure I see that coming from Gates. He needs to get in front of a camera and say, “We haven’t been treating the citizens of L.A. the way they should be treated. We’re not as attentive to minorities as we can be, and we’re going to correct that.”

The first thing that struck me in the Christopher Commission report was the officers’ unfettered use of MDTs (mobile digital terminals) to transmit racist comments to each other, apparently not concerned about leaving a trail. That this behavior occurred and no one reacted to it was most damaging. There are no hard-and-fast rules, but if we were able to track those kinds of comments there would be discipline. If you had a 20-year veteran and it was a first offense, he might be brought in and counseled. A first-year rookie might be fired.

When we got a new director at Metro-Dade (Police Department in Greater Miami, Fla.), he got us all in a room and said he wanted changes and he directed us to come up with programs. We’re not there yet, but we’re making progress.