Amnesty International to Probe L.A.

Two officials from the Amnesty International organization are scheduled to arrive here from England next Monday to investigate allegations of brutality in the Los Angeles Police and Los Angeles County Sheriff’s departments.

Ian Martin, secretary general of the human rights group, said in a letter Thursday to City Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky that Rod Morgan and Angela Wright intend to “collect information on the scale and nature of complaints as well as procedures for investigating alleged abuses.”

Wright is a staff member of the London-based group’s international secretariat. Morgan is a professor of criminal justice at Bristol University in England.

Similar letters have been sent to Police Chief Daryl F. Gates and Sheriff Sherman Block. Their offices said both men have agreed to cooperate with Amnesty International’s inquiry.

Both agencies have been under fire for alleged brutality since the televised beating of motorist Rodney G. King by LAPD officers last March and the shooting of several unarmed suspects by sheriff’s deputies.

According to the Associated Press, Amnesty International is also investigating several other police agencies across the nation.

Yaroslavsky said that when the letter from the group arrived, “My first reaction was dismay.”

“It seemed as though what was happening here was being put in same category with the things that happened under Gen. (Augusto) Pinochet in Chile and (the late President Ferdinand) Marcos in the Philippines,” Yaroslavsky said. “But on reflection, I thought it was a legitimate line of inquiry by Amnesty International. . . . It gives us an opportunity to explore their concerns.”

The councilman added: “In a democracy, we don’t sweep our problems under the rug.”

Roger Rathman, a local spokesman for the organization, said he had little information about Amnesty International’s scheduled inquiry because allegations of human rights violations are investigated by delegates from outside the nation in which they are said to have occurred.

“I have no idea about what they’re doing,” he said. “They seldom let us in on such things.”

Rathman said that, in general, delegates from his group decline public comment during their investigations.

“The decision to investigate is made by the research staff in London,” he said. “The (investigators) spend whatever time they deem necessary. Then they take their material back to London for analysis. That can take a year or more. Then they issue a written statement.”

Amnesty International officials in London were not immediately available for comment.