PROFILE / MARK A. KROEKER : Making Believers Out of the Skeptics : Police: The assistant chief is one of 32 candidates seeking Daryl Gates’ job.

Decades before he became the Valley’s top police official, Mark A. Kroeker was a missionary’s son in Zaire, where his nearly white blond hair was an object of fascination and pity for his African playmates.

“They said they felt sorry for me because God had overlooked me when he handed out color,” Kroeker recalled recently, conspicuous again as he drove through a blighted neighborhood in an immaculate, police-issue sedan.

But the experience served the 47-year-old Kroeker well, leaving him with the willingness to see himself through the eyes of others, especially as he strives to restore public confidence and boost morale among officers in the aftermath of the Rodney G. King case.

From boardrooms to barrios to black churches, Kroeker, a police chief candidate, has been seeking out residents of the increasingly diverse San Fernando Valley and trying to stand briefly in their shoes as they speak of rising crime and seemingly ineffective, sometimes brutal police.

In the nine months since he took command of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Valley Bureau, he has assigned 31 officers to full-time community relations work, signed up more than 300 volunteers as liaisons between their neighborhoods and the police and increased the number of minority officers and commanders in the Foothill Division, the patrol area where black motorist King was beaten in an incident that became a national symbol of police brutality.

He has also set up a bilingual committee to improve relations between police and Latinos who don’t speak English, spent two Saturdays leading scores of volunteers in painting over graffiti, and made plans with the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith for a police-civilian team to comfort victims of hate crimes.

He has even ordered that plants and sofas be placed in the Valley’s five police stations to make visitors feel more welcome--a gesture that some hard-core veterans have dismissed as “fern bars.”

But it is in countless meetings and news conferences where Kroeker has launched his biggest effort, tirelessly extolling the theme that police and civilians must mine their “human power” and “synergy” to become “partners” against crime. A devout fundamentalist Christian who lectures private groups on communications skills, Kroeker somehow combines a missionary’s zeal with industrial psychology with New Age, bumper sticker-style slogans to carry his message.

“Let’s forget about words like us and them and focus on that zone that we call we ,” he is fond of saying.

How his programs will affect the Valley’s rising crime rate remains to be seen. Some veterans have privately voiced concern that Kroeker’s community-based policing efforts are pulling too many patrol officers off the street.

But so far, Kroeker seems to have eased mistrust and impressed skeptics with his sincerity--no small feat in the post-King era of intense scrutiny and criticism.

“He has re-established confidence in the Police Department, respect for policemen and most of all minimized the fear that what happened to Rodney King could happen to any of us,” said the Rev. James V. Lyles, pastor of First United Methodist Church in Pacoima, an African-American congregation, and past president of the San Fernando Valley Ministers Alliance.

Lyles and other activists credited Kroeker for returning phone calls, meeting with them at any time, putting them at ease and following up on their questions and concerns.

“I did not believe the guy,” said Fred Taylor, a black businessman and founder of a civic organization called Focus 90. “But every time I’ve talked to someone who knows him they said this is the Kroeker of five years ago, 10 years ago, 15 years ago. He’s just a genuine human being. I have the utmost respect for him.”

A tall, gangly man with a boyish smile, Kroeker is among 32 applicants for chief of police. True to his painfully earnest personality and a penchant for news conferences, he announced his plans instead of simply applying for the post.

Now, Kroeker concedes, he sometimes regrets his candor and fears that he might have only invited questions about his motives each time he unveils a new plan.

“After Rodney King, people would say, ‘Are you doing this because of Rodney King?’ Now, people ask me if I’m doing something because I’m a candidate,” Kroeker laments.

“Well, no,” he continues, as if carrying on an internal debate. “I’m doing it because it’s the right thing.”

The candidates will be whittled down to 10 or 15 next month. The top six contenders, to be scored numerically in interviews with a citizens panel, will be forwarded to the Los Angeles Police Commission for the final cut.

As commander of the department’s 1,500 Valley officers, Kroeker has already embraced key reforms recommended by the Christopher Commission, the panel that studied the department after the King beating. His community-based policing plan, in which officers collaborate with civilians on crime prevention, preceded by six months a similar proposal adopted by the City Council.

Kroeker is characteristically diplomatic when discussing controversial Police Department matters, defending the department while at the same time saying that policies should be continually reviewed because “nothing is above reproach.”

For example, he does not favor reviving the chokehold, a restraint method abandoned in 1982 after opponents blamed it for 17 deaths in seven years, although the causes in most cases remained in dispute. Some officers, including the field sergeant indicted in the King beating, argue that the chokehold would have precluded the extensive use of batons in that incident. But Kroeker said he was persuaded that the chokehold’s pressure on the larynx was too dangerous.

He added that he would like to see a more moderate type of hold, the carotid hold, studied for possible expanded use. Its current use in the department is limited to life-threatening encounters, he said.

Kroeker also defended the department’s Special Investigations Section, the controversial undercover surveillance squad whose officers killed three robbers and wounded a fourth about two years ago after watching them hold up a McDonald’s restaurant manager at gunpoint. Thirty-five shots were fired at the four as they climbed into a getaway car in the Sunland restaurant’s parking lot.

Kroeker declined to evaluate the squad’s actions in that case, citing a pending civil suit. But he said of the SIS in general that it is “well-trained, well-staffed; the people are good people. Their assignment is a very, very difficult one and I think an essential one. . . . I think their strategy has been misunderstood many times because they are also very low key and don’t talk about it. They’re unsung in many ways.”

Though Kroeker is a well-respected police manager who has steadily risen through the ranks during 26 years on the force, his chances of becoming chief are questionable, say police sources and even Kroeker himself.

Mindful of the King beating and city demographics that show an increasingly nonwhite population, some city officials and activists have urged that a black or Latino lead the 8,300-officer force. Some have also suggested that it might be time to choose a chief from another city because the King beating so tarnished the Police Department’s credibility.

Kroeker says he is going about his job as if he will be staying in the Valley, and that he will back whoever is chosen.

“I think the chances are excellent for someone outside the department,” he said. “If so, fine, I’ll support her/him and let’s roll.”

He began his assignment in the Valley on March 11, the same week that four Foothill Division officers were indicted for King’s beating. Although he is careful not to publicly discuss the pending criminal trial of the four officers, Kroeker confided to 30-year friend Alfred Garcia of Tempe, Ariz., that he was repulsed when he watched an amateur photographer’s videotape of the March 3 beating in Lake View Terrace.

“That made him sick,” said Garcia, a bill collector who met Kroeker before he became a police officer when the two were working nights at United California Bank. They have remained friends, staying in touch monthly by phone and occasionally hunting together.

“He said, ‘You know, Al, we prepare ourselves for this. But when I saw this, it was just horrible. More than likely these police officers deserve to go to jail.’ ”

A surprising thing for a cop to say, maybe, but Kroeker is a cop full of surprises.

He still speaks the French he learned as a child in the Belgian Congo and Europe, listens to classical music in his office and car, and never swears. Garcia recalled how Kroeker once missed a target on a hunting trip and uttered, simply, “Oh, fudge.”

Despite the stresses of police work, a job known for a high incidence of divorce, he has been married to his “wife for life,” Diane for 26 1/2 years. Their three children, ages 24, 23 and 20, are pursuing careers in literature, international relations and music--Kroeker’s first choice of vocations until, by his own account, he flunked out of Biola College.

Later, Kroeker obtained a bachelor’s degree in police science and administration from Cal State Los Angeles and a master’s degree in public administration from USC.

His parents were Mennonites, members of an evangelical religious sect that eschews secular life and military service. When he joined the Police Department in 1965, Kroeker said, his family was appalled at the prospect of him carrying a gun.

His parents eventually forgave and came to respect his choice of careers, which drew him because of its “combination of exciting work and service-orientation.” But truth be told, Kroeker is still more dove than hawk. He confessed once to failing to qualify with his weapon, and friend Garcia said he treats hunting more as a camping trip than a chance to conquer game.

In the Police Department, Kroeker had about five years of field experience as a patrolman, sergeant and detective before he was promoted into management before the age of 30. Named one of six deputy chiefs in 1988, he is known as a tireless worker, a man of integrity and a fair, effective manager sympathetic to his troops.

That reputation was borne out on a recent, typically grueling day in which Kroeker rose before dawn, ran six miles to clear his head and was out the door of his Santa Clarita Valley home by 7 a.m.--talking to a gang expert on his car phone while balancing a mug of coffee and a clipboard of notes.

First stop was the Foothill Division to check on a series of searches at gang members’ homes. One aim was to make sure the houses were “searched but not ransacked,” Kroeker said, as he peered from one room into another, chatting briefly with handcuffed suspects and their pajama-clad relatives.

Another was clearly to boost the morale of his officers, who seemed to genuinely appreciate the gesture.

In one home searched as part of a drive-by shooting investigation, a teen-ager’s belongings included Police Department recruitment brochures as well as a fully loaded, 12-gauge shotgun.

“Remember, chief, we’re an equal opportunity employer!” one officer quipped, drawing bittersweet laughter from his colleagues and Kroeker.

“The chief is a good guy,” Officer Victor Colello said as weapons and drug paraphernalia were marked as evidence. “It’s unusual to see someone so high-ranking come out. I’d like to see him as chief, but good guys usually don’t make it.”

Later, Kroeker demonstrated the same easy rapport with a radio disc jockey with long hair and an earring. He had driven to a Valley radio station to record two 30-second spots to thank participants in Operation Sparkle II, one of his massive graffiti cleanup projects.

“Seventeen-hundred, forty-seven gallons of paint--that sounds better than one thousand, seven hundred and forty-seven, doesn’t it?” Kroeker asked deejay Dave Baker as he labored over his tiny ad.

“Hi, this is Deputy Police Chief Mark Kroeker. Do you hate graffiti? Well, so do I . . . “ he began self-consciously.

“Oh,” Kroeker groaned, about to mimic himself. “This is where I’ll flub and dub: ‘Do you hate graffiti? I don’t!’ ”

“The main thing I like about the guy is that he can laugh at himself,” said Capt. Paul Jefferson, a black patrol captain who Kroeker assigned to the Foothill Division after the King incident. Jefferson worked with Kroeker in the department’s Personnel and Training Division as his adjutant, or administrative assistant.

“In the office sometimes, as time permitted, he’d pull a joke on somebody or he could be on the butt end of the joke. People felt very comfortable being around him,” Jefferson said.

After a 10-hour day with as many appointments, Kroeker headed downtown for his off-duty work: a board meeting of a charity he founded called the World Children’s Transplant Fund. The private, nonprofit group provides training and technology to hospitals in Third World countries so children can receive organ transplants close to home.

So far, the 2-year-old group has founded pediatric transplant clinics in Argentina, Costa Rica and Moscow, where Kroeker and board member Steve Getzoff traveled together last summer.

Getzoff, an Encino accountant, said Kroeker has repeatedly defied his own “stereotypical prejudice . . . that anybody who’s a deputy chief of the LAPD is going to be a Daryl Gates persona.

“This guy was just so sincere and so genuine I was frankly somewhat disbelieving,” Getzoff said. “I mean, can this be for real? As I’ve gotten to know him, this is the real guy.”

Kroeker says he tries to live out his faith and pattern his life after Christ: “His care for the downtrodden, His intensity of kindness, His focus on a given mission, His disturbing of a system if it needed it.

“I don’t say I’m like Christ,” Kroeker continued. “I’m saying that’s what I want to be like.”

He is uncomfortable discussing religion because of the controversy it has brought Assistant Chief Robert L. Vernon, who became the subject of an internal investigation earlier this year into allegations that his fundamentalist Christian beliefs interfered with his police work.

Gates cleared Vernon of any wrongdoing, and Vernon has filed a $10-million civil rights lawsuit alleging religious persecution against several city officials.

Kroeker is a member of the same congregation, Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, was Vernon’s assistant for 2 1/2 years, and described Vernon as one of several Police Department mentors. But Kroeker said he is careful not to discuss his beliefs on the job, or to inquire about those of his staff.

“In fact, I have counseled officers to avoid doing that--to avoid, while on duty, speaking directly about their faith . . . for reasons that are obvious,” Kroeker said.

One police source said Kroeker has tried to distance himself from Vernon and began doing so even before the debate erupted over Vernon’s religious activism.

Although Kroeker delighted members of the Ministers Alliance by praying with them, several lay activists said the subject of religion has never been raised. Getzoff, who is Jewish, said he didn’t learn of Kroeker’s beliefs until they traveled together last summer.

Even then, Getzoff said, he was the one to bring up religion and Kroeker did not proselytize.

Kroeker has largely avoided controversy, but he is a defendant in a pending federal lawsuit alleging that a female officer was placed under psychiatric observation against her will.

The plaintiff, Jacqueline Boyer, was under Kroeker’s command in the Personnel and Training Division when she was arrested at her San Dimas home on Dec. 16, 1989, admitted to two psychiatric wards and held for observation for 72 hours.

The suit alleges that Kroeker was among a dozen Police Department officers and sheriff’s deputies summoned to Boyer’s home after a violent argument with her former roommate, Officer Donna Cox.

Boyer’s attorney, Gregory G. Petersen of Orange, said Kroeker’s actions at the scene were still under review, but “we believe he was responsible for her commitment.”

Kroeker said Boyer was “handled correctly in my view and very delicately and very professionally, but I cannot get into it.” He declined to discuss the case further.

Three years ago, Kroeker was the subject of an internal investigation into an allegation that he used his official position to garner a favor at Los Angeles International Airport.

Although the department has refused to discuss the investigation, Kroeker said he received a written reprimand from Gates that went into his personnel file.

According to Kroeker, in the fall of 1988, he and a former member of his charity’s board were bound for St. Louis for a series of crucial fund-raising meetings and missed their plane.

They found another flight with available seats, prevailed upon airport security to drive them to the gate, but nearly missed that plane when Kroeker’s associate argued with an airline employee over carry-on luggage. Kroeker said he persuaded the pilot to let them board.

He denied delaying the flight or citing a police emergency. But he acknowledged identifying himself as a deputy police chief while speaking with the pilot.

“Where I erred was in even identifying myself at all,” Kroeker said.

Once again, seeing himself through outsiders’ eyes and taking stock.

“Set the example as I do that to you, then you can be leaders to the community,” Kroeker told a group of traffic officers at a training seminar.

“The worst word in the English language is the ‘H’ word,” he told them. “Hypocrite.”

Biography

Name: Mark A. Kroeker

Age: 47

Position: Deputy Los Angeles police chief, in command of the Valley Bureau.

Latest accomplishment: Implementing community-based policing throughout the Valley by assigning 31 officers to work full time with civilians on crime prevention programs, and signing up about 300 volunteers to be liaisons between their neighborhoods and the police.

Career goal: He is among 32 applicants for chief of police.

Characteristic quote: “Let’s forget about words like us and them and focus on that zone that we call we .”