Gunman Who Shot Police Officers Tried to Join LAPD

David J. Fukuto, the gunman who shot two Palos Verdes Estates police officers to death this week, was so enraptured with the world of guns and law enforcement that he sought to become a Los Angeles police officer shortly after the 1992 riots, according to city personnel records and the account of a close friend.

“I think he wanted to try to do some good,” said the friend, who shared Fukuto’s passion for guns and often went target shooting with him. “Everybody wants to take the bad guys off the streets.”

Fukuto, 32, who died in the still unexplained attack at a motivational seminar for Palos Verdes Estates police officers and city officials, passed the Los Angeles Police Department’s written exam in June, 1992, and scored a 93 out of 100 on the oral exam a month later, according to city records.

Fukuto’s scores were considered outstanding, but the self-employed life insurance agent did not take subsequent tests or land a job because of a partial hiring freeze and a flood of applicants with Gulf War military experience, a city personnel department spokeswoman said.

Under the city’s hiring rules, veterans of Operation Desert Storm are given a five-point bonus on the police oral exam, enabling some applicants to score above 100.

“He did very well, but it was kind of cutthroat,” said Diana Britt, assistant chief of the department’s Police and Fire Selection Division. “I doubt they hired anyone that year who scored under 98.”

Britt said candidates--particularly minority applicants, who are typically in high demand--are encouraged to retake the oral exam every three months to improve their scores, but Fukuto--who was Japanese American--mysteriously dropped out and never tried again.

Lea Cherry, spokeswoman for the California Commission on Police Officer Standards and Training, which sets regulations for police agencies statewide, said there was no record that Fukuto had received any formal police training or had applied to other police departments, although she said the agency would know only about applications that resulted in official training.

A Hermosa Beach police officer, serving Friday as desk officer at the Palos Verdes Estates Police Department, said the department was consumed with funeral plans for the two slain officers and did not know if Fukuto had ever applied for a job there. A Palos Verdes Estates city employee, who asked not to be identified, said openings in the 23-member Police Department are rare and competition is intense. Last year, the employee said, the city was deluged with more than 300 applications for a civilian job in the department.

According to the close friend who attends Fukuto’s Mid-City Los Angeles church, Fukuto took the LAPD rejection “with a grain of salt” and never spoke of a grudge against law enforcement. The friend said being a cop “wasn’t on the top of his agenda,” but rather a visceral reaction to the lawlessness that followed the state verdicts in the Rodney G. King beating trial in the spring of 1992.

“If he talked of anything it was getting even with gangbangers or drug dealers, but not with cops,” said the friend, who refused to be identified out of respect to Fukuto’s family. “I think everyone has some sort of fantasy about being a cop and he probably did too, but I don’t think he had an obsession.”

Friends said Fukuto gradually had grown more concerned over the years about issues of personal safety and self-defense, once taking a course at El Camino College in defense tactics and later moving to the Mid-City home of his widowed grandmother out of fear for her safety in the sometimes dangerous neighborhood.

Father John Yamazaki, pastor emeritus of St. Mary’s Church, where Fukuto was a member of the board and was honored for his church service the night before the Torrance killings, said Fukuto went searching for his elderly grandmother after she wandered off to watch the looting during the riots. Friends said the riots convinced Fukuto that Los Angeles was a dangerous place to live, and that residents had to be responsible for their own well-being.

One source who asked not to be identified said the bulletproof vest Fukuto wore during the Monday attack had been loaned to him by a friend last year. The source said Fukuto feared that the federal verdicts in the King beating trial would lead to more rioting, and he wanted to be prepared.

“He believed that guns were not evil, that it was the people behind them,” one friend said.

According to friends and acquaintances, Fukuto had a longtime fascination with guns and law and order, something he made no attempt to hide. Police found an extensive gun and ammunition collection at Fukuto’s home, including at least 13 pistols, three rifles and two shotguns.

The close friend said Fukuto received his first rifle from his father, state District Court of Appeal Justice Morio Fukuto, who, in his only statement about the killings, described his son’s actions as terrible and unforgivable and said he could offer no explanation.

“He was just an adventurer type, a gun collector, a shooter,” said one friend who grew up in Fukuto’s childhood neighborhood in Torrance and played paint-ball war games with him in the early 1980s. “He was involved in street racing, and shooting and hunting. He was pretty well-liked.”

The newspaper Rafu Shimpo, which serves the Japanese American community in Los Angeles, reported this week that Fukuto had an hourlong debate over gun control with an acquaintance last Sunday, the day before he killed Capt. Michael Tracy, 50, and Sgt. Vernon Thomas Vanderpool, 57, on the 12th floor of the Torrance Holiday Inn.

Quoting an unidentified source, the newspaper said Fukuto insisted “we need guns to protect ourselves” and at times raised his voice during the debate. The newspaper also said an unidentified source saw Fukuto wearing a blue uniform shortly after graduating from North High School in Torrance. “I remember laughing at him in his blue uniform and black gloves. I think he was trying to be a cop,” the newspaper quoted the source.