LAPD Reorganizing Handling of Sexual Harassment Complaints : Law enforcement: Chief says steps began before disclosure of sweeping investigation at West Los Angeles station. New unit may be formed.

The Los Angeles Police Department, aggressively trying to demonstrate resolve on the issue of sexual harassment, is reorganizing its system for handling harassment complaints and may launch a department-wide audit to determine the full extent of the problem, LAPD leaders said Tuesday.

In the coming weeks, Police Chief Willie L. Williams said he intends to propose creating a specialized group to handle sexual harassment issues as well as other complaints of bias or discrimination. LAPD critics have long complained that female officers feel uncomfortable reporting harassment to Internal Affairs or through other department channels, partly because they fear retaliation.

“There are a lot of things that we have already started,” said Williams, who emphasized that the reorganization was under way before news reports last week disclosing the existence of a massive LAPD inquiry into allegations of sexual harassment at the West Los Angeles police station. “To change people’s views, to change people’s actions . . . takes more than six months or a year.”

Police Commission President Gary Greenebaum applauded Williams’ efforts to combat sexual harassment, crediting the chief with authorizing the audit of the West Los Angeles station and with aggressively attempting to reform the department’s handling of handling harassment complaints.

“The most important aspect of this is what is done from the top,” Greenebaum said. “There is no better way for him to signal that change is in the offing. Change is here; it’s happening now.”

Although Williams did not comment in detail about the West Los Angeles inquiry, he told members of the Police Commission that the department is “very concerned about backlash” against employees who cooperated in that inquiry. Williams said he advised senior LAPD officers last week when he learned that news reports were about to disclose details of the inquiry. Those officers raised the issue at roll calls in West Los Angeles, Williams added, in order to inform officers that their rights will be protected.

The West Los Angeles audit, which is nearly complete, involved interviews with more than 100 police officers. Sources say it found a number of instances of sexual harassment at the station and concluded that the environment there had become uncomfortable for many female officers.

Despite their protestations of innocence, two veteran police officers have been transferred out of West Los Angeles. Administrative action against them and other officers who either harassed women or tolerated harassment by others is being considered, according to LAPD sources.

The chief’s comments Tuesday came as leaders of several organizations called on the Police Department to reform its handling of sexual harassment allegations.

Carol Sobel, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, said she has six clients who either have filed lawsuits or are preparing to press legal action against the department on sexual harassment-related grounds. She said the department’s historically slow response to such allegations “sends out the wrong type of message--that if you drag these out long enough, you can get away with it.”

Sobel said complaints of sexual harassment abound within the LAPD. Female officers at the West Los Angeles station have filed a number of complaints in recent times, as have officers in other divisions, she said.

Although Sobel credited Williams with moving the department in the right direction on sexual harassment, she warned that simply creating a unit to investigate complaints will not solve the problem. She said that if the unit is made up of officers from Internal Affairs, some women may not trust it, and added that any unit must be equipped with a timetable for investigating and resolving disputes so that they do not linger unresolved for months.

Penny Harrington, a leader of the Women’s Advisory Council to the Police Commission, commended the LAPD for its inquiry at the West Los Angeles station and for its efforts to prevent officers who cooperated with that inquiry from being punished. But she said harassment remains widespread, and she urged the LAPD to expand its internal inquiry to include all 18 divisions.

“We would hope that this would continue,” she said.

Williams would not commit to a timetable for launching such an inquiry, but said after the meeting that “we will be moving forward in that direction.”

Greenebaum stopped short of endorsing a departmentwide audit, but said he would support new training techniques to drive home the need for special care on the issue of sexual harassment.

“As the department prepares to absorb large numbers of female officers, we have to make a commitment to the right kind of working environment,” he said. “We need to do the training of everyone so that these problems no longer exist.”