Judge Orders Council to Release Vote Record in Police Brutality Case

A federal judge Tuesday ordered the Los Angeles City Council to release a computerized record of its vote to give monetary aid to police officers ordered to pay a brutality judgment--setting the stage for a trial that could make council members financially liable, as individuals, for police misconduct.

The computer printout documenting the council’s action on April 22, 1992, is but one small part of a complicated case stemming from a shootout in which Los Angeles police killed three robbers and wounded a fourth as they fled a McDonald’s restaurant in Sunland.

But the lawyer who won access to the official record, Stephen Yagman, says it should help prove his claim that the council fostered a policy of police brutality when it voted to have the city pay punitive damages that an earlier trial had assessed against the officers in the 1990 incident.

An attorney for the City Council said it would be no problem to comply with the pretrial ruling by U. S. District Court Judge J. Spencer Letts, who ordered that the computer record be immediately turned over to Yagman.

“We’re happy to give it to them,” said Skip Miller, who called the dispute over the record a non-issue. “It’s always been a non-issue. It’s no secret that the council voted” to pay the damages itself, Miller said.

A trial is scheduled to begin next Tuesday in the case, which was filed on behalf of 4-year-old Johanna Trevino, daughter of one of the slain men. Yagman, who specializes in brutality cases against police, contends that council members owe the girl punitive damages out of their own pockets because of their vote relieving the officers of the obligation to pay the damages personally.

“Actually, I think they owe the public more than the kid,” Yagman said Tuesday.

He said he has tried in vain to obtain an exact record of the vote, which he said was originally contained in a public file, then removed and stamped “privileged.”

“I think I know the vote, but I want proof,” Yagman said.

Miller said the vote was privileged information because it was taken during a private--or executive--session of the council and pertained to a legal matter. Besides, other city attorneys have said, Yagman could establish the vote simply by questioning council members under oath during his pretrial preparations.

But Yagman said that most council members he has deposed so far have claimed they cannot remember how they voted on the issue, or they have given conflicting accounts of the now-significant session.

The council acted following a federal jury verdict assessing about $44,000 in punitive damages against then-Police Chief Daryl F. Gates and the nine officers involved in the fatal shooting.

Jurors said they deliberately kept the amount low--$44,000 among the 10 defendants--because they wanted the police themselves to pay the damages, instead of the usual practice of the city treasury picking up such judgments against officers for actions on duty.

When the council voted to pay the award anyway, Yagman filed a new suit on behalf of the Trevino girl, arguing that by agreeing to shield the officers from the jury’s financial penalty, the council members condoned police brutality. His suit seeks unspecified damages from council members personally.

The council tried to have the case dismissed, citing the longstanding legal doctrine that legislators are immune from personal lawsuits over their official actions, and taking the matter all the way to the U. S. Supreme Court.

But last month, the high court let stand a lower court ruling that City Council members indeed can be sued individually for using taxpayers’ money to pay for police brutality judgments.