LAPD WATCH : Mansion Policing

The Los Angeles Police Department says it has been trying hard to institute the Christopher Commission’s reforms, including community policing. However, some officers may have been doing a little too much community policing in the pricey enclave of Brentwood.

It turns out that LAPD officers were no strangers to the swimming pool and tennis court at the Brentwood estate of O. J. Simpson, now the defendant in a massively publicized murder trial. Dozens were hangers-on, hangers-out, part-time bodyguards and sometime groupies. Indeed, a Times story on Thursday details a pattern of cloying attentiveness that only can hurt the image of a Police Department that complains it is saddled with inadequate personnel numbers and resources.

Did the years of fraternization with Simpson cause the department to extend to him liberties denied the ordinary citizen? It’s quite disturbing that one LAPD member--although the action apparently does not constitute official misconduct--even bought for Simpson the pistol that the ex-football star cradled in the famous Bronco ride.

All this should make for sober reading at Parker Center, and it should raise questions: Do others among the elite get similar treatment? Does community policing mean one thing in South Los Angeles and quite another in Brentwood? Off-duty officers have every right to their private lives; on duty, socializing is another matter. Hobnobbing with celebs may be one form of community outreach, but we think that’s not what the Christopher Commission had in mind.