LAPD Chief to Seek Private Donations for His Legal Bill : Fund raising: Williams to name committee to oversee effort to pay off $60,805 tab resulting from ethics inquiry.

Los Angeles Police Chief Willie L. Williams, after initially inquiring about the city paying the tab, plans to ask private donors to help him pay a $60,805 legal bill stemming from his successful campaign to overturn a reprimand by the Police Commission.

“In my view, it is unfair to burden my family and me with the cost of these legal expenses,” Williams wrote in an Aug. 7 letter to the City Ethics Commission, outlining his plans to establish what amounts to a legal defense fund.

“For this reason, and rather than making a claim on the city’s already stretched budget for this amount, I wish to name a committee of private citizens to undertake a fund-raising effort in my behalf to pay these fees,” the chief stated.

The legal fees arose last spring as Williams sought to defend himself against various allegations of improprieties, including accepting free lodging at Las Vegas hotels and misusing city phone privileges.

The Police Commission reprimanded the chief for lying to its members about whether he had ever obtained free Las Vegas lodgings. But the commission’s decision, while upheld by Mayor Richard Riordan, was overturned by the Los Angeles City Council in June.

On Tuesday, Williams underscored his intent to raise the money privately. “I’m not asking the taxpayers to pay my legal fees,” he said in an interview.

But Williams acknowledged that before making that decision, he wrote City Atty. James Hahn’s office inquiring about the procedures for requesting that the city pay his bills.

However, in a July 18 letter from the city attorney’s office, the chief’s June 27 letter is characterized as a request for payment, not just an inquiry about how to make such a request.

“In his letter, the chief requests that the city pay his ‘legal expenses,’ and certain reasons are set forth in support of that request,” the letter from Hahn’s office says. The city attorney’s office refused to comment Tuesday on its dealings with Williams in the matter.

To receive payment from the city, Williams would have to file a claim with the City Council, Hahn’s office advised the chief in the letter.

The 1991 case of former Chief Daryl F. Gates was also cited in the reply. Gates asked that the city pay his legal fees arising from the Police Commission’s attempt to place him on leave of absence while it investigated the Rodney G. King beating. That request was successfully opposed by Hahn.

Williams refused to characterize the city attorney’s reply as throwing cold water on his inquiries about city payment of his fees. But he acknowledged that some City Council members had advised him against pursuing a claim.

“One [council member] said I should proceed, others said maybe that I shouldn’t,” he said.

“I made no formal request to be paid by the city. . . . My decision not to go to the city for payment was [based on] what I considered right and appropriate.”

Although Williams refused to call it so, his attorney, Melanie Lomax, said it was unfair for him to have to foot the costs of defending himself against rumors that were never substantiated.

“It was a pretty shallow victory for him,” Lomax said. “This bill represents more than half of his take-home pay for one year. Here’s a case where the commission launches an unprecedented investigation of the chief based on rumors and he is cleared and then he has this bill to pay.”