South Pasadena’s G-Rated Image Undergoes a Change

Before a series of scandalous events involving its police and government made headlines this month, South Pasadena seemed immune to the incivilities of our times--or at least able to keep news of its troubles locked behind the doors of its cozy bungalows.

Here, just a 15-minute drive from downtown Los Angeles, picture shows start with the parting of velvet curtains in a theater with balcony seats. The pharmacy delivers, but those who stop in can sip a lime rickey or chocolate phosphate at the soda fountain.

Its population of 24,000 can’t fill a quarter of the Rose Bowl, but keeps a dozen antique shops in business. The entire downtown is on the National Register of Historic Places.

With roots as deep as those of the oaks that form canopies shading the town’s streets, the South Pasadena way of life has produced some splendid results: crime is low, school test scores are high.

But heavenly South Pasadena crashed to earth this month.

A city official accused of embezzling quit. On-duty police officers are reported to have engaged in bawdy conduct, and another officer--the son-in-law of a former mayor--allegedly sped away from an off-duty hit-and-run accident.

South Pasadenans have been hit over the head with the kind of news that usually comes up in other places, and it smarts. There’s no more denying it, something’s rotten in Our Town.

“The predominant feeling is sadness,” said City Council member Dick Richards, who like other residents defended the city’s finest. “There’s a lot of good officers and we shouldn’t make a bad generalization based on a few.”

Standing behind rows of penny candy jars in his wife’s Family Fair gift shop, Richards pointed out that the problems seem worse because big-city indifference has yet to overtake South Pasadena. “If these things had happened in New York city or Los Angeles they might not be that significant, but this is such a close-knit community.”

So close, in fact, that many residents interviewed refused to say anything critical of the city or its officials on the record, fearing not retaliation, but harm to long-standing social relationships.

“It’s a fishbowl. Everybody knows everybody and everybody’s business,” said Diana McGrail, an 18-year resident.

But if all were aware of one another’s business, whatever hanky-panky there was remained concealed--until this month when the carefully cultivated, G-rated image was marred by NC-17 events.

Theresa Goldston, 27, has claimed to have had intimate relations with seven of the Police Department’s 35 sworn officers, including two who were on duty.

After breaking up with one of the officers in February, an angry Goldston stormed into the police station and held a gun to her head. Before officers could arrest Goldston, she fired a shot out of the station’s front door onto Mission Street, according to police records. In July, Goldston, who once courted her lovers with doughnuts, filed a claim against the Police Department, seeking money to pay for her psychological counseling.

Adding insult to the city’s injury, police documents reveal that the alleged trysts occurred in familiar sites throughout the city. There was an encounter in the parking lot at the Woodsy Owl Day Care Center, part of the United Methodist Church. The Oneonta Congregational Christian Church was another site, as were the Unocal gas station and a Huntington Drive parking garage.

News of the sex scandal surprised and saddened many residents. But the high quality of South Pasadena life has tempered potential outrage.

Many residents said they can’t be angry at a Police Department that responds quickly even to noise complaints. Some even said the officers’ misbehavior could be explained partly by the low crime rate, which might have left them with lots of free time.

Indeed, three officers on the morning shift were caught sleeping in the department’s briefing room last year, what one officer referred to as a “Code Z.”

That relaxed lifestyle has been maintained only by active resistance to encroaching forces, notably the decades-long fight to keep the Long Beach Freeway extension out of the 3.4-square-mile town.

But just because South Pasadena is a small town, it doesn’t mean its residents are naive or self-righteous.

David Perez, 23, his skateboard parked in front of the South Pasadena Mercantile Co., assessed the town’s police troubles: “At least they didn’t beat anybody up.”

Perez called the sex scandal “almost innocent.” Besides, he said, it’ll bring some folks down to earth. “People here think this is a very lofty place where this kind of thing doesn’t happen, so it’s kind of funny when it does.”

Women at a local beauty parlor also found some humor in the events, calling the officers “the Magnificent Seven.”

Others hope that some positive changes will follow the bad news.

John Won, 18, and Viet Truong, 17, said they are glad to see the Police Department scrutinized. They claimed that they and their friends are treated rudely by police and are sometimes pulled over and questioned.

“They’re hypocrites, having sex on duty when they’re supposed to be protecting us,” said Won.

Less discussed are the incidents that followed news of the sex scandal.

Shortly after that news broke, Assistant City Manager Charles M. Conn resigned, days after he was arrested on suspicion of embezzling $12,250 from a transit group.

The next week, word that police omitted the name of an off-duty officer from a hit-and-run traffic accident report surfaced. The officer was let go, then rehired, and it was learned that two other officers were in the car with him.

Wesley Tom, 33, said he wasn’t shocked to hear of the alleged misdeeds, but was surprised “that it went on for so long before anyone said anything.”

Edgar Castle, 63, who along with his wife, Nadine, runs Joanna’s--South Stampadena, a rubber stamp and gift store, expressed frustration that problems were not addressed until they got out of hand. “It’s like when they don’t put up a stop sign until after a kid gets hit, that sort of mentality,” he said.

In the historic business district, Mission Antiques store owner John Turk said it is important to keep South Pasadena’s recent notoriety in perspective. “People will still want to buy a house here. Compared with other places, this is still a great place.”

At least for those who can afford the $371,700 median home cost.

Turk, 39, said the relative quiet in recent years has made this month’s revelations seem more sensational. The last time he saw so many TV camera crews and reporters descend upon the town was in June, he said, when a woman won a court fight to allow her to walk her pet pig in town without a leash.

The city will live on and learn from its problems, Turk said. “We’re going through puberty as a town, we’re growing up.”

For a few police officers and city officials, at least, that appears to be the case.