Bell Gardens to Hear Latino Officers’ Case

In hopes of settling a racially charged dispute, Bell Gardens officials will meet Friday with the attorneys for 19 current and former Latino police officers who have accused the police chief of discriminating against Latinos in the department.

In a civil rights claim filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the officers accused Police Chief Frederick Freeman of creating a hostile atmosphere for Latinos by denying promotions to qualified Latino officers and by referring to Latinos as “bullfighters” and “burrito eaters” during roll call.

The EEOC has investigated the allegations and concluded in a report issued earlier this month that “the preponderance of evidence” supports the charges made by the officers.

The discrimination claim, filed last year, has become a highly divisive issue in the small blue-collar city, which is more than 90% Latino. About half of the city’s 76-member police force are Latinos. Freeman, who is white, replaced the city’s first Latino police chief, Andrew Romero, in 1995.

Thirteen of the officers who filed the EEOC claim made the same charges in a discrimination lawsuit filed in April in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

The ruling by the federal civil rights investigators requires the city to address the allegations or face an EEOC lawsuit. The EEOC has asked city officials and lawyers for the 19 officers to meet before a retired judge in West Covina on Friday.

Freeman could not be reached for comment.

Bell Gardens Deputy City Atty. Jesse Jauregui said the city will cooperate with the EEOC conciliation efforts. But he criticized the EEOC’s findings, saying the agency failed to thoroughly examine the evidence and to cross-examine the witnesses.

“We are disappointed with the EEOC’s investigation because we do not believe they investigated all of the facts,” he said.

In the lawsuit, the officers allege that during Freeman’s tenure, 21 white Police Department employees received promotions, compared to only three Latinos.

Freeman allegedly denied “light duty” to Latino officers who were injured on the job and changed the shifts to create difficulties for Latino officers, according to the suit.

Alleging that Freeman retaliated against officers who sued, the complaint quotes members of Freeman’s command staff as saying that it was “payback time.”