Proposed Bias Suit Deal Calls for Reallocating Probation Workers

The Los Angeles County Probation Department would send more officers and resources to central Los Angeles as part of a proposal recommended by a county panel Monday to settle a massive class action federal civil rights lawsuit.

The lawsuit, filed five years ago by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund on behalf of black probation officers, community groups and churches, alleged that the department for years has understaffed its offices in Los Angeles’ urban core, resulting in less guidance for youths on probation in that area and a greater likelihood that they would end up in prison.

“That means a kid on probation in Santa Monica is in effect getting much better services than a kid in Compton,” said Kevin Reed, an attorney for the plaintiffs. “We believe that is one of the things that has contributed to the over-incarceration of African American men in Los Angeles County and in the state of California.”

Under the settlement, which will be considered by the Board of Supervisors for formal approval next month, the department will study how it staffs its various offices in the county and reallocate resources toward the urban offices that were the focus of the lawsuit.

Without admitting wrongdoing, it will change personnel policies and award $2 million to the plaintiffs--which include eight black probation officers who allege that they were denied promotions and raises due to race--their attorneys and other officers who may have been professionally slighted due to alleged discrimination within the department.

In a memo to the county claims board, the body that recommended the settlement Monday, county lawyers warned that a jury could award as much as $8 million to plaintiffs in the job discrimination claims alone, noting that an expert hired by the county to analyze the department’s promotional examinations showed a “disparate impact based on race.”

At the time the suit was filed, blacks accounted for 50% of the agency’s more than 3,200 officers, but only 38% of its supervisors or managers. Whites, who were 28% of the department, were 44% of the managerial and supervisory staff.

The Probation Department declined to comment because the settlement has not won final approval. County documents say that the changes are in keeping with the department’s current policies. Calvin House, one of the lawyers who defended the county, said there was no racist intent in the department’s past operations.

“The department was not in the business of discrimination,” House said. “It just turned out to be the way the numbers turned out.”

The settlement enables the county to avoid the risks of a federal trial and the possibility that a federal judge would place the department under a consent decree.

“This is something that’s been hanging over the head of the Probation Department for a long time,” House said. “And now we’re able to put it behind us and not worry about a federal judge running the department.”

He added that the issues in the 5-year-old lawsuit, brought when the department was under different leadership, “are almost ancient history now.”

At the time, the county in legal papers called the lawsuit “a broad-based attack” on how it allocates resources.

The Probation Department, the nation’s largest, is responsible for monitoring 80,000 criminals and ensuring that they comply with the terms of their court-ordered probation.

The department assigned officers based on regional caseloads rather than the complexity of those individual cases. The lawsuit alleged that cases in the gang-infested inner city were more complex than those in outlying areas, but the complexity was not reflected in staffing. Reed said the department essentially was saying that the cases of a Jordan high school student flirting with gangs and a Santa Monica drunk driver were equal.

As a result, only four of the department’s 56 anti-gang specialists were assigned to the five offices in the lawsuit.

Overworked officers in those locations, who were predominantly black, could not devote enough time to their cases and channel wayward youths into social programs, lawyers alleged.

House countered that there was no solid statistical evidence that the department’s allocation of resources discriminated against inner-city residents.

He pointed out that Los Angeles’ gang problems have expanded to the suburbs.

Under the settlement, which must be approved by the trial judge, the department will study how it allocates resources and make adjustments to iron out any discriminatory effect.

“This [study] will make sure it does not happen in the future,” House said.