Genesis of a Scandal

March 2, 1998: Six pounds of cocaine is checked out from property room at LAPD headquarters, ostensibly for use as evidence in a drug trial.

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March 27: Police officials, concerned that the cocaine has not been returned, launch an internal investigation.

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Aug. 25: LAPD Officer Rafael A. Perez is arrested on suspicion of stealing the cocaine.

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Dec. 23: Perez’s trial ends in a hung jury.

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Sept. 8, 1999: As a jury is being selected for his second trial, Perez pleads guilty to stealing eight pounds of cocaine from LAPD facilities. He enters into a confidential plea agreement in which he is expected to receive a reduced sentence on the drug charges in exchange for identifying other police officers involved in crimes and misconduct.

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Sept. 13: Ex-LAPD Officer David A. Mack, a former partner and friend of Perez, is sentenced to 14 years in federal prison for a Nov. 6, 1997, bank robbery in which he and two accomplices escaped with about $722,000, most of which remains unaccounted for. Perez and Mack partied together in Las Vegas, spending thousands of dollars, two days after the bank heist.

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Sept. 15: Chief Bernard C. Parks announces that Perez has implicated himself and another officer in the shooting of an unarmed man, Javier Francisco Ovando. Parks says that 12 officers have been either assigned to home or fired in connection with the ongoing investigation.

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Sept. 16: Ovando, the man shot by Perez and his partner and later framed for assaulting the two officers, is freed from prison after serving three years of a 23-year sentence. The FBI, meanwhile, launches a civil rights investigation.

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Sept. 20: Prosecutors announce they are immediately suspending enforcement of two sweeping anti-gang injunctions affecting more than 100 members of the notorious 18th Street gang.

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Oct. 13: Ovando files a lawsuit against the city.

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Nov. 10: A judge overturns criminal convictions against four men and dismisses a case against another. All of the actions are taken at the prosecution’s request after Perez says the defendants were framed.

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Nov. 17: A court commissioner, acting on a defense attorney’s motion, orders the release from state prison of Ruben Rojas. Perez admitted framing Rojas on a drug charge.

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Nov. 30: Judges overturn criminal convictions against four more men, each of whom was allegedly framed.

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Dec. 29: Detectives reopen an investigation into the May 19, 1998, shooting death of Carlos Perez Vertiz, 44, a man with no criminal record who was shot 10 times and killed in the basement laundry room of the apartment building where he lived, after he allegedly pulled a shotgun on Officers Frank Galindo and Ruben Palomares.

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Jan. 13, 2000: Four LAPD officers are relieved of duty with pay, bringing the total to 20 who have been relieved of duty, suspended without pay or fired, or who have resigned.

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Jan. 14: LAPD officials ask Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti to file criminal charges against Officers Nino Durden, Brian Hewitt and Michael Buchanan, suspected of crimes ranging from assault under color of authority to perjury.

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Jan. 25: Judge overturns the convictions of 10 others who were allegedly framed, bringing the total to 23.

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Jan. 27: In an interview with The Times, a second Rampart officer corroborates Perez’s allegation that officers, acting with at least one supervisor’s knowledge, planted evidence to frame people.

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Jan. 31: Prosecutors move for the first time to overturn convictions not directly involving Perez, but involving nine other officers. Four of them have not been relieved of duty or disciplined for alleged misconduct.

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Feb. 1: Judge reverses the convictions of seven adults and two juveniles allegedly framed by officers.

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Feb. 5: Chief Parks tells the Police Commission that lax oversight and poor adherence to departmental policies helped “corruption to flourish” and that he needs at least $9 million and hundreds of new positions to fix the problem.

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Feb. 10: The Times reports that, in transcripts of Perez’s interviews with investigators, Perez tells of an incident in which a 21-year-old man shot by police lay bleeding to death in the hallway of a Mid-City apartment building. He said officers intentionally delayed calling an ambulance while they planted a gun near where the man had fallen.

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* Transcripts also reveal that Perez told investigators an organized criminal subculture thrived within the department. He said a secret fraternity of more than 30 anti-gang officers and supervisors awarded plaques to officers for wounding or killing people.

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Feb. 12-14: The Times reports that Perez told investigators that he and fellow ex-Officer Durden used a drug-addicted homeless woman as one of their regular informants, giving her crack cocaine as payment. Using that information, they would shake down drug dealers, stealing their money and drugs for the officers’ own profit, he said. It is reported that Perez told investigators that he helped cover up three unjustified shootings and knows of at least five others in which officers and their supervisors doctored shooting scenes. In one, a rookie officer allegedly overreacted and shot an unarmed man hiding in a closet. A supervisor allegedly splattered ketchup around the scene and concocted a tale that the young officer thought it was blood and believed he was in danger of being shot.

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Feb. 17: Mayor Richard Riordan seeks to divert $300 million in expected tobacco settlement money to pay the cost of resolving Rampart-related lawsuits.

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* Police disciplinary unit calls for Capt. Richard Meraz to be punished for failing to take appropriate action after being told of an alleged beating at the Rampart station.

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Feb. 23: FBI launches probe into scandal, while the district attorney’s office pursues murder and attempted murder charges against some officers.

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* The Times reports that officers, working from what they alleged was a list of 10,000 purported gang members, systematically circumvented city policy by colluding with a little-known unit of the Immigration and Naturalization Service to deport at least 160 Latino immigrants and deny others citizenship.

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Feb. 25: Perez is sentenced to five years in prison for stealing eight pounds of cocaine.

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March 2: The Times reports that INS agents working with LAPD detectives explicitly suggested deporting alleged 18th Street gang members who couldn’t be prosecuted.

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March 22: The Times reports that the LAPD supervisor who was told by a prosecutor of alleged perjury by Perez was among the detectives who conspired to cover up crimes and misconduct.

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March 30: Police corruption probe spreads to other divisions, including the Central, 77th Street and Southeast.

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* The Times reports that as the Rampart scandal widened last fall, an INS agent warned that many arrested Latinos had been falsely accused of gang membership, according to an INS memo.

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April 5: Federal grand jury indicts Officer Edward Patrick Ruiz and former Officer Jon Paul Taylor, from the 77th Street Division, alleging they framed Victor Tyson, who had no previous criminal record, five years ago by falsely claiming he had a concealed weapon.

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* City Council approves first two settlements of what is expected to be a flood of lawsuits by alleged police victims.

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April 13: Thirty LAPD officers are summoned to testify behind closed doors before the grand jury.

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April 17: Los Angeles City Atty. James K. Hahn says that at least 71 criminal convictions may be overturned because of credibility problems with officers implicated in Rampart. The misdemeanor cases are in addition to the 99 felony convictions that authorities previously identified as tainted.

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April 20: Judge overturns seven more tainted convictions, increasing the number of cases thrown out in scandal to 67.

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April 24: The district attorney’s office files criminal charges against three officers for their roles in the arrest of an 18th Street gang member who allegedly was framed on a weapons charge in April 1996. *

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March 2, 1998

Six pounds of cocaine missing from Rampart property room.

Turning Points:

August 1998

Rampart Officer Rafael Perez arrested in missing cocaine case.

Sept. 15, 1999

Perez implicates himself and another officer in shooting of unarmed man. Corruption scandal then quickly widens.

April 24, 2000

Criminal charges filed against three officers for their roles in the arrest of a gang member who allegedly was framed.

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Profiles of a Precinct

GEOGRAPHY

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Rampart L.A. City Population per sq. mi. 30,560 7,610 Area in square miles 6.208 471.285

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DEMOGRAPHICS

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Rampart L.A. City ’98 population 189,716 3,586,289 ’90 population 191,606 3,486,320 Pop. age 18+ 130,087 2,640,752 Med. age of total pop. 29.00 33.5

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INCOME

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Rampart L.A. City Median $21,110 $43,201 % under $15,000 37 22

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HOUSING UNITS

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Rampart L.A. City Number 60,843 1,304,454 % 10+ units in structure 61 33

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EDUCATION

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Rampart L.A. City % completed 0-8 yrs. 40 19 Some high school, no diploma 17 15 % high school graduate 15 19 % some college 15 25 % college degree 13 23

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Note: Figures may not total 100 percent because of rounding.

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ETHNICITY

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Rampart L.A. City % Latino 79 48 % White 3 30 % Black 4 12 % Asian 15 10 % Am. Indian Less than 1 Less than 1

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Sources: Times files, Claritas

Researched by CECILIA RASMUSSEN / Los Angeles Times