Former L.A. Officers Find Support in the Suburbs

Feeling demoralized by scandal and abandoned by their leaders, dozens of LAPD officers are fleeing the force for law enforcement jobs in Ventura County and other suburban areas.

“This is becoming LAPD north,” said Todd Bilbo, a former Los Angeles officer who now works for the Ventura Police Department.

In the past two years, Ventura has hired five Los Angeles Police Department officers and will take on an additional four next month.

And each day the phone rings with more looking to join up. In the space of 30 minutes last week, Lt. Quinn Fenwick took three such calls.

“They want to go to a place where there is less animosity and more support for them,” Fenwick, the Ventura police spokesman, said.

Former LAPD Officer Leo Medina, hired by the Ventura department earlier this year, agreed.

“My friends on the LAPD tell me it’s worse than ever,” he said. “I tell them the command staff here is very supportive of patrol officers. That’s the backbone of the force.”

The Simi Valley Police Department has also become an LAPD magnet. Over the past two years the department has hired seven Los Angeles officers.

“We have had 30 or more apply,” said Lt. Rex Jones, the Simi Valley police spokesman. He added that for various reasons none were hired. “We could easily hire five more now, but we want them to fulfill their contracts first.”

Oxnard police said they are stepping up efforts to recruit LAPD officers.

A Ventura County Sheriff’s Department spokesman said there has been no upsurge in interest in his department, probably because officers must undergo additional training to become deputies.

The LAPD, already reeling from the Rampart police corruption scandal, was hit recently by a study authorized by the city’s Police Commission that said the department suffered from serious morale problems, meddling politicians and a heavy-handed chief. The report also called for better training and disciplining of officers.

Officials at the department of 9,170 admit the exodus is a serious concern, and say recruiters are scouring college campuses and military bases for new officers.

“Obviously we can’t discount the effect of bad publicity and high-profile scandals,” said Sgt. John Pasquariella, an LAPD spokesman. “We are down about 800 officers and that is an issue we are concerned about. Our attrition rate is higher this year. We are losing more than we are taking in. We have a big city to patrol . . . and if we don’t stem the tide, this could be a problem in the next few years.”

At least 494 LAPD officers are leaving this year, and only 191 people are joining the force, said Adena Tessler, who handles law enforcement issues for Los Angeles City Councilwoman Cindy Miscikowski, head of the panel’s Public Safety Committee.

In 1999, 369 officers were hired while 652 left the LAPD. In 1998, 413 were added while 610 left.

Many of the officers now working in Ventura County have lived here for years and commuted to work in Los Angeles. But on county forces, they find better schedules--some Ventura officers work three days a week, 12 hours a day--and a superior quality of life. Starting pay is sometimes a bit less than the LAPD, but the pay soon reaches parity.

Retirement benefits are often better. LAPD officers can only earn a maximum of 70% of their salary when they retire, while Ventura police are paid up to 85%.

Not everyone is happy about the influx of LAPD cops.

John Hatcher III, president of the Ventura County NAACP, said the trend worries him.

“I am hoping and praying they don’t bring the same racist mentality from Los Angeles to Ventura County,” he said. “They are used to jumping out of cars and beating people up. I don’t want that to happen here.”

Local police say that is unlikely.

Intense background investigations help weed out potential problems, they say.

“I’ve got people pounding down the door, so I can afford to be picky,” said Fenwick, who interviews candidates for the Ventura department. “We don’t take every applicant. I have no qualms about the guys I brought in. Our track record with these guys bears out the fact that they are good employees. They want to go to a place where there is less animosity and more support for them.”

Jones said Simi Valley is also careful.

“We would rather run short of officers than take someone of low quality,” he said.

Santa Ana Police Department officials said they are also seeing a surge in the number of Los Angeles applicants.

“We have definitely seen an increase,” said Cpl. Gene McManus, who does background investigations for all new hires on the Santa Ana force. “Of the next dozen we hire, about half will be LAPD.”

Santa Ana police spokesman Raul Luna said the force is very strict in taking outside transfers.

“Obviously, we want to know why they left,” Luna said. “But they have turned out pretty well.”

The Anaheim, La Verne and Newport Beach police departments have also become LAPD destinations, officers say.

Oxnard Police Chief Art Lopez spent 28 years with the LAPD, rising to the rank of deputy chief, overseeing five geographical areas and 2,000 officers.

“We get calls [from LAPD officers] and we are trying to do some recruiting,” Lopez said. “They are well-trained officers from a great tradition of law enforcement. They are just going through some tough times.”

Lopez, who has been chief for two years, said he enjoyed life at the LAPD but understands why officers are attracted to this area.

“Quality of life,” he said. “If I’m a young officer looking to raise a family, I’d come to Ventura County. I wish I had known about this place when I was young.”

Lopez said housing can be more expensive in Ventura County, but added that affordable homes are out there.

And Oxnard may not have the action of Los Angeles, Lopez said, but there are other benefits.

“You make up for the action with in-depth investigations,” he said. “In the LAPD, it’s like a paper mill--you go from one investigation to another to another. The variety of assignments is better here.”

That is what Medina, the former LAPD officer, has learned since joining the Ventura Police Department.

As he cruised a ragged bit of Ventura Avenue recently, the 32-year-old Medina summed up the difference between a typical LAPD night and a typical Ventura night:

“In L.A., you’re pulling your gun out two or three times a night. It’s a different type of police work here.”

That means officers pay more attention to things they might let slide in fast-paced Los Angeles. Someone drinking a beer on the street might be ignored by harried LAPD officers racing from call to call, but not here, some ex-Los Angeles officers say. But the former LAPD officers must adjust to working without partners in most Ventura County departments.

As he drove, Medina checked his computer for incoming calls--there were none. At the LAPD’s Van Nuys and Devonshire divisions, where Medina worked 3 1/2 years, calls were stacked up at the beginning of the shift and rarely let up.

“What I like about Ventura is you really get to know the community,” said Medina, a Van Nuys native. “In L.A., there is much more violent crime. It’s all about tactics. You’re getting more hair-raising calls, so you are constantly thinking about safety.”

Minutes later, Medina pulled over a man for driving with a broken tail light. Then came a report of gang members loitering near a Taco Bell. They turned out to be former gang members passing out fliers for a Christian revival.

“Jesus delivered me from crack cocaine!” exclaimed one, handing the officer a pamphlet.

Medina smiled and jammed it into his coat pocket.

“It’s a little slower pace here,” he said. “But the investigations are more thorough.”

For many of these former LAPD officers, life on a big city police force offered everything a young cadet could wish for--excitement, challenge and the chance to make a difference.

The 1991 Rodney King beating, which thrust the department into the international spotlight, had come and gone. There were investigations, leadership changes and new procedures.

But the department is now immersed in the Rampart scandal, in which officers are accused of a wide range of misconduct, including planting evidence, stealing drugs and brutalizing suspects. Former officers say public confidence in the LAPD has eroded again.

Before he left the LAPD, Medina said, he saw more people videotaping officers as they worked, in the hopes of catching them in some illegal act.

And the complaint system in Los Angeles means any charge against an officer--from police brutality to rudeness--has to be fully investigated, a process that can last a year.

Miscikowski said the complaint process has “created a black cloud” over LAPD officers.

“It’s the No. 1 issue,” said Miscikowski, citing it as the reason the LAPD has not had a recruit class in two months. “You could have a stellar officer, but the complaint becomes a black mark next to their name. You can’t be moved or promoted during the investigation of a complaint.”

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The fact so many officers are leaving for other departments is a huge loss, she said.

“They are still our highest commodity,” Miscikowski said. “I just wish we treated them better.”

Officers also blame plummeting morale on frequent scheduling changes and the abandonment of the beloved three-day, 12-hour shift.

“It was an accumulation of things,” said Officer Bilbo, 30, who spent more than four years with the LAPD’s Rampart Division before joining the Ventura force. “The complaint procedures became ridiculous.”

Of the 38 graduates of his police academy class, Bilbo said, only 20 remain in the LAPD, and word has spread throughout the force that Ventura County is a good place to live and work.

In February, Officer David Maupin, 30, arrived in Ventura from the LAPD.

“It’s comforting to know that here the department will back you up,” he said. “I felt betrayed by the leadership there. You get in a position where your bosses don’t support you.”

Friends on the LAPD tell him that 30% to 40% of officers there are in background investigations for jobs with other departments.

Out on Ventura Avenue, Officer Medina pulled up outside Snooky’s bar. Inside the smoky tavern, a woman wearing a flowered bikini top said she had received a death threat from the wife of her boyfriend.

A poker-faced Medina took the report, gave the woman his card and promised to investigate. She tossed back her brown hair and smiled gratefully.

Medina left the bar and drove into the night. He waved at a passing group of teenagers, inspected a parking garage for signs of illicit activity, helped take a parolee into custody and stopped off for a soda and candy.

“For the first time in my life,” he said of his career, “I feel really content.”