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Getting to Bottom and Top

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It sounded like an over-the-top television script, but these were real-life allegations in the Los Angeles Police Department: corrupt cops planting rock cocaine on unsuspecting victims; officers selling stolen drugs to traffickers instead of arresting them; cops kidnapping gang members, stripping them naked and dropping them in rival gang territory; cops shooting a man and then allowing him to bleed to death while they concocted a scenario to justify the shooting; cops awarding each other plaques, with highest honors going to those who not only wound but kill. Allegations of police planting evidence--the mere possibility of which was scoffed at during the O.J. Simpson trial--are now just one of a long list of charges being leveled against the LAPD.

Investigators must get to the absolute bottom of the scandal. And the top, as in how high in the ranks does it go?

To date, the brunt of the corruption probe rests on the statements of former LAPD anti-gang officer Rafael Perez, who is seeking a sentence reduction for cocaine theft. Perez is said to have fared poorly on a polygraph test. That will no doubt give prosecutors some pause, even though some of his statements have been corroborated. That makes it incumbent for Police Chief Bernard C. Parks and Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti to demonstrate they are on the same page and doing everything they can to encourage the gathering of more evidence.

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Already we have suggested that the Police Department might temporarily ease its internal rules to encourage officers who have relevant information to come forward. This is not to let the lethargic district attorney’s office off the hook. Garcetti should move more aggressively. He can let it be known that limited or full criminal immunity on a case-by-case basis is possible for officers who can provide key information.

In at least two modern scandals involving local law enforcement, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office offered some degree of immunity from prosecution to former sheriff’s deputies in exchange for information and testimony against other deputies. One was the now infamous drug money skimming case against seven deputies in 1990. The second was in 1996, against a deputy accused of planting evidence and trumping up charges against minority suspects. In the former, limited immunity was even granted to some drug dealers.

The real scope of the Rampart scandal seems finally to have dawned on city officials. Maybe it was the briefing in which the City Council learned that it faces perhaps more than $125 million in settlements stemming from lawsuits of suspects falsely charged, convicted and incarcerated. Maybe it was the more than 70 LAPD officers who are under investigation or the hundreds and perhaps thousands of prosecutions that must be reviewed.

Now, there is a rising chorus of those who wonder whether the LAPD, despite the voluminous work of its board of inquiry, is really capable of policing itself. Some have called for an independent commission or for a takeover of the investigation by the U.S. attorney’s office and the FBI. These calls are worth consideration, given that so many local law enforcement careers and even political reputations may be at stake.

Clearly, the LAPD must be more open about its progress and findings. Inspector General Jeffrey Eglash of the city’s Police Commission, for example, has regularly attended internal LAPD meetings on the scandal and reported back to the commissioners. But the commissioners, as public representatives appointed by the mayor and City Council, should have had far more to say about the scandal by now. Their role is vitally important, as they will be expected to assess the LAPD’s own inquiry and determine, in part, whether it was adequate.

At the bottom are these unanswered questions: How could Rampart officers stage crime scenes and falsify as much evidence as has been alleged without someone far up the chain of command getting wind of something gone horribly awry? And what, beyond Chief Parks’ wish list for more resources, will ensure that this will never happen again? Without some assurance that Parks has a handle on that, the calls for independent investigations will only grow louder.

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