Breaking Ranks, Hahn Urges Independent Rampart Probe

In a shift thick with political significance, Los Angeles City Atty. James K. Hahn on Tuesday broke with the city’s police chief and mayor and announced that he now favors the creation of an independent commission to investigate the Rampart corruption scandal.

Hahn said he was moved by frustration with the feuding between Los Angeles Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti and Police Chief Bernard C. Parks, and he recommended that the city reach out to former Secretary of State Warren M. Christopher, a Los Angeles lawyer who headed a similar panel in 1991.

“Reluctantly, I have now come to the conclusion that the only way to restore credibility to the investigative process and to the Police Department is to appoint an independent commission,” Hahn wrote in a letter to Mayor Richard Riordan and members of the City Council. “The public demands that all agencies involved be accountable, and the public must have a mechanism to do so. An independent commission overseeing the Rampart investigation is the answer.”

Christopher quickly declined the invitation to head a new commission or even to endorse the creation of one--at least for now.

“I have seen the city attorney’s letter, and while I’m personally grateful for its confidence in me, I cannot agree with his suggestion,” Christopher said in a statement. “Putting aside my personal availability to serve in the role he proposes, I feel this is not the moment to back away from our established civilian oversight mechanisms.”

Christopher, however, went on to suggest that his refusal to endorse an independent commission was, at least to some extent, conditional, resting in part on the willingness and ability of the Police Commission and its inspector general to do their jobs.

“So long as the Police Commission has the will to get at the facts underlying the Rampart scandal and provided that the inspector general receives the information and cooperation he requires from the LAPD to conduct a thorough investigation, I think they should be given the chance to perform the jobs defined for them under the City Charter,” he said.

Despite Christopher’s unwillingness to take up the call for his personal involvement, the letter makes Hahn the highest-ranking city official to endorse the creation of an independent commission. Faced with Christopher’s rejection, Hahn said he hoped the former secretary of state would reconsider and that Riordan or City Council members would try to prevail upon him to change his mind.

At last count, six council members--two short of a majority--have called for an independent investigation of the Rampart scandal. They are Joel Wachs, Mark Ridley-Thomas, Laura Chick, Rudy Svorinich Jr., Rita Walters and Jackie Goldberg.

They are up against tough adversaries, though.

“I stand with Warren Christopher,” Council President John Ferraro said Tuesday. “I think we should let the process work, because we all have such confidence in the Christopher Commission report. If the process doesn’t work, then we’ll look at something else.”

From now on, Ferraro added, he will forward all motions regarding the Rampart scandal to the council’s Public Safety Committee instead of allowing city lawmakers to automatically debate their concerns on the council floor.

In fact, by eliciting Christopher’s endorsement for the primacy of the Police Commission, Hahn inadvertently bolstered that side of the debate as well. Riordan and Parks, among others, have argued that it should be the city’s Police Commission, which sets LAPD policy, that investigates the department’s handling of the current scandal. They say that setting up an independent panel would strip the commission of its oversight authority and render it toothless.

Police commissioners agreed, saying they believe their panel is the right group to handle the inquiry. On Tuesday, the City Council approved $1.3 million for the commission to conduct its investigation.

“Obviously, I don’t agree with this,” Commissioner Dean Hansell said when he first learned of Hahn’s proposal. “We are the independent panel. This is our first significant test. We ought to be given a chance.”

Otherwise, Hansell added, “we are relegated to the role of dealing with minor grievances and parade permits.”

Commissioner Raquel de la Rocha said an independent commission would be duplicative. Commissioner Warren Jackson said the commission remained the appropriate body for the task at hand, and Commission President Gerald Chaleff said that while he respected Hahn’s motives, “the remedy he recommends simply is wrong.”

The emphasis on the Police Commission’s role was suggested in 1991 by the Christopher Commission, which was seeking a way to enhance civilian control over the department and its controversial chief, Daryl F. Gates, who was barely on speaking terms with then-Mayor Tom Bradley.

But some advocates of the Police Commission approach have been rattled by the developments in recent weeks and by their sense that the current commission is struggling to assert its independence from the chief and the mayor. Christopher has generally avoided the debate, but did emerge earlier this month to voice his concern about the city’s failure to implement some of the most important reforms his panel suggested nearly a decade ago.

Although the immediate consequence of Hahn’s letter is to align himself with those who want to seek outside help in resolving the Rampart scandal, it has potential longer-term effects as well: Hahn is the leading candidate for mayor in 2001, and this move may help separate him from the scandal and its handling by the current administration.

Councilman Wachs, another mayoral candidate, was one of the first to endorse creation of an independent commission, and he repeatedly has urged his council colleagues to vote for such a panel. Antonio Villaraigosa, speaker of the California Assembly and another mayoral candidate, also supports an outside commission.

Commercial real estate broker Steve Soboroff and U.S. Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Los Angeles), who also are running for mayor, oppose the appointment of an outside commission at this time.

As news of Hahn’s decision spread Tuesday, much of the immediate reaction centered on whether Christopher would agree to step back into the fray. When it became clear that he would not, some city leaders said the city attorney had blundered by publicly courting the former diplomat, only to be rebuffed.

“It’s a tactical blunder in the extreme,” said one city source.

Others disagreed. According to one Hahn ally, the city attorney’s announcement emphasized that while other officials are bickering over their responsibilities and accusing one another of subverting the investigation, Hahn is searching for a way through the crisis.

“In this mess, there are children and there are grown-ups,” that person said. “This puts Jim with the grown-ups.”

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Times staff writer Scott Glover contributed to this story.