2 Inglewood Officials End Vacations

Inglewood’s top city administrator and police chief are cutting short vacations to return to their jobs after the videotaped beating of a 16-year-old boy by an Inglewood police officer, the city’s mayor said Tuesday.

Mayor Roosevelt F. Dorn said Police Chief Ronald C. Banks will break off his vacation in Hawaii. City Administrator Joseph T. Rouzan Jr. is returning from out of the area, Dorn said.

Banks’ absence has been particularly notable in recent days, as his department has been deluged with reaction to the incident involving Donovan Jackson. On Wednesday, Inglewood officers helped control a protest that stormed inside City Hall.

Banks joined the Inglewood Police Department in March 1998, after a 32-year career with the Los Angeles Police Department, where he rose to become assistant chief under Chief Willie L. Williams.

Banks became one of Williams’ closest advisors. But in 1997, as Williams was leaving the LAPD, interim Los Angeles Police Chief Bayan Lewis ruled that Banks inappropriately sought a pay raise he did not deserve.

Shortly thereafter, Banks retired from the LAPD and took charge of Inglewood’s department.