Rampart Task Force Urges Tracking of Officers’ Conduct

Four years after the Rampart police corruption scandal, local bar leaders have proposed reforms in the justice system to protect the rights of criminal defendants, including a controversial proposal to track suspected misconduct by police officers.

The 24-member task force, led by U.S. District Court Judge Audrey B. Collins, will release a report today recommending the creation of what defense attorney Richard G. Hirsch described as “an early warning detection system” for police corruption.

Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley called the report “a well-intentioned effort by a distinguished group of individuals” but said some of its suggestions are “patently unconstitutional or in contravention of state law.”

The task force also urged prosecutors to call more witnesses at preliminary hearings, proposed that police keep complaints against officers for 10 years, and endorsed the idea of “localizing” criminal courts to match police divisions as another method of keeping tabs on police officers who regularly testify in court.

Unlike earlier reports, the Los Angeles County Bar Assn. group focused on policy, procedural and statutory changes in the criminal justice system to supplement reforms already taking place within the Los Angeles Police Department.

“Every part of the system needs to be awakened to problems when they develop,” said Miriam Aroni Krinsky, the association’s president. “The system as a whole has to take responsibility and evaluate what should be done differently.”

Krinsky did not invite any prosecutors or government defenders to sit on the committee because she said she wanted “a fresh perspective.”

But Cooley blamed “the constitutional failings” of the bar’s report on its failure to include “front-line law enforcement groups and their attorneys” and victims’ rights advocates in the deliberative process.

As a result, the task force waded into at least one political hot spot when its members recommended the database to track police misconduct. Hirsch, a former prosecutor, said such a system might have allowed authorities to react earlier to the corruption charges made against officers in the LAPD’s Rampart Division.

“If these same names keep popping up,” he said, that would give prosecutors a warning that the credibility of these officers is at issue.

Police union officials have fought statewide efforts by prosecutors to collect and store information about officers, data the unions consider confidential personnel information.

“I would fight that for sure,” said attorney Elizabeth Tourgeman, who represents the Los Angeles Police Protective League. She said the league worked out an agreement with Cooley that his office’s database exclude police officer personnel records.

That’s the problem, said Gary Wigodsky, an alternate public defender who leads the office’s Rampart team and wants prosecutors to build a better database.

“I think the extent of the Rampart scandal would have never gotten so big” if a comprehensive database had been in place, Wigodsky said, estimating that just 1% of the available information on officers is entered in Cooley’s database. “In my opinion, it will happen again because nothing really has changed.”

On a positive note, Cooley applauded the report’s recommendation to decentralize the downtown criminal courts, an idea that task force member John Van de Kamp said has been around since he was district attorney.

By reducing the virtual anonymity of the expansive downtown Los Angeles court system, Van de Kamp said, prosecutors would be able to spot problem officers early.

The Rampart scandal broke in September 1999, after ex-officer Rafael Perez, in exchange for a lighter sentence for stealing drugs, told authorities that he and other officers in the Rampart Division beat suspects, planted drugs on them, lied in court, filed false police reports and covered up unjustified shootings.

Since then, more than 100 criminal convictions were overturned, and taxpayers have paid more than $40 million to settle lawsuits arising from the scandal.

Eight officers were charged with on-duty crimes. Four pleaded guilty or no contest to crimes. Three others were convicted of corruption-related offenses by a jury, but the judge overturned the jury’s verdict. Prosecutors are appealing the judge’s decision. One officer was acquitted of wrongdoing.

In February, LAPD Chief William J. Bratton called for an independent investigation into the department’s handling of the scandal.

Three months earlier, Cooley had announced that his office would not prosecute 82 Rampart-related cases because of insufficient evidence and because the statute of limitations had expired.