Tom Reddin, 88; Ex-LAPD Chief Introduced Community Policing

Tom Reddin, the innovative former chief of the Los Angeles Police Department who introduced community policing and went on to be a television newscaster, mayoral candidate and head of his own private security firm, died Saturday. He was 88.

Reddin died at his Los Angeles home of complications from Parkinson’s disease, said his wife, Betty Jane.

A career cop who rose through the ranks under conservative Chief William H. Parker, Reddin is widely credited with modernizing the LAPD, introducing computerized dispatch systems, upgrading communication technology and improving training and pay. But his short tenure -- he served just over two years -- is perhaps best remembered for his efforts to make police and the community partners in preventing crime, establishing the concept of community policing.

“He was one of the first really progressive people in law enforcement -- completely different from the militaristic Parker and FBI Chief J. Edgar Hoover, who were the prototypes into the ‘60s. Tom Reddin was ahead of his time,” Richard Mosk, an associate justice of the California Court of Appeal and close family friend, said Saturday.

Mitzi Grasso, a director of the Los Angeles Police Protective League, praised Reddin in a statement as a “master communicator” who “helped define the term ‘community policing.’ ”

“Tom Reddin ... embarked on a mission to bring space-age technologies to use in the LAPD,” she said. “It was through his leadership that the LAPD developed a sophisticated 911 dispatching system.”

When Reddin was appointed police chief in 1967, just two years after the Watts riots, he was considered the ideal leader to take the LAPD in a significant new direction. Time magazine put him on its cover, hailing him as “an optimist for Los Angeles.”

A gifted communicator, Reddin won attention and respect for suggesting that modern police officers act like “street corner sociologists,” talk with people in the community and even wear nametags and hand out business cards.

He communicated with the public and his officers, making 245 speeches in his first year as chief, and sending out The T.R. Times, a newsletter to officers, urging such maxims as “Don’t blow your cool.”

Reddin, himself cool under stress, attracted national attention after California’s June 4, 1968, presidential primary election. Shortly after midnight on June 5, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was shot while leaving his victory party in Los Angeles’ Ambassador Hotel and died the next day. For 42 nearly sleepless hours, Reddin directed the investigation of the murder and deftly answered newsmen’s questions on network television.

But Reddin resigned in 1969 to accept a post as a news anchorman at KTLA Channel 5 that paid about four times the $32,800 he earned as chief. (KTLA is now owned by Tribune Co., which also owns The Times.)

Reddin may have found being head of the LAPD too much of a burden. Earlier in his life, he had remarked that he did not enjoy sitting behind a desk as an administrator.

Daryl Gates, who served as LAPD chief long after Reddin and had been instructed by him at the Police Academy and worked for him as a sergeant, said Reddin “left the department too soon in my judgment.... He wasn’t chief long enough to fulfill his role.”

Unfortunately, the genial giant -- at 6 feet 4 and 215 pounds -- known for his communication skills from the podium or in a private conversation, was less successful on camera. He occupied the KTLA anchor chair only three years before abandoning it to run for mayor.

Gates, for one, was not too surprised by the career switch, noting that Reddin communicated best informally but faltered at reading speeches.

“As an anchor,” Gates said, “he had to read and did not have an audience he could directly relate to. When he was face-to-face with you, speaking spontaneously, there was no one better.”

Despite his popularity and recognizability, Reddin got less than 13% of the vote in the 1973 primary election for mayor, his one race for political office. He finished fourth in a crowded field behind the eventual winner, another former policeman, Tom Bradley; the incumbent Mayor Sam Yorty; and former Assembly Speaker Jesse Unruh.

With characteristic modesty, Reddin said afterward that he had “found out I was one of the world’s worst politicians.”

After his short but significant stints as police chief, news anchor and political contender, Reddin settled into a successful career in the security business. His Tom Reddin Security Services operated for more than 20 years, employing 350 guards for numerous buildings throughout Southern California.

Born in New York City, Reddin was the son of a millionaire who made his fortune building amusement parks in Europe and Australia -- and lost it drilling dry holes in a futile search for oil in Oklahoma.

Reddin spent his early childhood in Holdenville, Okla., and moved to Denver with his family when he was 8. Bright and a star athlete who lettered in baseball, basketball and football, he enrolled at the University of Colorado but was forced to drop out for lack of money. During the Depression, he served four years as a Navy seaman on the battleship West Virginia.

After moving to Los Angeles, he worked as manager of a service station until a holdup man stuck a gun in his back and took $12 from the cash box. Impressed with the quick response of the LAPD, which apprehended the robber, Reddin started asking questions. The patrolmen assured him he could earn more money as a policeman than in a service station, and he joined the force in 1941 at $170 a week.

Reddin rose steadily, becoming a sergeant in 1945, lieutenant in 1949, captain in 1953, inspector in 1955 and deputy chief under Parker in 1960.

During the 1965 Watts riots, Parker made provocative remarks that many people thought exacerbated feelings in the tense city. When he died of a heart attack the next year, the stage seemed set for a more progressive chief.

Reddin, who had served as night field commander during the riots, appeared before a Los Angeles City Council committee investigating the unrest after Parker declined to appear. His measured testimony earned him lasting goodwill among council members.

Reddin won the job for his overall depth and breadth of experience and capability, even though then-Inspector James G. Fisk bested him in the civil service exam score by one-half of 1%.

Despite Reddin’s myriad reforms in making his officers more responsive to the community, the LAPD still garnered criticism for a few highly publicized incidents.

His officers, for example, were accused of using unduly strong tactics in dispersing Vietnam War protesters outside the Century Plaza Hotel on June 23, 1967. President Johnson was giving a speech inside the hotel.

Thirty years later, Reddin acknowledged that women had been beaten by the police in the course of the demonstration.

“I don’t deny the use of force,” he said in an interview. “Force was used. Was there provable brutality? No.”

Maybe not, but after the incident, Reddin quietly issued orders that nightsticks no longer be raised above the shoulder by his officers.

Reddin felt he had made important strides, but in one 1968 remark he failed to predict the future turmoil in the LAPD, saying, “Taking someone behind a door and beating the hell out of him? Our officers wouldn’t dare. They know that if they did, they’d be prosecuted, and might just end up in the joint.”

But despite Reddin’s inability to foresee such future police abuse scandals as the Rampart case of the late 1990s, author Joseph Wambaugh, a former LAPD officer, suggested that the unflappable Reddin would have handled public relations during such crises far better than his successors at the LAPD managed to do.

“Chief Tom Reddin was so respected and trusted by the media that he could have introduced proportionality to the affair even while conducting a vigorous internal inquiry,” Wambaugh said.

In addition to his wife of 67 years, Reddin is survived by a son, Michael, of Malibu; a daughter, Nancy Kienholz, of Hope, Idaho; eight grandchildren; and several great-grandchildren. Another son, Tom, preceded him in death.

Memorial services are pending.

His wife asked that memorial donations be sent to the Los Angeles Police Museum.

Material written by Kenneth Reich while a Times staff writer was used in this obituary.