Panel May Rethink Vote on ID Policy

Chastised by a state senator for overturning a policy that made public the names of officers in shooting reports, the Los Angeles Police Commission decided Monday to call for the release of a legal opinion central to its decision.

Senate Majority Leader Gloria Romero (D-Los Angeles) appeared before the commission and said that if it did not resume releasing the names because members were unsure what state law allowed, she would introduce legislation to clarify the public’s right to know which officers are firing their weapons.

“I do not believe that we want to send a message that we want to begin a new era of cover-ups or the perception of such,” said Romero, who also complained that the decision was originally made behind closed doors.

The senator first made her criticisms known in a letter to the commission Friday.

Shortly before Romero spoke Monday, the commission agreed to waive the attorney-client privilege that kept the legal opinion confidential. The City Council, whose waiver is also needed, is expected to meet on the issue today.

Commissioners also said they would be open to reconsidering the policy change based on testimony from legal experts and others who they hope will attend a public hearing at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday at Parker Center.

“I’m always ready to rethink decisions,” said Commissioner Andrea Sheridan Ordin. “I think it’s appropriate to be open.”

Romero told the commission during a special meeting Monday that the legal opinion from City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo appears to give the panel a “choice to go into the dark and not release names, or a choice to remain fully in the sunshine.”

The commission vote to waive the privilege was 3 to 0.

“The advice that has been given to us is a matter of public interest,” said Ordin, who also is a business attorney who served on a panel that investigated the Los Angeles Police Department after the 1991 police beating of Rodney G. King. “It is a complex opinion, and one that warrants being read by the public.”

Romero said her reading of the law is that it does not specifically require that officers’ names be kept confidential, and judges in several courts in other cases have ruled in favor of disclosure.

“I’m ready to work with you if you feel any clarification of the law or strengthening of the law needs to occur,” Romero told the commission.

Late Monday, the commission’s vote to call for releasing the 13-page legal opinion was applauded by the Southern California chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.

“We hope that the City Council will vote to waive the privilege so the public can understand what led to the Police Commission’s revocation of its 25-year practice of providing full public accountability for officer-involved shootings” said Catherine Lhamon, the chapter’s racial justice director.

Lhamon said removing names from commission reports “fails to accomplish its purported goal” because LAPD commanders routinely release that information at the time of each shooting.

“But the Police Commission’s decision to redact officers’ names in summary reports does diminish public confidence in their Police Department -- and that does immeasurable damage in a city that is infamous for decades of police scandal,” she said.

The Times obtained a copy of the legal opinion and reported Friday that Delgadillo’s office recommended that the commission “carefully consider” its options.

But the opinion left the panel to decide whether the public interest in disclosure outweighed officers’ claims of privacy.

Commission President John Mack, a former head of the Los Angeles Urban League, said the issue arose after the panel decided last year to post summaries of police shooting reports on a website.

At that point, he said, the city attorney warned that it could pose a legal problem if officers were identified by name.

“Our whole purpose was to further inform the public,” said Mack, adding that he has not ruled out reconsidering the policy change.

Mack noted that through a report posted by the commission last week on the shooting of 13-year-old Devin Brown, the public learned that the car Brown had been driving was backing up at 2 mph or less and that all officer shots were from the side, not the rear.

“That would not have been known to the public were it not for this new report,” he said, calling it an improvement on the police chief’s reports that previously were released to the media with the officers’ names included.

He said that only about half a dozen people, including news reporters, asked for the chief’s shooting reports in the past.

Like Mack and Ordin, Commissioner Anthony Pacheco said he is open to hearing new arguments, but was noncommittal on whether he would vote to keep or repeal the policy.

The other two commission members -- Alan J. Sobkin, an attorney with Galpin Motors Inc., and Shelley Freeman, a Wells Fargo bank executive -- were absent Monday.

“I wouldn’t say I’m having second thoughts. I think there are some explanations that need to be made just so we can get some closure on this issue,” said Pacheco, a business attorney and former federal prosecutor.

Pacheco predicted that once the public reads the legal opinion, people will see “this commission weighed the appropriate facts to get to a place where there could be maximum disclosure while at the same time upholding the rights of officers.”