Editorial: Give the L.A. sheriff some civilian help

Among the many reforms put in place by the federal consent decree that governed the Los Angeles Police Department for the decade that followed the Rampart corruption scandal was the creation of a new position, reporting exclusively to the chief, to advise him on how to ensure that police work was performed constitutionally. The two people who have filled that post are attorneys with strong expertise in criminal justice and constitutional rights, and they have been well placed to help the chief spot issues before they become problems and work through strategies for making sure that effective reform takes hold. Others are in place — the inspector general, for example, and the civilian Police Commission — to conduct investigations and report to the public and City Hall. The special assistant reports to the chief and helps him do his job better.

Sheriff Jim McDonnell needs someone like that as he tries to steer his department out of a period marked by deputy misconduct, bad hiring decisions and mismanagement. He too must deal with a consent decree, not to mention settlement agreements that dictate various aspects of how he runs his department, and civil service rules and labor contracts that restrict the action he can take against misbehaving employees. He needs an advisor, independent of the Board of Supervisors or the county counsel.

Former Sheriff Lee Baca had, in theory, an advisor in the form of the Office of Independent Review. But that office performed poorly because it was pulled in too many different directions, reporting to both the sheriff and the Board of Supervisors. The head of the office could not be fully candid with the sheriff or, presumably, vice versa. The office was dissolved and half of its functions — investigations, reporting to the Board of Supervisors and the public — were assigned to the new inspector general and a yet-to-be-created civilian oversight commission.

It’s now well past time to complete the restructuring by permitting the sheriff to hire internal civilian advisors, not beholden to the supervisors, not reporting to the county counsel, not subject to the civil service system, not part of the uniformed chain of command. There are others who will continue to fill all those roles. The sheriff needs his own constitutional policing advisors to help him to quickly identify and address problems, such as the egregious mistreatment of mentally ill inmates reported in The Times this week. The sheriff has asked the board to permit two such hires, and the supervisors should grant the request at their next meeting Tuesday, without further delay.

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