L.A. sheriff seeks to guard against LAPD-style problems with full-time civilian review

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department patrols an area of more than 3,000 square miles -- areas not covered by the LAPD

July 9, 2000
Web posted at: 10:07 p.m. EDT (0207 GMT)

In this story: LAPD commission is part-time Union voices objections RELATED STORIES, SITES

LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- While the Los Angeles Police Department continues to face the fallout from a corruption scandal, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department is about to become the largest law-enforcement agency in the nation to embrace a full-time independent review system composed of civil rights lawyers and retired judges.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca, who says he is "fed up" with law enforcement officers who do not uphold the law, vows that he will soon implement the independent review system he proposed and the county Board of Supervisors has already approved.

	VIDEO
CNN's Charles Feldman reports on the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department's move to a full-time civilian review commission. Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K

Said Baca: "Certain people get attracted to this type of work; they pass our stringent background investigations, they get through our academies, they take an oath of office to defend the constitution of the state of California as well as the United States -- and what do they do? They go off in a total different direction. And I think the public is fed up with this, and I know I am fed up with it."

By contrast, the commission that runs the LAPD is part-time, and the department has repeatedly rejected the notion of full-time civilian oversight.

In the LAPD Rampart Division scandal, three police officers face criminal charges, and on Sunday the Los Angeles Times reported that the district attorney's office may file criminal charges this week against a fourth.

Lawyers representing the three officers charged in the LAPD corruption scandal -- Sgts. Edward Ortiz and Brian Liddy, and Officer Paul Harper -- this week tried to get the Los Angeles district attorney's office disqualified from the case. But Superior Court Judge Michael Pastor denied the motion, ruling that lawyers had failed to prove that the district attorney's office is caught in a conflict of interest and that any conflict would result in an unfair trial for the officers.

Ortiz, 43, and Liddy, 38, have been charged with filing false police reports, and Harper, 33, with perjury. They were implicated of wrongdoing by former Rampart officer Rafael Perez, who has been cooperating with investigators in exchange for a lighter sentence after he was caught stealing cocaine from a police evidence lock-up.

LAPD officers are said to have beaten, framed and shot innocent people in the Rampart neighborhood, a largely minority area near downtown Los Angeles. So far, the revelations have resulted in 95 conviction dismissals. At least 70 police officers are under investigation.

The union that represents most of the uniformed officers in the sheriff's department says it supports civilian review but doesn't like the notion of civil rights lawyers taking part.

Roy Burns, president of the deputy sheriffs' union, said, "We believe the citizens of L.A. county could honestly and fairly evaluate our conduct. It's ... hiring civil rights attorneys that concerns our membership. These are individuals who in the past have been our adversaries ... that have opposed us and, we believe, have an agenda."

With its more than 8,000 sworn personnel, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department patrols an area of more than 3,000 square miles with a population of more than 2.5 million people -- areas not covered by the LAPD or other municipal police departments.

And the sheriff says he wants the public to know there is a new sense of accountability at the department.

"If you screw up and violate policy," Baca says, or you go out and commit a crime and you wear a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department star on your chest, you have to face the ultimate responsibility for what you do wrong.

"And I'm not going to do anything to make it easy for a person who willfully violates policy."

CNN Correspondent Charles Feldman and Reuters contributed to this report.

Los Angeles will not accept consent decree on police reform, mayor says
June 7, 2000
Gang prevention group sues LAPD, claiming harassment
June 3, 2000
Four more convictions may be overturned in LAPD scandal
May 23, 2000
Pittsburgh settlement could be model for LAPD reforms
May 12, 2000
Los Angeles Police Department timeline
May 12, 2000
Investigators raid homes of 17 LAPD officers
May 6, 2000
Anti-gang units a casualty of Los Angeles police scandal
March 13, 2000
LAPD officer at heart of corruption scandal gets 5 years in prison
February 25, 2000

The Los Angeles Police Department
  • Office of the Chief of Police
United States Attorney's Office, Central District of California
U.S. State Department, Official Web Site
Federal Bureau of Investigation
City of Pittsburgh Home Page
  • Mayor's Office

Note: Pages will open in a new browser window

External sites are not endorsed by CNN Interactive.