Extend Federal Oversight over Los Angeles Police Department

June 22, 2009

The Honorable Gary A. Feess
United States District Court
Central District of California
Los Angeles, CA

re: Extend Federal Oversight over Los Angeles Police Department

Dear Judge Feess:

We respectfully urge the Court to extend federal judicial oversight of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). Ending oversight now would be like the old joke about the town that took down a sign on a winding mountain road that said “Danger: Curves Ahead,” because no cars were driving off the side of the road anyway. Under federal oversight, the LAPD has made progress to root out corruption and reduce brutality and racially-biased arrests, but it must still do more to eliminate racial disparities in police searches and the use of force.

Tom Hayden, Robert García and Paul Hoffman wrote an Op/Ed piece in the L.A. Times in 2000 urging the United States Department of Justice to intervene to reform the LAPD. We cited the pattern and practice of LAPD abuses from the Rodney King beating to officers stealing illegal drugs, framing innocent people, and committing extortion. The article helped lead to the present oversight. See L. A. Times, Perspective on the Rampart Scandal: This Case Calls for a Truly Outside Inquiry, Feb. 20, 2000, page 5. Nine years later, the LAPD has not fully addressed the “problem officers” issue, continues to amass a secret gang data base, and once again showed its paramilitary nature in the MacArthur Park episode only one year ago.

We respectfully urge the Court to extend federal oversight for three years that would end if the LAPD reduced racial bias searches and arrests, instituted financial disclosure for specified kinds of investigators, implemented an effective system to track complaints against problem officers and use of force, and reduced its massive emphasis on a gang data base that is seriously deficient in due process protections.

We look forward to presenting our views in detail in whatever manner the court deems appropriate.

Very truly yours,

Robert García

Tom Hayden