Rampart: Council Approves Settlement Despite Claim By Disgraced Officer Perez That The Arrest On Drug Charge Was Valid. The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday approved a $900,000 settlement for a man who claims he spent 7 1/2 years in prison on a false drug charge concocted by former Los Angeles Police Officer Rafael Perez. Although Perez, who pleaded guilty to cocaine theft charges as part of a plea bargain, maintains that the 1992 arrest of Lorenzo Irving was valid, the district attorney's office believed there was enough evidence that warranted overturning the man's conviction. As a result, the city attorney's office crafted the settlement with Irving, who was ordered released from prison in February. The council voted 10 to 1 to accept the settlement. [continues 295 words]
Damages: City Council Is Told It Has Little Choice In Case Where Police Stormed The Wrong House In South-Central And Prosecutor Failed To File A Key Motion. First, the Los Angeles Police Department's Southwest CRASH unit raided the wrong house--allegedly traumatizing two senior citizens, a baby, a teenage boy and a number of other adults there. Then the city attorney's office neglected to file a key motion in its effort to defend the city against the lawsuit brought by the victims of the faulty raid. [continues 532 words]
[]Police: Sources say mayor and chief hope for a less restrictive pact with Justice Department. As Los Angeles city officials prepare to resume their negotiations over police reform with the U.S. Department of Justice today, Mayor Richard Riordan and Police Chief Bernard C. Parks are expressing misgivings about entering into a consent decree to forestall a civil rights lawsuit. While Parks lobbied behind the scenes at City Hall, Riordan said publicly that he does not believe a federally imposed court order is needed to address "pattern or practice" abuses within the department. [continues 385 words]
[]Probe: Once terms of consent decree are worked out, members will vote on settlement. Federal officials are also investigating whether LAPD 'discriminates on basis of race.' Presented with a Department of Justice letter that stingingly indicts the Los Angeles Police Department's supervision at every level, Los Angeles City Council members said Tuesday that they will support negotiation of a consent decree to avoid a court battle over allegations of widespread misconduct and civil rights abuses. Justice Department officials, who outlined their findings in a blunt, four-page letter to the city, said the federal authorities are continuing an investigation into whether the department "discriminates on the basis of race or national origin in its law enforcement activities." The federal government's investigation into the LAPD's "pattern and practice" has been underway for four years. [continues 1092 words]
Police: Federal Spokesman Says Request Will Probably Be Turned Down, At Least For Now. Expressing dismay about the ongoing feud between Los Angeles Police Chief Bernard C. Parks and Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti, the City Council on Wednesday passed a resolution calling on the U.S. Department of Justice to head a task force to investigate criminality in the Rampart corruption scandal. A representative of the Justice Department said the federal agency is considering the council's proposal. However, sources said the federal officials will probably turn down the request, at least for now. [continues 330 words]
Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky branded the Rampart police scandal an "assault on democracy" Thursday, as local officials intensified their calls for an independent investigation into the Los Angeles Police Department's deepening corruption crisis. The Rampart situation--in which officers allegedly conspired to put innocent people in jail and to cover up unjustified shootings and beatings--warrants a U.S. criminal civil rights investigation because there is evidence of "a widespread pattern and practice of federal civil rights violations" by Rampart officers, said lawyer Merrick J. Bobb, an expert on police misconduct who advises the Board of Supervisors and the Los Angeles Police Commission. [continues 1254 words]
The survivor of a second controversial police shooting being investigated by local and federal authorities said in an interview Friday that officers from the Los Angeles Police Department's Rampart Division shot him in the back and killed his friend, then tried to frame him by saying he pulled a gun on them. The allegations by Jose Perez, an inmate at the Men's Central Jail awaiting trial on unrelated charges, mirror those that have surfaced in another shooting and that led to the release from prison Thursday of a man convicted of assaulting the police officers. [continues 1234 words]
Civil rights: U.S. panel says D.A. should be replaced in LAPD, sheriff's cases. Officials respond that some findings are inaccurate, outdated. Wrapping up a long-running investigation into misconduct and bias among Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies and Los Angeles Police Department officers, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights will recommend that a special prosecutor be created to replace the county district attorney in pursuing allegations of abuse against law enforcement officers. In its report on a probe that has been ongoing since 1993, the commission cites the district attorney's poor record of prosecuting such cases and consequent lack of public faith in the process as justification for the new post. [continues 1575 words]
