REPORT: POLICE OFFICERS IN SCANDAL SAY THEY WERE IN A LIFE-OR-DEATH STRUGGLE

A Culture Of Chaos Reigned In Rampart Division

LOS ANGELES - Anti-gang officers at the center of the Police Department
corruption scandal believed they were waging a life-or-death struggle with
the drug pushers and street hoodlums they encountered daily, according to
an internal report released Wednesday.

The unit "routinely made up its own rules and, for all intents and
purposes, was left to function with little or no oversight," the report
said. The department's Board of Inquiry concluded the unit "developed its
own culture and operated as an entity unto itself."

The six-month investigation shook the core of the LAPD, exposing systematic
corruption that has eroded public trust, said Deputy Chief Michael J.
Bostic, chairman of the inquiry board.

Commanders were stunned by revelations that forced them to accept that "we
can no longer trust the integrity of every officer in the LAPD," he told
reporters.

The department's 362-page report recommended 108 charges in policies and
procedures. Among them: requiring routine polygraph tests for candidates
and creating tighter controls for investigating officer-involved shootings.

But the board also largely endorsed current policies and procedures. Among
them: requiring routine polygraph tests for candidates and creating tighter
controls for investigating officer-involved shootings.

But the board also largely endorsed current policies and procedures, saying
the scandal was a result of officers and supervisors failing to carry them
out.

The scandal has led to 40 convictions being overturned and 20 officers
being relieved of duty. Officials have estimated liability could cost
taxpayers more than $100 million. More than 15 civil damage suits have been
filed.

With the city's reputation and coffers at stake, the scandal also has
generated backbiting between officials. Disagreements are being raised over
the need for an independent review and the speed with which the district
attorney is pursuing criminal charges against bad cops.

The American Civil Liberties or Southern California, while lauding the
department for its extensive self-review, called for an independent
investigation.

"Relying on the Police Department to ferret out all of the underlying
problems is like having a cancer patient operate on himself," ACLU
Executive Director Ramona Ripston said in a statement.

The scandal might have been avoided is supervisors had noticed a troubling
series of red flags first raised in the mid-1980s, the report said.

"Pursuits, injuries resulting from uses of force, officer-involved shooting
and personnel complaints had a clearly identifiable pattern. 85 Yet no one
seems to have noticed and, more importantly, dealt with the patterns," the
report said.

Symbolic of the anti-gang unit's anything goes approach was its logo - a
grinning skull in a cowboy hat with the so-called dead man's poker hand
arrayed behind it. Officers worked with little contact or control from
supervisors and sometimes signed a sergeant's name to arrest reports, the
report said.

In one incident at the end of the 1992 riot, a supervisor found the unit's
members playing cards and working out when they should have been on patrol.
Two days after complaining to a superior, the supervisor found the tires on
his personal vehicle slashed, the report said. After buying a new set, he
found those slashed.

Rampart officers declined to talk about the report. Police Chief Bernard C.
Parks requested that officers not comment, said department spokeswoman Lt.
Sharyn Buck.

Some Rampart residents said they still trust police.

"I haven't had any problems with them. They have always responded to my
call," said 34-year-old Delfina Martinez, whose apartment is a few miles
from the Rampart station.

"I have a lot of confidence in them. I feel very safe when I see them,"
Martinez said.

Mario Solis, 39, lives in the same building, the scene of questionable
police shooting in 1996 that left one man wounded and another dead.

Officers have since been accused of planting a gun and falsifying their
report.

Solis has less confidence in Rampart officers.

"I have not had problems personally, but I know that (people) have had
problems with them," Solis said. "They say they are here 'to protect and
serve,' but in certain cases they are abusing their power and it shouldn't
be that way."

The Board of Inquiry report targeted poor paperwork, lax supervision and
poor understanding of police rules and policies. Mostly, it was a case of
"people failing to do their jobs."

"We think this is a very exhaustive investigation of our systems, our
management style, our issues that we think may have caused the opportunity
for this issue of corruption in Rampart," Parks told reporters.