LAPD IS TAKING LAWS INTO ITS OWN HANDS

The Police Department shouldn't be able to pick and choose the laws
it wants to enforce.

When federal agents busted down doors raiding medical- marijuana
dispensaries in Los Angeles in July, Los Angeles Police Department
officers were their comrades in arms.

The department's assistance in the raids infuriated some City
Council members, who chastised them Wednesday for cooperating with
the Drug Enforcement Agency and for enforcing federal drug laws that
are in conflict with California's medical-marijuana law - and the
will of the public.

They even threatened to forbid the LAPD from cooperating with the
DEA, but that would require the council to actually take an unequivocal stand.

LAPD officials just brushed off the criticism, essentially telling
the council to get over it. The department will continue to help the
feds bust medical-

marijuana dispensaries, they said, even though Chief William Bratton
has declared that the department supports the state law.

The explanation officials offered was simple: The LAPD has a policy
of enforcing federal laws.

That would make sense if it were a policy the department actually followed.

But the truth is that the LAPD only enforces the federal laws that
it feels like enforcing.

Despite pressure from federal authorities and many residents of Los
Angeles, the LAPD has refused to enforce immigration laws, and
officers don't ask about citizenship status except in the rarest instances.

The department has stuck to Special Order 40, which prohibits LAPD
officers from asking people about their citizenship status. So much
for working with the feds.

Medical-marijuana dispensaries exist legally under state law, but
not under federal law. In L.A., city officials are finally trying to
craft regulations that will make them less flagrant for feds to
bust. But the DEA doesn't care what the city or the state does.

That leaves the LAPD in an awkward situation, but selectively picking
which laws it will enforce and which it will ignore does nothing to
enhance the department's credibility.