Mayor's office seen directing ouster effort, 1991-03-15 |
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THE LOS ANGELES TIMES March 15 , 1991 Mayor's Office Seen Directing Ouster Effort Bv GLE'.'JN F. BUNTING T l.\tES STAFF W RITER While Mayor Tom Bradley has refrained from calling for the ouster of Police Chief Daryl F. Gates. his chief of staff has been busy orchestrating moves to " turn up the heat" on Gates and force him to resign over last week's po li ce beating. it was learned Thursday. The behind-the-scenes campa ign. directed by Deputy Mayor ~lark Fabiani. is designed to exert so much political and public pressure on Gates that he eventually will give up his Sl68.000-a-year post for the good of the Police Department and the community, said City Hall sources familiar with the effort. Within days. Bradley is expected to fill one of two vacancies on the city' s Police Comm1ss1on with an appointment intended to jolt the Parker Center police headquarters. according to the sources. who ·spoke on condition of anonymity. The mayor also revealed Thursday th at he is considering whether to :create an independent citizens panel to investigate the Police Department. Bradley refused to be interviewed · for this story and F'abiani declined to ' discuss his strategies to persuade -Gates to leave after 13 y ean in office. But in an interview F'abiani · teft little doubt about his sentiments. " We have received literally -Lhousands of letters and phone [c alls, and a vast majority have 1 soug~t. ,the chief's resignation. " he . 1 said. "'f.h>s is clearly a broad-based ou tcr y on the part of all segment.I of the't.otnmumty and it's growing. l We s<;~ no signs here at City Hall I that e_e2ple 's anger 1s diminishing.'' The mayor and his staff realize 1 that it could take weeks. perhaps months, before Gates could be i coaxed into stepping down, the 1 1 sources said. Ir. an interview Thursday. Gates I said he has no intention of walking ~way from the department during ·a Cr!SlS • . I • "The rocks arc all being aimed nght at me as if I created all this. the I entire problem. and that my ouster will solve the problem," Gates said. "!don'! (ttl that way. So therefore l I . don't nave any plans to leave the department-much to the unhappi- 1 ness ~ ~ot of people. l'm sure." i I L I .£\ ~ktd if he was awa re that the ~i,ir ·s o ffi c e was p lotting to haste~is departure. Gates said : " l ha v&'h'; i}i y idea. l susp e ct th ey ' re ove rfl\e~e thinking ver y hard. " Gates said he recognized that the I mayor • considers him a "po l1t1 cal 1l ab1lity~ . . . l thin k an y po l1t1 cal l eader~ who t hinks the ch ief of 1 police ~J l1ab il1ty wants to get ri d I or him,. ., : R~g¥'4ing Bradley . th e chief l add ~.-: :flobody 's asking him to 1 1 ret1 re,-ana he ·s been there longer t han'llUve." 1 Bradley has carefully side- ! stepped questions about whether Gates should quit over the March 3 I 1nc1 dent in which three officers I were videotaped striking Rod ney I G. King. 25. of Altadena. more than 50 t imes with n1ghtst1cks while 12 I other offi cers wa tched. • "That's a dec1s1on that the chief I has to make and I'm not going to • intervene 1n that." Bradley s aid at I a recent news conference. " If l were to do 1l [c all for Gates' I r cs1gnat1on j, you would simply have a.nother distracting . . . con- ! trovl!'rt,J .'between the mayor and the ~~ff. and I'm not going to I co11U11-.. lo that." I aa!ll) and Gates have feuded for yeaJ'.9. Last fall. their animos1 - lies boiled over when Gales said I Bradley'. had wntten a "dumb let-ter" calling for an investigation of alleged police improprieties sur rounding a violen t drug raid on apartments near 39lh Street and Dalton A venue. For years. the mayor has been frustrated by his inability to dismiss city department heads under Civil Service protection rules. Bradley proposed a City Charter amendment on Tuesday that would subicct the police chief and all other department managers to a performance review and possible dismissal every five years. After tolerating one embarrassing episode after another from Gates. the mayor's office seized the King incident to go after the chief because it outraged virtually ev - eryone in Los Angeles rather than a single ethnic or community group as in the past. the sources said. The mayor's advisers felt that with the national spotlight focused on Gates and the department. the King beating presented the best opportunity yet to push the IH- year-old Gates into retirement. The mayor's current strategy of using Fabiani to bring intense pressure on Gates while he remains publicly silent on the chiefs s1..1 tus 1s a familiar one. The same approach was employed by Bradley recently in soliciting the res1gnat1ons of th ree Clly department heads-Joh n Tuite of t he Community Redev elo pment Agency. Warren Thomas o( the zoo and Ken Topping of th e Planiung Department. But driv ing Gates out o( offic e could be more difficult. "Daryl Gates 1s not K en Topr1n ~ and the LAPD is not th e P lanning Department." said one city cou n - c1lman. who said he was aware of the mayor's plan to oust Gates but asked to remain anonymous. " l don ' t think they will succeed." The chief enioys strong support from the City Council. which could not muster enough votes W ednes • day to summon Gates to Cit y Hall to explain how his department is responding to the King beallng. Council President John Ferraro said several members have "hinted around" that Gates should resign. but " I don't think any of them are brave enough to come out and say 1t." Sources say that the strategy to remove Gates. largely devised b y Fabiani and approved by the mayor. mcludes the following: • Bradley plans to fill the t wo vacancies on the Police Commission with prominent candidates who wtll send a strong message to Gales that he will be held accountable for police misconduct. The first of the replacements is expect ed lo be announced soon. possib ly as _early as today. In a meeting with community leaders this week, Bradley was urged to appoint strong community leaders who " would be willi ng to take a hard look at Daryl Gates and the department, and would have the guts to remove him ," said John Mack. president of the Los Angeles Urban League. Bradley began overhauling the commission late last year by ap pointing two prominent minority lawyers. Dan Garcia and Melanie Lomax, and sources say that their m1ss1on is, in part. to scrutinize Gates' performance. Two other comm1ss 1on s cats hccamc vacant last week when Herbert F' . Oocck - mann and Reva 8 . Tooley resigned in protest ov er a new ethics law that required them to tl1sclose t heir personal finances 1n detail. • The ma yor intends to set up a hlue-ribbon comm1ss1on cons1sllng of c1t1zens who would examine the Police Department from top to bottom. The mayor 's office has researched the poss1b1l1ty of t ransferring the Police Comm1ss10n 's subpoena powers to the c1t1zens group. said a source familiar with the plan. On Thursday. Bradley a11- nounced t hat he 1s cons1rler111g whether t o appoint such an independent panel, but said that he has not yet made up his mind. The panel would be s1m1lar to the Knapp Comri11ss1on. wjl1ch was established in 1970 by Mayor John Lindsay to investigate police corruption in New York City. Three out of four Los Angeles residents favor setting up a c1v11ian board to review alleged cases of misconduct by police officers. according to a Times poll conducted last week. • The mayor's office will maintain constant pressure on Gates t o resign by establishing contact with a broad cross -section of com m untty . business and co llege gro ups who have cJllcd fo r his ouster . On Thu rsda y. s tudents ,1t L!SC ;rnd members of the anll-Jbort1on movement s taged protests calling for Ga tes to resign. A ~t anct111 g room only crowd 1ammed rolice h0adriuartcrs to attend a ro mmis s1011 hearing and c hanted. " Hey, hey. ho. ho' Dar yl Gates has got to go !" And the executive board of the Los Angeles County federation of Labor passed a resolution demanding that Gates quit. <. <. I think the sense of o utrage and urgency 1s unprecedented." s aid \1ark Ridley -Thomas. head of t he local Southern Chris tian Leadership Conference who is running for the 8th Council District scat. " And 1t 1s a calculated mistake on the part of the chief to underestimate how deep t his sentiment runs . ... l don 't think that this 1s somethmg that will go away." Police Comm1ss1oner Garcia said: " (don't envy (Gatesj in his role ri~ht now . I think this 1s the toughest thing he has ever faced. How long 1t will persist I don 't know." Over the last two days. the campaign by t he mayor 's office received an unexpected boost: On Thursday. U.S. Atty . Gen. Dick Thornburgh ordered a Justice Department review of all police bru-t al1t y co mplain ts « ~am st Los An~ cles police r1urin l{ r. hc last ~ rx yea rs to uetcrm1nc 1f t he K111 g heJttng 1s ran of a pat te rn u f m isconduct. And on Wcdncsr1av. conse r vative eolu m rllst Geor~e Will. one o f Ga tes· fa v orite writers. castigated the chief. " Cates h;i~ I on ~ been a special pinup of the kmd of conservatives who c utton to pr1m1t1v1sm. " Will wrote. F'ab1a111 said: "Cl early . George Will ' s expression represents a conservative viewpoint that is not ordinarily crillcal of the chief. One of the real questions now 1s how far the protest in Los Angeles will spread. . The George W ill co lumn seems to indicate that no let up IS 111 Sight. " The c hief's adver~anes . i ncluding those in the mayor·s office . ~aid they are hopeful that Gates wi ll dig himself an even deeper hole through his public remarks. They po111t to the fact that Gates. in apolog17.ing to King. s a1ct in part. " He' s on parole. He ' s a convictect robber. In spite of the fact that he · ~ on parole and a convicted robber. I'd be glad to apologize ." Ridley -Thomas said: " The apol - ogy was half - hearted. dis111~enuous and missed the point. And t here was no good reason to do that. .. Times staff wrtters Bob Bakef and J"M Katz contrit»uted to this story.
Object Description
Title | Commission meetings: newspaper clippings, 1991-03-06 - 1991-04-10 |
Description | Commission meetings: newspaper clippings, 1991 March 6 - April 10. PART OF A SERIES: Materials in the series fall into one of several categories related to the Independent Commission's work product: (1) Commission meeting materials, which include meeting agendas, work plans, memoranda, and articles about police misconduct that were circulated and reviewed during the Commission's internal meetings; (2) public correspondence, which includes citizen complaints against the LAPD in the form of written testimony, articles, and an audio cassette tape, as well as letters drafted by citizens in support of the LAPD; (3) summaries of interviews held with LAPD officers regarding Departmental procedures and relations; (4) public meeting materials, which include transcripts, supplementary documents, and witness statements that were reviewed at the Commission's public meetings; (5) press releases related to the formation and work product of the Commission; and (6) miscellaneous materials reviewed by the Commission during its study, including LAPD personnel and training manuals, a memorandum of understanding, and messages from the LAPD's Mobile Digital Terminal (MDT) system. |
Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California |
Date issued | 1991-03-06/1991-03-08; 1991-03-12; 119-03-13; 1991-03-15; 1991-03-16; 1991-03-18/1991-03-22; 1991-03-26/1991-03-29; 1991-04-02/1991-04-10 |
Type |
texts images |
Format | 94 p. |
Format (aat) | clippings (information artifacts) |
Format (imt) | application/pdf |
Language | English |
Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
Part of collection | Independent Commission on the Los Angeles Police Department, 1991 |
Series | Independent Commission File List |
File | Commission meetings: newspaper clippings |
Box and folder | box 21, folder 31 |
Provenance | The collection was given to the University of Southern California on July 31, 1991. |
Rights | This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Manuscripts Librarian. Permission for publication is given on behalf of Special Collections as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained. |
Physical access | Contact: Special Collections, Doheny Memorial Library, Libraries, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-0189; specol@dots.usc.edu |
Repository name | USC Libraries Special Collections |
Repository address | Doheny Memorial Library, Los Angeles, CA 90089-0189 |
Repository email | specol@dots.usc.edu |
Filename | indep-box21-31 |
Description
Title | Mayor's office seen directing ouster effort, 1991-03-15 |
Description | Glenn F. Bunting "Mayor's office seen directing ouster effort" Los Angeles Times (1991 March 15). |
Creator | Bunting, Glenn F. |
Publisher (of the original version) | Los Angeles Times |
Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California, USA |
Date issued | 1991-03-15 |
Type | texts |
Format | 2 p. |
Format (aat) | clippings (information artifacts) |
Format (imt) | application/pdf |
Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
Series | Independent Commission File List |
File | Commission meetings: newspaper clippings |
Box and folder | box 21, folder 31, item 11 |
Physical access | Contact: Special Collections, Doheny Memorial Library, Libraries, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-0189; specol@dots.usc.edu |
Full text | THE LOS ANGELES TIMES March 15 , 1991 Mayor's Office Seen Directing Ouster Effort Bv GLE'.'JN F. BUNTING T l.\tES STAFF W RITER While Mayor Tom Bradley has refrained from calling for the ouster of Police Chief Daryl F. Gates. his chief of staff has been busy orchestrating moves to " turn up the heat" on Gates and force him to resign over last week's po li ce beating. it was learned Thursday. The behind-the-scenes campa ign. directed by Deputy Mayor ~lark Fabiani. is designed to exert so much political and public pressure on Gates that he eventually will give up his Sl68.000-a-year post for the good of the Police Department and the community, said City Hall sources familiar with the effort. Within days. Bradley is expected to fill one of two vacancies on the city' s Police Comm1ss1on with an appointment intended to jolt the Parker Center police headquarters. according to the sources. who ·spoke on condition of anonymity. The mayor also revealed Thursday th at he is considering whether to :create an independent citizens panel to investigate the Police Department. Bradley refused to be interviewed · for this story and F'abiani declined to ' discuss his strategies to persuade -Gates to leave after 13 y ean in office. But in an interview F'abiani · teft little doubt about his sentiments. " We have received literally -Lhousands of letters and phone [c alls, and a vast majority have 1 soug~t. ,the chief's resignation. " he . 1 said. "'f.h>s is clearly a broad-based ou tcr y on the part of all segment.I of the't.otnmumty and it's growing. l We s<;~ no signs here at City Hall I that e_e2ple 's anger 1s diminishing.'' The mayor and his staff realize 1 that it could take weeks. perhaps months, before Gates could be i coaxed into stepping down, the 1 1 sources said. Ir. an interview Thursday. Gates I said he has no intention of walking ~way from the department during ·a Cr!SlS • . I • "The rocks arc all being aimed nght at me as if I created all this. the I entire problem. and that my ouster will solve the problem," Gates said. "!don'! (ttl that way. So therefore l I . don't nave any plans to leave the department-much to the unhappi- 1 ness ~ ~ot of people. l'm sure." i I L I .£\ ~ktd if he was awa re that the ~i,ir ·s o ffi c e was p lotting to haste~is departure. Gates said : " l ha v&'h'; i}i y idea. l susp e ct th ey ' re ove rfl\e~e thinking ver y hard. " Gates said he recognized that the I mayor • considers him a "po l1t1 cal 1l ab1lity~ . . . l thin k an y po l1t1 cal l eader~ who t hinks the ch ief of 1 police ~J l1ab il1ty wants to get ri d I or him,. ., : R~g¥'4ing Bradley . th e chief l add ~.-: :flobody 's asking him to 1 1 ret1 re,-ana he ·s been there longer t han'llUve." 1 Bradley has carefully side- ! stepped questions about whether Gates should quit over the March 3 I 1nc1 dent in which three officers I were videotaped striking Rod ney I G. King. 25. of Altadena. more than 50 t imes with n1ghtst1cks while 12 I other offi cers wa tched. • "That's a dec1s1on that the chief I has to make and I'm not going to • intervene 1n that." Bradley s aid at I a recent news conference. " If l were to do 1l [c all for Gates' I r cs1gnat1on j, you would simply have a.nother distracting . . . con- ! trovl!'rt,J .'between the mayor and the ~~ff. and I'm not going to I co11U11-.. lo that." I aa!ll) and Gates have feuded for yeaJ'.9. Last fall. their animos1 - lies boiled over when Gales said I Bradley'. had wntten a "dumb let-ter" calling for an investigation of alleged police improprieties sur rounding a violen t drug raid on apartments near 39lh Street and Dalton A venue. For years. the mayor has been frustrated by his inability to dismiss city department heads under Civil Service protection rules. Bradley proposed a City Charter amendment on Tuesday that would subicct the police chief and all other department managers to a performance review and possible dismissal every five years. After tolerating one embarrassing episode after another from Gates. the mayor's office seized the King incident to go after the chief because it outraged virtually ev - eryone in Los Angeles rather than a single ethnic or community group as in the past. the sources said. The mayor's advisers felt that with the national spotlight focused on Gates and the department. the King beating presented the best opportunity yet to push the IH- year-old Gates into retirement. The mayor's current strategy of using Fabiani to bring intense pressure on Gates while he remains publicly silent on the chiefs s1..1 tus 1s a familiar one. The same approach was employed by Bradley recently in soliciting the res1gnat1ons of th ree Clly department heads-Joh n Tuite of t he Community Redev elo pment Agency. Warren Thomas o( the zoo and Ken Topping of th e Planiung Department. But driv ing Gates out o( offic e could be more difficult. "Daryl Gates 1s not K en Topr1n ~ and the LAPD is not th e P lanning Department." said one city cou n - c1lman. who said he was aware of the mayor's plan to oust Gates but asked to remain anonymous. " l don ' t think they will succeed." The chief enioys strong support from the City Council. which could not muster enough votes W ednes • day to summon Gates to Cit y Hall to explain how his department is responding to the King beallng. Council President John Ferraro said several members have "hinted around" that Gates should resign. but " I don't think any of them are brave enough to come out and say 1t." Sources say that the strategy to remove Gates. largely devised b y Fabiani and approved by the mayor. mcludes the following: • Bradley plans to fill the t wo vacancies on the Police Commission with prominent candidates who wtll send a strong message to Gales that he will be held accountable for police misconduct. The first of the replacements is expect ed lo be announced soon. possib ly as _early as today. In a meeting with community leaders this week, Bradley was urged to appoint strong community leaders who " would be willi ng to take a hard look at Daryl Gates and the department, and would have the guts to remove him ," said John Mack. president of the Los Angeles Urban League. Bradley began overhauling the commission late last year by ap pointing two prominent minority lawyers. Dan Garcia and Melanie Lomax, and sources say that their m1ss1on is, in part. to scrutinize Gates' performance. Two other comm1ss 1on s cats hccamc vacant last week when Herbert F' . Oocck - mann and Reva 8 . Tooley resigned in protest ov er a new ethics law that required them to tl1sclose t heir personal finances 1n detail. • The ma yor intends to set up a hlue-ribbon comm1ss1on cons1sllng of c1t1zens who would examine the Police Department from top to bottom. The mayor 's office has researched the poss1b1l1ty of t ransferring the Police Comm1ss10n 's subpoena powers to the c1t1zens group. said a source familiar with the plan. On Thursday. Bradley a11- nounced t hat he 1s cons1rler111g whether t o appoint such an independent panel, but said that he has not yet made up his mind. The panel would be s1m1lar to the Knapp Comri11ss1on. wjl1ch was established in 1970 by Mayor John Lindsay to investigate police corruption in New York City. Three out of four Los Angeles residents favor setting up a c1v11ian board to review alleged cases of misconduct by police officers. according to a Times poll conducted last week. • The mayor's office will maintain constant pressure on Gates t o resign by establishing contact with a broad cross -section of com m untty . business and co llege gro ups who have cJllcd fo r his ouster . On Thu rsda y. s tudents ,1t L!SC ;rnd members of the anll-Jbort1on movement s taged protests calling for Ga tes to resign. A ~t anct111 g room only crowd 1ammed rolice h0adriuartcrs to attend a ro mmis s1011 hearing and c hanted. " Hey, hey. ho. ho' Dar yl Gates has got to go !" And the executive board of the Los Angeles County federation of Labor passed a resolution demanding that Gates quit. <. <. I think the sense of o utrage and urgency 1s unprecedented." s aid \1ark Ridley -Thomas. head of t he local Southern Chris tian Leadership Conference who is running for the 8th Council District scat. " And 1t 1s a calculated mistake on the part of the chief to underestimate how deep t his sentiment runs . ... l don 't think that this 1s somethmg that will go away." Police Comm1ss1oner Garcia said: " (don't envy (Gatesj in his role ri~ht now . I think this 1s the toughest thing he has ever faced. How long 1t will persist I don 't know." Over the last two days. the campaign by t he mayor 's office received an unexpected boost: On Thursday. U.S. Atty . Gen. Dick Thornburgh ordered a Justice Department review of all police bru-t al1t y co mplain ts « ~am st Los An~ cles police r1urin l{ r. hc last ~ rx yea rs to uetcrm1nc 1f t he K111 g heJttng 1s ran of a pat te rn u f m isconduct. And on Wcdncsr1av. conse r vative eolu m rllst Geor~e Will. one o f Ga tes· fa v orite writers. castigated the chief. " Cates h;i~ I on ~ been a special pinup of the kmd of conservatives who c utton to pr1m1t1v1sm. " Will wrote. F'ab1a111 said: "Cl early . George Will ' s expression represents a conservative viewpoint that is not ordinarily crillcal of the chief. One of the real questions now 1s how far the protest in Los Angeles will spread. . The George W ill co lumn seems to indicate that no let up IS 111 Sight. " The c hief's adver~anes . i ncluding those in the mayor·s office . ~aid they are hopeful that Gates wi ll dig himself an even deeper hole through his public remarks. They po111t to the fact that Gates. in apolog17.ing to King. s a1ct in part. " He' s on parole. He ' s a convictect robber. In spite of the fact that he · ~ on parole and a convicted robber. I'd be glad to apologize ." Ridley -Thomas said: " The apol - ogy was half - hearted. dis111~enuous and missed the point. And t here was no good reason to do that. .. Times staff wrtters Bob Bakef and J"M Katz contrit»uted to this story. |
Filename | indep-box21-31-11.pdf |
Archival file | Volume70/indep-box21-31-11.pdf |