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Los Angeles Webster Commission records, 1931-1992
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Aviva Bobb, interview, 1992-07-07
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Aviva Bobb, interview, 1992-07-07
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Content
MEMORANDUM
Privileged and Confidential
Attorney Work Product
DATE • July 7, 1992 .
TO
.
Susan I. Spivak, Esq. .
Jan L. Handzlik, Esq.
FROM
.
Tracy w. Young, Esq.
•
Maren Christensen, Esq.
RE : Interview of Aviva Bobb, Presiding Judge,
Los Angeles Municipal Court
On July 6, 1992, at 10:30 a.m. at the Los Angeles Municipal
Court, 110 North Grand Avenue, Ms. Christensen and I interviewed
Aviva Bobb, Presiding Judge of the Los Angeles Municipal Court.
At the tail end of the interview, we were joined by Fritz
Ohlrich, Assistant Court Administrator. The following is a
summary of our recollections of this meeting, including our
questions and comments, together with our mental impressions,
conclusions and opinions, based upon our meeting.
I. INTRODUCTION
On July 6, 1992, Maren Christensen and I met with Aviva
Bobb, Presiding Judge of the Los Angeles Municipal Court. The
meeting lasted approximately one and one-half hours.
Judge Bobb, in response to our query regarding the existence
of civil disturbance plans, identified a plan created by the
Sheriff's Office in preparation for the 1984 Olympics to deal
with mass arrests. A copy of that plan is attached hereto.
Some aspects of the 1984 "Olympic Plan" for mass arrests
which Judge Bobb referred to may have been appropriately applied
to the arrests and processing procedures during the recent civil
unrest. There has been no explanation as to why that plan was
_ not followed. Judge Bobb indicated only that it was pulled out
by her administrator at the beginning of the civil disturbance,
but that they did not use it.
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\ \\'b
II. PREPARATION AND ADVANCE KNOWLEDGE
Neither Judge Bobb nor her staff anticipated that there
would be an acquittal in the Rodney King trial. Judge Bobb heard
about the verdict through a telephone call.
She pointed out that the Municipal Court does not become
involved in the process for at least a day. The police first
make arrests, which are then processed by the District Attorney's
Office. She agreed that advance notice would have been helpful
and that Courts should always be notified as soon as possible
when mass arrests or other events which could impact the Court
are occurring.
III. EVENTS AFTER THE VERDICT
Wednesday, April 29, 1992
By 6:00 p.m. on April 29, 1992 Judge Bobb had seen the
violence beginning on the television. Her first concern was the
issue of whether or not to keep the Courts open and whether or
not the staff should come to work. She and her staff decided
that the Municipal Court would remain open on April JO, 1992.
She believes that government should remain visible.
Thursday, April 30, 1992
The "Metropolitan Court", part of the Municipal Court system
in the "problem" area, reported demonstrations and believed that
there would be problems. Judge Bobb ordered the Metropolitan
Court closed on Thursday morning, April JO, 1992.
During the morning, various courts called and asked the
Municipal Court if they should close because the District
Attorney's Office and the Superior Court were closing. There had
been threats regarding a demonstration, a rumor which did not pan
out.
By noon on Thursday, all the Courts in the City had been
closed except for the Arraignment Courts. The following
Arraignment Courts were kept open:
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\bob0707.llell
Divisions 80 - 83, Misdemeanor Arraignment Courts
near the jail;
Division 100, the Van Nuys Arraignment Court; and
Division JO, Felony Arraignment (Video
Arraignment) Court.
The video arraignments were not utilized because the police were
required to house people at Parker Center in the area that is
normally utilized for video arraignments.
Friday, May 1, 1992
Judge Bobb called a meeting with the following enforcement
agencies: LAPD (represented by Commander John White, head of
detectives); the Sheriff's Office (represented by Commander Pat
Devaney, head of transportation); the District Attorney's Office;
the Marshal's Office; the City Attorney (represented by James
Hahn); the Public Defender's Office (represented by Wilber
Littlefield); and County Counsel. Judge Bobb noted that it was
odd for the Court to assume a leadership role.
They discussed what to do over the weekend. It was decided
to keep open the arraignment parts. Prisoners were arraigned
from all over the County. The Van Nuys arraignment part was
closed over the weekend.
Monday, May 4 and Tuesday, Mays, 1992
By Monday it was clear that they were not arraigning people
in sufficient numbers. There were inflated arrest numbers. They
decided to stay open for 24 hours. By law they had to arraign
people by Tuesday; they had not yet received emergency relief
extending the arraignment period.
Sheriff Block, in order to alleviate the crowding problem
resulting from the mass arrests by the LAPDl had offered to
assume jurisdiction over any of the prisoners, even those who had
not yet been processed. This caused problems because it turned
the system inside out. The Sheriff's Office normally assumes
jurisdiction after a prisoner has been processed and arraigned.
The difficulties arose primarily from Felony cases. There
was a very high ratio of felony cases being filed for the number
of arrests that were occurring. Problems they had never imagined
resulted. The Court had previous experience with mass arrests in
misdemeanor matters, e.g., the "Operation Rescue" abortion
demonstrations. The City Attorney could easily bring
misdemeanants through the tunnel attaching the jail to the
misdemeanor arraignment courts.
Felonies are handled differently. Normally, a police
officer arrests an individual, then a detective decides whether
or not charges will be filed. Those charges are then reviewed by
a District Attorney after which a felony complaint is filed with
the Court. The officer usually coordinates the transferring of
arrested individuals to Court, where they meet up with the
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\bob0707.INM
3
paperwork. They normally do not come under the Sheriff's
jurisdiction and to the City Jail until they have been arraigned.
As a result of the Sheriff's Office assuming jurisdiction
early in the process, they were getting people without paper
work. There was not enough room to put everyone; accordingly,
prisoners were being taken all over the County and housed at
State Correctional and other facilities which lowered their
standards regarding paperwork to accept prisoners.
Because of this situation, Sheriff Block was under
increasing pressure to release people. He decided to let people
out by Tuesday because he was afraid of civil liability resulting
from extending incarceration beyond the statutorily permitted
arraignment date; apparently, the only remedy available to a
prisoner who is held beyond the arraignment period is a civil
suit against the Sheriff's Office.
Judge Bobb had further meetings with agency representatives.
She met with Sheriff Block and D.A. Ira Reiner to discuss the
situation. There was also a Tuesday meeting of the above-noted
agency representatives concerning who was remaining to be
arraigned. Reiner came to that meeting. At the time, he was
working on emergency legislation to extend the arraignment
period. That legislation was passed on Tuesday.
It took the Court awhile to realize that they had to go find
the people to match them up with the paperwork. They got the
paperwork from the District Attorney and then had to send the
Sheriff out to the various jails to pick up people and bring them
back to Court. This caused at least a 3 hour delay. Papers were
arriving in Court without bodies and were not being matched up
with the right bodies.
Communication was not a problem. The Sheriff's Office sent
over three officers with computers. The Court moved them
downstairs so that when they got the paperwork, they could
immediately send an Officer (Deputy) out to obtain the prisoner
to be brought back to court for arraignment.
The Court is now in the process of codifying and
computerizing the system they worked out to deal with this
situation. In fact, they created a computer program on the spot
to deal with inputting the necessary information. This took some
hours to be worked out.
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\bob0707 ...
4
IV. COORDINATION WITH OTHER AGENCIES
Judge Bobb opined that everyone was very cooperative. She
singled out Pat Devaney from the Sheriff's Office as especially
helpful, noting that he was "everywhere" and always available.
She was steadily in contact with Ron Frankle of the LAPD.
According to Judge Bobb, there was no problem that they could not
fix and interagency cooperation was excellent.
Mass arrests were being written up as mass complaints.
Judge Bobb said this made sense from the Police Department's
standpoint because then only 1 police officer would have to show
up to testify at the preliminary hearing. They were, however,
jamming up to 53 or 58 people on to a single complaint and the
files were not in alphabetical order, which resulted in chaos.
This made it extremely difficult to find people as the files came
in. If there had been single defendants on complaints it would
have been much easier. They ultimately informed the L.A.P.D and
the District Attorney's Office to limit the number of Defendants
on a Complaint to 10. There was no problem with compliance.
The Superior Court normally does not get involved until much
later in the process. Associate Presiding Judge Molano
telephoned Judge Bobb on Thursday and Friday on a number of
occasions. The following week Judge Torres called. Municipal
court supervising Judge Patti Jo MaKay worked out with Superior
Court Supervising Judge Cecil Mills how Superior Court Judges
could help. They created a disposition part to dispose of felony
cases.
The Municipal Court did not, however, take advantage of
superior Court's offer of help with Arraignments and Preliminary
Hearings. According to Judge Bobb, the Municipal Court had
enough staff to handle the situation, although the arraignment
courts were open late into the night on a number of evenings and
on a 24 hour basis for at least 2 days. Judge Bobb asserted that
her staff and the judges were extremely willing to help and
managed well.
She referred especially to the good management of the
Municipal Court, specifically complimenting Fritz Ohlrich, the
assistant administrator of the Los Angeles Municipal Court.
V. COURT SECURITY
The Marshals and the National Guard provided protection to
the Municipal Court. There were no problems with Court security.
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5
,; >.
VI. FUTURE PLANS
Judge Bobb stated they were working on an in-house basis to
codify the procedures they created during the civil disturbance.
Additionally, she referred to the County-wide criminal Courts
Justice Committee, a group that met to debrief various agencies
as to what happened during the civil disturbance. Judge Bobb has
asked that the Municipal Court function as a member of the
subcommittee regarding post-arrest procedures. She expects a
decision soon and expects it to be positive. She also expects a
report out of the committee by mid-September on what happened and
approximately two months later a report regarding what should be
done.
VII. VIEWS OF THE ASSISTANT COURT ADMINISTRATOR
Fritz Ohlrich joined Judge Bobb towards the tail end of the
interview. His participation had not been planned. He
interjected some more controversial thoughts into the interview.
Ohlrich stated that when he went home late on Sunday night
from Municipal Court, he thought they had everything under
control, but then when he returned early on Monday morning he
realized that they were right back to where they had started.
They were not yet coordinated with the Sheriff's Office with
respect to producing "bodies" to coordinate with the paperwork.
The Sheriff's Office's computer system is not designed to run on
a 24 hour basis; it needs to be updated. Names that should have
been removed from the computer were still appearing; thus,
individuals were being produced for arraignment two, three and
four times. This occurred because the paperwork had not yet
caught up with the system. There should have been a single
complaint for each defendant. It would have been a lot easier.
Ohlrich referred to the "operation rescue" mass arrests and
indicated there had been single arrests with single complaints as
part of the plan for dealing with the situation.
VIII. IMPRESSIONS
Without pointing to anything in particular, it was our
impression that Judge Bobb was "protecting her turf". Although
we do not doubt that the Municipal Court swung into action and
- handled things extraordinarily well under the circumstances,
there has not to date been any explanation as to how the
Municipal Court's staff stretched to accommodate 24 hour
arraignment courts and why the Superior Court judges who offered
to help were not requested to do so.
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6
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Description
Interview with Aviva Bobb, Presiding Judge of the Los Angeles Municipal Court, about her impressions of the civil disturbance and the Los Angeles Police Department's subsequent response. PART OF SERIES: After the violence had subsided, the Webster Commission met with a variety of public officials, law enforcement personnel, activists, and community leaders to discuss the rioting, its root causes, and the adequacy of the LAPD's response. The series includes summaries of these meetings, including questions and comments along with the interviewers' own mental impressions, conclusions, and opinions. Materials are arranged in alphabetical order, according to the last name of the interviewee.
Asset Metadata
Core Title
Aviva Bobb, interview, 1992-07-07
Tag
OAI-PMH Harvest
Format
6 p.
(format),
application/pdf
(imt),
Interviews
(aat)
Permanent Link (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.25549/webster-c100-30726
Unique identifier
UC11447832
Identifier
box 19 (box),web-box19-023-01.pdf (filename),folder 23 (folder),webster-c100-30726 (legacy record id)
Legacy Identifier
web-box19-023/web-box19-023-01.pdf
Dmrecord
30726
Format
6 p. (format),application/pdf (imt),Interviews (aat)
Type
texts
Tags
Folder test
Inherited Values
Title
Los Angeles Webster Commission records, 1931-1992
Description
Chaired by former federal judge and FBI and CIA Director William H. Webster, the Los Angeles Webster Commission assessed law enforcement's performance in connection with the April, 1992 Los Angeles civil unrest. The collection consists of materials collected and studied by the Commission over the course of its investigation. Materials pertain to both the Los Angeles incident specifically, and civil disturbance, civil unrest control, and policing tactics in general.
Included in the collection are the following: interviews with LAPD officers, law enforcement personnel, government officials, community leaders, and activists; articles, broadcasts, and press releases covering the civil unrest; various tactical and contingency plans created for disasters and emergencies; reports, studies, and manuals about civil unrest control and prevention; literature about community-based policing strategies; emergency plans and procedures developed by other cities; and after-action reports issued once the civil unrest had subsided. Also featured are items related to the internal operations of the LAPD both before and during the civil unrest, including activity reports, meeting agendas and minutes, arrest data, annual reports, curricula and educational materials, and personnel rosters.
See also the finding aid (https://archives.usc.edu/repositories/3/resources/2266).
See also The Los Angeles Riots: The Independent and Webster Commissions Collections (https://scalar.usc.edu/works/the-los-angeles-riots-christopher-and-webster-commissions-collections/index).
Related collections in the USC Digital Library:
? Independent Commission on the Los Angeles Police Department, 1991 (see also the finding aid: https://archives.usc.edu/repositories/3/resources/2251)
? Richard M. Mosk Christopher Commission records, 1988-2011 (see also the finding aid: https://archives.usc.edu/repositories/3/resources/393)
? Kendall O. Price Los Angeles riots records, 1965-1967 (see also the finding aid: https://archives.usc.edu/repositories/3/resources/979)
? Watts riots records, 1965 (see also the finding aid: https://archives.usc.edu/repositories/3/resources/83)
Thanks to generous support from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the USC Libraries are digitizing this collection for online public access.
Coverage Temporal
1931/1992