L.A. Police Dept. and Simpson Case

Re “Officials Hold Rally for LAPD,” March 22: I think all of us need to get back to basics . . . it is wrong for the Los Angeles mayor and chief of police to react to public pressures in the media by suggesting procedural changes in the O.J. Simpson case courtroom, whether by defense attorneys or prosecution attorneys.

Judge Lance Ito presides in the courtroom--not the mayor, not the chief of police. Judge Ito decides the evidence presented in the courtroom and to the jury. Obviously all witnesses undergo scrutiny, including those witnesses who work for the Los Angeles Police Department.

This trial is about our judicial process, an individual’s right to a fair trial, the jury’s decision and the destiny of the defendant. This may sound very simple, but I think we need to be reminded.

ETELVINA R. PATMAS

Orange

(Simpson defense attorney) Alan Dershowitz did a terribly self-serving thing while testimony was in progress by seasoned investigators in the Simpson trial. He went on national television describing how officers were taught in the police academy to testify falsely in court trials. He further said they called it “testilying.”

I was in law enforcement 31 years in the Los Angeles area; I attended 57 classes after the academy that had to do with evidence and court testimony, and have been in state and federal courts all over the nation. Never, did I ever hear anyone teach, tell, supervise, or train to divert the truth from the actual evidence in court. By the way, I am retired now.

All law enforcement officers have heard the term “testily.” It is really a station house hoke that’s used to describe what incredulous witnesses testify to regarding the crime at hand. Police officers are not a part of it.

STAN NELSON

San Pedro

In your March 21 article about my comments regarding the police, you claim that I offer “no evidence” for my assertion. When your reporter called me, the first thing I did was to fax him an article I had written which quotes extensively from a commission report, a police witness and others. There is abundant empirical evidence by objective observers to support my comments. I am pleased to have stimulated a national debate on this important issue.

ALAN M. DERSHOWITZ

Harvard Law School

Cambridge, Mass.

All of the commentators on television and radio are making such a big deal of the Simpson defense team having the audacity to question the veracity of police officers or cast aspersions on their professionalism in investigating this case. Isn’t this the same Police Department that was taken to task by the Christopher Commission? Isn’t this the same Police Department whose officers lied on their reports explaining the Rodney King beating prior to their knowledge of the existence of the videotape of the beating? Haven’t all of these investigators from the Police Department been on the force for many years and trained under the policies criticized by the Christopher Commission?

I don’t know if Simpson is innocent or guilty, but I feel that his defense has every right to question these police officers. HARVEY J. GLASS

Sherman Oaks

I was once an admirer of Dershowitz. I bought and read his books. I respected him as a legal authority with ethical standards. At one time, his chutzpah was endearing. But his former stature has been sacrificed to an insatiable ego. His effort to be seen and to win whatever the moral cost make it clear that he regards the law more as a chess-like game of sport than a search for truth.

His blanket statements about police perjury, “especially in L.A.,” are clearly calculated and self-serving and may well backfire. But whatever the outcome of this case and appeal if there is one, Dershowitz’s arrogance and ego have rendered him permanently irrelevant to the cause of justice.

P. McCARTHY

Burbank

The Times misses the big picture in its March 17 editorial on the Simpson trial. While it is undeniable that decorum in the courtroom is essential for the rule of law, amity among the participants is not enough: Dispensation of justice must be the ultimate measure of any legal system.

In American today, justice is merely a byproduct of a system that condemns calling a liar a liar, but establishes as birthright a defense attorney’s privilege to falsify. Courtrooms have become hallowed ground for an elite guild to absolve those who break the law, condemn those who enforce it and ignore those who write it.

WILLIAM L. MORGON

Long Beach

Considering that what is taking place in our courthouse is nothing less than a mad tea party at our own expense, I would like to request that each major player step into his or her appropriate character: Simpson as the Dormouse, Marcia Clark the Queen of Hearts, Judge Ito the Caterpillar, Johnny Cochran the Cheshire Cat and F. Lee Bailey the Mad Hatter. Alice, of course, left the scene in the first chapter.

ROSS M. LEVINE

Los Angeles

Washington Hospital*1

Your March 19 edition contained an article about a Washington hospital that lacked basic medical supplies, such as gauze bandages, rubber groves and other basic medicines. If this were a Third World country we would have a plane ready for takeoff. This situation, however, is in our nation’s capital.

I am sure that our senators and congressmen do not use this hospital. The Times buried the article inside, instead of placing it on the front page where it belongs for all the world to see.

It is a sad commentary that this is happening in this country. What will it be like when the Republicans get through cutting even more money out of health care?

CECIL GREENWOLD

Los Angeles