Amnesty Key to Inquiry

By tossing out nine more convictions last week, a Superior Court judge raised the total of reversed convictions to 32 since ex-officer-turned-informant Rafael Perez first came forward last September with his sordid tales of planted evidence, framed suspects, beatings, drug dealing and unnecessary police shootings. It is important to get to the bottom of what looks like an ever-deepening pit of corruption in the Los Angeles Police Department. The solution lies in the whole truth--however painful and messy it is.

The depth and breadth of the ongoing Rampart Division scandal are staggering: In addition to the convictions overturned so far, 20 police officers have been relieved of duty or suspended, have quit or were fired, and hundreds, possibly thousands of criminal cases may have been tainted. Concern is mounting that the corruption, planted evidence and bad shootings could extend well beyond the Rampart Division and that the scandal might go higher up the chain of command.

The consequences are grave for the LAPD, still tarnished by revelations of pervasive racism and officer misconduct that surfaced after the Rodney King beating in 1991. Little wonder that Chief Bernard C. Parks is anxious to get this trouble behind him. The chief, who along with a deputy city attorney told a stunned City Council last Wednesday that Los Angeles may have to pay as much as $125 million to settle lawsuits stemming from the scandal, has vowed to root out the corruption, directing more than 45 officers and detectives to investigate alleged wrongdoing. Parks has also pressured Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti to move quickly, even calling on him to dismiss presumed tainted cases “en masse” instead of prolonging the investigation.

Mass dismissals alone won’t get to the truth about what happened, and the district attorney’s office is correct to resist that approach; determining whether innocent men and women have been sent to prison should be the highest priority. The goal here must be not expediency but truth. To get to that truth, prosecutors will need corroboration from police who witnessed misconduct by fellow officers. The D.A. is understandably reluctant to bring charges in the weak cases he now has before him, which often rely on the testimony of corrupt cops. However, Chief Parks himself can speed along the process and perhaps ensure its success. Here’s how.

The LAPD, like most urban police departments, obligates all employees to immediately notify a supervisor when they become “aware of possible misconduct by another member of the department.” The consequences for failing to report misconduct can be severe, including dismissal. Ironically, that rule has become an obstacle to clearing up the stench in Rampart. The well-known reluctance of police officers, here and elsewhere, to rat on one another allowed Rafael Perez and his ilk to act with impunity. An officer who witnessed corruption or misconduct, if he or she came forward now, would be subject to discipline.

No LAPD rule or mechanism should be allowed to discourage truth-telling in this scandal, the department’s worst in decades. Parks should declare a one-time amnesty of limited duration for previous failure to report misconduct. He has the unilateral authority under the charter to issue such an amnesty. He may well resist, arguing that the credibility of officers who came forward in the Rampart case months or years after the fact would be damaged in all future criminal cases. But amnesty is the surest method for the LAPD to determine the full extent of this scandal and assist prosecutors. This would be better than continuing on the current path, a meandering and possibly inconclusive one.

If temporarily loosening the rules helps some officers step forward and expose serious wrongdoing, then that’s what is needed. The greater benefit is in rooting out rogue cops who are a scourge on good officers everywhere and a direct threat to the integrity of the criminal justice system.