Officer Garcia’s Pattern
In 1993, Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney David Sotelo violated the civil rights of a Los Angeles police officer who, he knew, was factually innocent. Despite Sotelo’s deliberate misconduct, Gray Davis appointed him to sit in judgment of others as a Los Angeles Superior Court Judge. Although I was the one whose civil rights he violated, I have since accepted that we all make mistakes and most of us learn and grow from them. I’ve kept an eye on Sotelo and am heartened by his temperament today. He seems to have learned from his mistakes, as most of us do.
Why is this relevant? Because as the LA Dog Trainer and lefty lawyers wax hysterical about the outcome of the Devin Brown shooting, LAPD Officer Steven Garcia’s exoneration, and the terrible secrecy of his Trial Board, LA Dog Trainer-reporter Scott Glover has dug up Officer Garcia’s ten-year-old complaint:
A Los Angeles Police Department captain who voted not to discipline Officer Steven Garcia this week in the shooting of 13-year-old Devin Brown had warned him in a previous disciplinary case that one more offense would probably get him fired.Yet that history was ignored in the Board of Rights hearing on Brown’s death because LAPD rules typically do not allow an officer’s past misconduct to be considered.
Warren Christopher used the same tactic to smear good police officers in 1991, so it’s important to explain its use.
First of all, the LAPD hires no one. Appointments to the Los Angeles Police Academy are made at the Los Angeles Personnel Department, by civilians who consider quotas to ensure that LAPD officers are of the appropriate color and gender. This is not to say that Garcia relied on quotas to join the LAPD, I know little of him. But I do know that white male applicants must possess remarkable credentials to compete with quotas.
According to Glover, Officer Garcia was suspended for 44 days without pay in 1997 for misconduct. Other than the Brown shooting, Glover’s report does not indicate any misconduct by Garcia before 1997 or during the subsequent decade.
Under LAPD rules, prior discipline can be presented as evidence in a new case only if it is used to demonstrate a pattern of misconduct. If an officer is ultimately found guilty of an offense, past discipline may then be considered in determining punishment. As with similar rules in criminal court, restrictions on the admissibility of past misconduct are intended to protect against undue prejudice…
Jeffrey C. Eglash, who served as the LAPD’s inspector general from 1999 through 2002, said “the department has historically taken an unnecessarily narrow view” of the use of prior evidence. “When relevant evidence about an officer’s complaint or use-of-force history that would be admitted in an actual trial is excluded in a Board of Rights, that unnecessarily tilts the playing field” in the officer’s favor, said Eglash, now a private attorney in Connecticut. “I think that’s wrong.”
So let’s look at Officer Garcia’s pattern of misconduct. The LAPD has employed him for at least ten years and he still works in a busy uniformed patrol division. Street cops typically come into contact with several dozen suspects, witnesses, and victims every day. Considering that the average officer is on the streets interacting with suspects and victims for about 200 days each year, we can assume that Officer Garcia had direct contact with roughly 4,000 Angelenos each day, or approximately 40,000 people between 1997 and today.
Now if we’re looking for patterns, this pattern is obvious: Of the 40,000 contacts Officer Garcia has had while serving on the most violent streets in the United States, less than one-tenth of one percent of those who had contact with him have ever complained. These numbers do not imply reckless or malicious behavior, but instead show a pattern of restraint and excellence. For the LA Dog Trainer to question Officer Garcia’s fitness is pathetic at best, especially in light of their severe allergic reaction to accurate journalism.
And if we compare David Sotelo’s short service as a prosecutor, I am confident that the percentage of Sotelo’s recorded civil rights abuses far outweigh Officer Garcia’s.
And if these numbers still confuse you, ask yourself whether LA Lakers star Kobe Bryant, who averages 3.2 personal fouls per game, is a more valuable player than teammate Shammond Williams, who averages less than one foul per game. Smart people figure these things out intuitively and people like Eglash, Chemerinsky, and Glover know better than to misrepresent these facts.
Police officers who misrepresent fact are severely disciplined or fired, while Eglash and Chemerinsky play as loose and sloppy as the LA Dog Trainer because of biases that favor their liberal clients, friends, and philosophy. Before any of those noisy benchwarmers complain about Kobe Bryant’s performance or Officer Garcia’s record, they should first be required to spend a few days playing center court.
But as a former LAPD training officer, I doubt that talented performers like Glover, Eglash, or Chemerinsky possess the virtues expected of Los Angeles police officers.
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Clark Baker is a senior contributor to CaliforniaConservative.org. He is an author, filmaker, father and retired LAPD officer. You may read more of his work here and here.