Parker on Police [First Edition] 0398020809, 9780398020804

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PARKER ON POLICE

William H. Parker

PARKER ON POLICE Edited by O.W. WILSON Dean, School of Criminology University of California Berkley, California

Charles C Thomas Springfield

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Illinois

Publisher .

USA

CHARLES C THOMAS

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PUBLISHER

Bannerstone House 302-327 East Lawrence Avenue, Springfield, Illinois, USA

Published simultaneously in the British Commonwealth of Nations by BLACKWELL SCIENTIFIC PUBLICATIONS, LTD, OXFORD, ENGLAND

Published Simultaneously in Canada by THE RYERSON PRESS, TORONTO

This book is protected by copyright. No part Of it may be reproduced in any manner without Written permission from the publisher.

Copyright 1957, by CHARLES C THOMAS

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PUBLISHER

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 57-5608

Printed in the United States of America

THE AUGUST VOLLMER MEMORIAL SCHOLARSHIP FUND All royalties from the sale of this book are to be paid to The Regents of the University of California, Account: The August Vollmer Memorial Scholarship Fund. Contributions to this fund may be mailed to The Regents of the University of California, Berkley, California. Charles C Thomas

FORWARD

My Acquaintance with William H Parker has extended over a great many years and, during World War II, our association was a close one. Since his appointment as Chief of Police of Los Angeles, I have watched his operations and the progress of his department with an interest stimulated by the discovery that he was making the most of his rare opportunity to modernize and professionalize police service. He immediately reorganized his department to simplify and assure his control over its operations and to facilitate the attainment of police objectives. He also adopted the best of known police procedures and urged his exceptionally competent staff to develop new ones. Such changes meet resistance in the police force and in the community just as does any change in nature or the body politic. What Parker was doing required more courage than is possessed by most men, but his courage is grounded on a great religious faith and he has superb inherent qualities that enable him to carry his intentions into practice. Perhaps it is his faith that has enabled him to weather the rough political seas that every police chief encounters during his career – and nowhere are the seas rougher than in a large American city. Like other pioneers in the professionalization of police service, he has been confronted by endless obstacles and many scoffers. That he has successfully persisted is evidence of great qualities of leadership implemented by patience, diplomacy, sound judgment, unusual moral courage, and great physical and emotional strength. The idea of publishing Parker’s addresses and articles in book form was conceived while listening to an address by him that was interleaved with a basic philosophy that was unique in its setting and subject matter. This book is offered in the conviction, first, that it presents much information and many simple truths relating to administrative problems that are worth the attention of all police

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viii Executives and, second, that its subject matter is presented in such a frank, straightforward, simple way that it will prove interesting reading to the layman and will enable him to understand how a successful police chief in a large American city discharges some of his administrative responsibilities. The publication of this book gives me the pleasant opportunity of endorsing the high ideals and progressive ideas of Chief William H. Parker. O.W. Wilson Berkley, 1957

INTRODUCTION Chief William H. Parker

On August 9, 1950, William H Parker was appointed Chief of Police of the City of Los Angeles. His law enforcement career, dating from August 8, 1927, includes service in all ranks within the Los Angeles Police Department. Today, having spent more than twenty-nine of his fifty-four years serving Los Angeles, he is recognized as one of the leading architects of that city’s world-famous police organization. The comprehensive working knowledge of modern law enforcement acquired in a wide variety of assignments has earned him professional status as one of the top police administrators in the nation. After his first year of service as Chief, in August, 1951, Parker received an award from the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce commending the department for exceptional efficiency under his leadership. It has since become a model for police administrators throughout the world. During the Kefauver Crime Investigation of 1952, he was personally commended, and the Senate Committee took official notice of the effectiveness of the Los Angeles Police Department. Similar notice has been taken by State and other Federal Crime Investigation agencies and by nationally-known police and civilian authorities, with Los Angeles becoming known as the ‘white spot’ in the nation’s pattern of crime. During October of 1952, Chief Parker was singled out by the government of the Republic of Korea when its Ministry of Home Affairs appointed him Honorary Chief of the National Police, commending him for prominence in all fields of law enforcement and for the inspiration he had offered to the democratic police of the Free World. In February of 1953, he was selected as ‘Citizen of the Year by the Los Angeles Junior Chamber of Commerce for outstanding service to his community. In November, 1953,

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x He was presented with the “Award of Merit for Distinguished Citizenship” by the B’nai B’rith. In May of 1955, Chief Parker was selected as “Salesman of the Year” by the Sales Executive Club of Los Angeles for his outstanding contribution toward the furtherance of public understanding of law enforcement. In December, 1955, he was awarded a Life Membership in the Military Order of the Purple Heart. Born June 21, 1902, in Lead, South Dakota, he acquired his interest in police work from his grandfather, a colorful frontier law-enforcement officer. He completed high school in Deadwood, in the heart of the Black Hills. Continuing his education after joining the Los Angeles Police Department, he received his LL.B. degree in 1930 from the Los Angeles College of Law and became a member of the California State Bar. During the following years he attended a variety of specialized police training courses and received certificates in Police and Traffic Administration from Northwestern University. He studied Overseas Administration and the Italian language at Harvard University during World War II. During twenty-six months overseas with the Military Government branch of the Armed Forces, he served from Sardinia to Occupied Germany. He developed the Police and Prisons Plan for the European invasion and created democratic police systems for Munich and Frankfort. He was wounded during the Normandy Invasion and was awarded the Purple Heart. For his work during the liberation of Paris, he was awarded the Croix de Guerre with Silver Star by the Free French Government. Italy awarded him the Star of Solidarity for his work in restoring civil government in Sardinia. He was honorably discharged an Army Captain in November, 1945. Chief Parker’s service with the Los Angeles Police Department has seen him develop administrative concepts which are now established procedures in other police agencies. He was instrumental in the creation and development of the Internal Affairs Division, which handles complaints concerning the conduct of members of the department. Equally interested in officer welfare, he was co-author of the Board of Rights procedure (Section 202, Los Angeles City Charter) which guarantees separation of police discipline from municipal politics.

xi He served on the Executive Committee of the Fire and Police Protective League for many years. After becoming Chief, he created the Bureau of Administration which includes the nationally-famous Intelligence and Planning and Research divisions. Active in American Legion affairs, Chief Parker was elected Commander of Police Post 381 in 1948. Under his administration, the Post grew to 2500 members, the largest in California. For this achievement, he was appointed Membership Chairman of The American Legion in California for two successive terms. In 1949 he was appointed Chairman of the Legion Americanism Commission for California. In the 17th District, he was elected 2nd ViceCommander in 1948, 1st Vice-Commander in 1949, and District Commander in 1950. It was Chief Parker’s keen understanding of the Los Angeles Police Department needs that brought about the present functional design of the new Police Administration Building. This represented a savings of over $5,000,000 to the city and gave to the police a more efficient base of operations. Chief Parker is recognized today as one of the leading exponents of professionalism in police work. An advocate of a close working relationship between the citizen and the police officer, he spends a great portion of his personal time addressing citizen and business groups. Because of Chief Parker’s interest in the youth of the community he was, in January, 1956, appointed to the Executive Board of the Los Angeles Council, Boy Scouts of America. Interested in worldwide development of democratic police practices, he has co-operated extensively with the U.S. State Department, serving as host to police and governmental delegates from almost every country outside the Iron Curtain. On May 28, 1956, Chief Parker was elected to the Board of Governors of the Welfare Federation, Los Angeles Area. This organization administers the affairs of the Community Chest locally. A member of the California Bar for over 25 years, he was admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court on April 9, 1956. He was presented to the court on this occasion by Warren Olney III, Assistant Attorney General of the United States.

TABLE OF CONTENTS Foreword by O. W. Wilson…………………………………………………………

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Introduction: William H. Parker, A Biographical Profile…………………………..

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Chapter I. Parker’s Radio Address Following His Appointment as Chief of Police…………

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II. Parker’s Philosophy Crime and Belief, IACP Address. September, 1952…………………………

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Religion and Morality, Holy Name Society, January, 1953…………………

18

The Police Profession, Graduating Class, Police Academy, April, 1951…..

20

Police Philosophy, Legal Secretaries Association, January, 1951…………..

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III. Parker to Businessmen The Businessmen and the Police, February, 1952…………………………….

35

Business Principles Applied in Police Service, Prepared for the Property Owner’s Association Radio Broadcast, January, 1952……………… 39 IV. Parker on Crime Invasion from Within, September, 1952……………………………………..

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Excerpts from Exchange Club Addresses on Crime Prevention, February 1954, February 1955 ………………………………………………………… 66 V. Parker on Police Planning Practical Aspects of Police Planning, IACP, September, 1954………………… 73

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xiv VI. Parker on Legal Restrictions Imposed on Police Surveillance by Wiretap, California Law Review, December 1954…………..

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Cahan Decision Made Life Easier for Criminals, California Judiciary Subcommittee, January 1956……………………………………………… 113 The March of Crime, excerpts, March, 1956…………………………..

VII. Parker on Public Relations The Police Administrator and Public Relations, September, 1955……… Police Role in Community Relations, May, 1955………………………...

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135 147

VIII. Parker on Traffic Transit Inflation, Rotary Club, January, 1953…………………………

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Freedom on the Freeways, Breakfast Club, July, 1953……………….

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Public Relations and the Traffic Officer, Municipal Motorcycle Officers Yearbook, 1952……………………………………………… 180 IX. Parker on Police Administration The Police Challenge in Our Great Cities…………………………..

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X. Parker to Citizens Progress Report, January, 1953………………………………………..

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Response to Questions Concerning Juvenile Gangs, December, 1953…..

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The Rehabilitation Center. Excerpts from the March of Crime, March, 1956…218 XI. Parker to His Force Miscellaneous “Chief’s Messages” from the 1952 Annual Reports and The Beat……………………………………………………………… 225 Index…………………………………………………………………………

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PARKER ON POLICE

Chapter One

PARKER’S RADIO ADDRESS FOLLOWING HIS APPOINTMENT AS CHIEF OF POLICE OF LOS ANGELES; DELIVERED OVER RADIO STATION KFI, AUGUST 9, 1950

Parker’s Radio Address Following His Appointment as Chief of Police

As your new Chief of Police, I humbly appreciate the honor conferred upon me and realize my great responsibility to the people of the City of Los Angeles. The growth of this city has been phenomenal. The office of Chief of Police was first created in 1877, and at that time the force consisted of six police officers. In the short span of seventy-three years, the force has grown to an authorized strength of 4493 police officers and approximately 900 clerical and technical personnel. The police department today expends approximately twenty million dollars a year in its operation. This money is derived from the pockets of the taxpayers, and they are certainly entitled to a full measure of service in return. People have organized themselves into our present society in order that each person may contribute to the welfare of the others and thus provide a full and protected life. But social contracts create friction. There are wicked men with evil hearts who sustain themselves by preying upon society. There are men who lack control over their strong passions, and thus we have vicious assaults, many times amounting to the destruction of the life of a fellow man. To control and repress these evil forces, police forces have existed, in some form or another, throughout recorded history. On the surface it would appear that complete harmony should reign between the good citizens of the community and their police. But there are frictions even in this relationship. As society increases in number, it becomes more complex and additional regulations become necessary to preserve it from disintegration. But it must be remembered that this great nation of ours was founded by men and women who fought their way

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6 across the Atlantic to escape the harsh and oppressive restrictions under which they lived in Europe. From these hardy pioneers we have developed a nation of people who are deeply conscious and rightfully jealous of their individual liberties and the dignity of man. The resultant conflict between increased regulation and individual liberty gives rise to a problem of serious proportions. The police, in an attempt to obey legislative mandate and enforce regulations, are often brought to grips with the individuals to whom these measures are applied. The American people possess a greater degree of sympathy for the “under-dog” than any of the other peoples on earth. Thus, when police measures are applied against an individual, we are inclined to extend sympathy to that individual and are there fore prone to overlook deeds of the individual that made police action necessary. The police enforcement burden is therefore in two parts: they must enforce regulations on one hand and maintain public support on the other. It has been aptly stated by an eminent judge that the success of any police department rests largely upon the confidence of the people whom it serves. There is another factor that enters into the delicate relationship of the police and the public. It is axiomatic that a police force is judged by the acts of its individual members. Sometimes wicked men elude the detection devices of the selective processes and find their way into police service. Their evil acts, when discovered, cast disrepute upon the entire force and sometimes result in a sharp break between the community and the police. The infrequent contact between the individual citizen and the police is usually with only one or two members of the force. The nature of that contact builds within the mind of the individual a concept of the entire organization. When the experience is satisfactory, the citizen praises the force and is pleased with his police establishment. When the experience is unpleasant, all members are grouped together as the object of his castigation. In an endeavor to build a superior police department in the City of Los Angeles, we have applied recruiting standards and a measure of selectivity probably more stringent than has been used in any other part of the country. For example, in a recent examination for the position of policeman, in which over 2300 applicants participated, only seventeen achieved a passing grade in the written test. Credits in the oral examination and the application

7 of veteran credits qualified less than 150 men out of the original group. 1 Subsequent thereto, many of these failed to pass our rigid medical examination and others failed to perform in accordance with our high standards during their probationary period. Those receiving appointments have been sent through a comprehensive training period at the police academy and, in addition to the other phases of the policeman’s craft, these officers have been inculcated with a deep appreciation of the relationship between the police and the public. It is the considered opinion of authorities in the police field that about five years of service are required before an officer, through training and experience, develops the sense of judgment that enables him to handle almost any situation with a minimum of conflict and friction. Ours is a young department. Over 3000 young men have entered the department since the cessation of hostilities in World War II. With rare exception, all are veterans of the War. It is a radical change to relive a man from a fighting armed force, where he is imbued with a deep sense of preservation of self and destruction of the enemy, and to place him in the peacetime role of a police officer where he must refrain from the use of physical force unless it becomes absolutely necessary for the protection of society. In the administration of the affairs of your police department, it will be my earnest endeavor to provide you with an honest and efficient police force, dedicated to the service of the community. The law will be enforced in a reasonable fashion, with full consideration given to the individual rights of every citizen. We will continue in our attempts to eradicate from the community those parasites who prey upon us and whose nefarious activities drain huge sums of money from local channels of trade. In order to achieve this, a full measure of consideration must be given to the lives and welfare of our police officers and their

1 Prior to 1954 the veteran credit of 10% could be added to the written grade thus qualifying the candidate to continue with the other phases of the examination. In the 1950 examination referred to, only 17 candidates achieved a grade of 75% or higher without application of the 10% veteran credit. Out of the entire group of 2300, less than 150 candidates successfully passed all phases of the examination and became eligible for appointment. [Ed.]

8 families. A young man entering the police service realizes he cannot expect to amass great wealth, but he and his family are entitled to a scale of living that will provide him with the moderate advantages of a home and an opportunity to afford to his children a proper degree of social, recreational, and educational opportunities. Los Angeles is the white spot of the great cities of America today. It is to the advantage of the community that we keep it that way. To do so, our police must receive adequate wage and other elements of economic security that will enable them to resist the temptations that constantly face the police officer, that will give the individual officer the courage to hold community above self, and that will attract to the police service, men possessing that high degree of both physical and moral courage, and of health and intelligence, so necessary in the proper discharge of the complex duties of the modern police officer. The police officers of this city are well aware that their concerns have been my concern and are full familiar with the many occasions when it has been my good fortune to represent them in matters relating to the welfare of themselves and their families. May I assure all members of the Los Angeles Police Department that my interest in their individual welfare will not diminish. All the employees of our great department are encouraged to continue in their efforts to increase their professional knowledge and to compete with their fellow officers in promotional examinations, for merit will be rewarded without regard to race, color, or creed. It is my firm intention that selections for promotional positions will be made in strict conformity with the order of promotional lists. I shall do all in my power to accomplish those things necessary to make the policeman’s life a little brighter and the load a little lighter. In return, I ask only that we remain steadfast in our loyalty to the people of the community whom we serve, that we ever remember that our oath of office binds us to a life of service to the community. May I assure the people of Los Angeles that we will not deviate from this solemn obligation, and that we will continue in our endeavor to bring about complete understanding between the police and the public, which can only react to our mutual benefit.

Chapter Two

PARKER’S PHILOSOPHY Crime and Belief: An address delivered at the 59th Annual Conference of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, Los Angeles, September 1952.

Religion and Morality: Excerpts from a speech to Holy Name Society, Los Angeles, January, 1953.

The Police Profession: An address delivered to the graduating class at the Los Angeles Police Academy, April, 1951.

Police Philosophy: An address delivered to the Legal Secretaries Association, Glendale, California, January, 1951.

Crime and Belief

I wish that I might have been asked twenty-five years ago to speak to this gathering on the subject of crime prevention. At that time I was a young policeman and had solved that great problem. Terms like “as the twig is bent” and “eliminate the desire” came readily to my mind. In those days the problems of the world were etched in blacks and whites; there were fewer greys. If I had spoken to you at that time I am sure I could have offered immediate solutions. Today, a quarter-century later, I am not that same confident oracle. I have misplaced those ringing slogans. I have found that rules-of-thumb are usually only exercises in finger-twirling, and I have learned that wisdom consists of more than shallow postulation. The man who wants an easy formula, a common denominator, or universal solution for every problem, will not find his answer here. An inquiry into crime prevention requires, as do most discussions, the establishment of some basic point from which to proceed. Fundamental agreement is necessary to determine the scope of the problem and the limits of its practical solution. First, I believe it can be fairly stated that crime prevention is not an exact science. We have had some practical experience; we have some facts; we have made a number of lucky guesses. In the past few years a beam of light has been focused upon the subject, but it is a thin beam and so far has only been sufficient to warn us that we face a deep and many-sided enigma. In our time we have seen crime blamed on our ancestors, friends, diet, sex, the movies, radio, television, and comic books. Later it was the vogue to lump all factors together and call it “multiple causation.” Today we recognize that the roots of crime go deeper; that they are intertwined about the fundamental concepts that distinguish animal from man and man from his Creator. 11

12 Second, we must face the fact that the public has displayed only mild interest in the prevention of crime. We have been encouraged by a few farsighted and aggressive community leaders, but on the whole we have seen little inclination on the part of the public to furnish the interest, time, or funds necessary for a truly comprehensive program of prevention. Undoubtedly the cause of some of this failure can be traced to the police. The public does not rest great responsibility upon those in whom it does not rest great faith. Police history is not a pretty thing; it does not inspire confidence. However bright the present and promising the future, the past hangs as a millstone about the neck of the professional-minded police leaders who are gathered here. Third, the prevention of crime is not one of the traditional police tasks. Law enforcement officers are neither equipped nor authorized to deal with broad social problems. We do not control economic cycles; we are not equipped to deal with racial, religious, or political prejudice; we are not arbiters of right and wrong. In short, we are not healers of social ills. Our job is to apply emergency treatment to society’s surface wounds; we deal with effects, not causes. This is a rather melancholy examination of crime prevention. However, if we can determine our limitations, we have taken the first step toward a solution. The wise navigator is concerned first with his position. He does not select a spot where he would like to be; instead, he pin-points his exact location and then, however far off course, proceeds resolutely from there. I said before that I will disappoint anyone who expects to find here an easy formula for preventing crime. As a problem in ethics (the third branch of philosophy) crime has received attention from the best minds of all the centuries. Not only has man failed to find a solution, he has been unable to agree on a common definition. To one man it is a crime to steal a penny but good business to steal a fortune. To another it is a crime to gamble at cards but recreation to gamble at horse races. And to another it is a crime to betray a political party but idealism to betray a nation. What is a crime? We do not know; we have only our personal concepts. As policemen we are guided by an artificial definition of right and wrong – the law. We do not pretend that it is all-wise, all-

13 inclusive, or all-just. The student of ethics will find in it many flaws. The student of theosophy will find in it many deviations from fundamental religious principles. The student of logic will find in it many contradictions. It is probable that no man exists who agrees with all the statutes. This creates a remarkable paradox. Law exists, not because we do agree on what is right and wrong, but because we do not agree. A universally accepted standard of ethics does not exist. To prevent anarchy, it is necessary to impose this artificial standard based on majority agreement. When a majority of persons do not accept these imposed concepts, the law is changed, either by democratic process or by force, and new standards are adopted. The minority who do not accept them, however, are said to be the criminal element. Crime has its birth in this clash between individual and group ethics. I submit that the volume of crime is proportional to the quantity and breadth of this variance. I believe that this hypothesis is susceptible of proof. As practicing policemen we are familiar with the fact that the average criminal does not believe that he is doing wrong. As he views the situation, he is doing right. However faulty his premises, however weak his logic, however selfish his reasons, and however transitory his beliefs, he acts in accord with his own concepts. Therefore, if we are to approach crime at its most vulnerable angle, we must recognize that man is a creature of belief. If anyone doubts the power of belief, let him turn to his history book and watch man rise and fall, love and kill, exalt and fear – all on this basis. In the arena of war, conflicts that have arisen from empty stomachs have been mere skirmishes compared to those holocausts incited by confused minds. Kings rule, martyrs suffer, and merchants prosper according to their own convictions. Like other men, the criminal acts in response to his own beliefs. The fact that his beliefs differ from those of the majority and that they may be completely illogical does not alter the primary fact that they are the mainspring of his life. Hunger, poverty, maladjustment, and other physical problems do not incite crime – they incite beliefs that may produce crime. This subtle difference may be regarded by some as hair-splitting.

14 In reality, the distinction is of enormous importance. If criminal acts are symptoms of a conflict between individual morals and accepted morals, then the problem can only be solved by resolving the conflict. Either the law, our artificial standard of morals, must be altered, or the individual’s standard must be brought into closer conformity with popular requirements. The two in conflict invariably produce crime. It is apparent that our way of life cannot survive if we so relax and broaden our laws that almost any individual’s standard will conform with them. Such a course would be little more than anarchy. Therefore, the only alternative is to alter individual standards. A question immediately arises: Can individual ethical standards be altered? The answer is unreservedly “Yes!” Men’s ideas are constantly being revised. Our great religions are founded on this fact. Science, philosophy, and art depend upon it for their creative sustenance. Discarded ideas, like burned-out torches, litter mankind’s path, and its future way is lit by those freshly kindled. Ideals, morals, ethics, or b y whatever name you call man’s convictions – they are the indispensable tools of life. Another question: How may beliefs be altered? It is no secret to practical men that beliefs are altered by stronger beliefs. Grecian philosophy altered the convictions of the Mediterranean; Roman practically dominated Europe and Africa; and, in turn, the minds of both were captured by a small band of Hebrews who preached the ideals of Christianity. America was conceived in the rupture of old beliefs and nurtured by new ones. Small beliefs are also changed. Bathtubs, chewing gum, chrome bumpers, and vitamin tablets all represent new convictions. Police administrators improve their departments by implanting new convictions. Ideas great and small are susceptible to change. To a nation that daily uses the press, radio, and television with such frightful potency, this should come as no surprise. This is not a call to fit men into identical patterns. There is a divine dignity in individuality. If the price of eliminating crime is to cast all men from a common mold, the price is too great. It is better to bolt the door in fear of the criminal than to bold the

15 mind in fear of an all-powerful state. Fortunately it is unnecessary to suffer from either extreme. In a democratic society, ample latitude exists within the law to exercise creative diversities. During the 1930’s the German dictatorship successfully imposed upon an entire generation of youth, and with only slightly less success upon older generations, completely new concepts of moral values. More recently the Soviet Union, undoubtedly encouraged by Germany’s success, has improved and expanded the program internationally. That these are false concepts, we know. But the activities of our enemy demonstrate something we once knew but have forgotten. Men want desperately for something to believe in. This desire is so great that they will flock to new concepts, even though they be evil and illogical, so long as they are strong concepts. Americans who know how to sell people on the largely mythical values of luxury commodities can also sell them on the obvious values of majority ethical convictions. Would the burglar be reduced to tears and deterred from his crime by a thirty-second radio announcement on the advantages of virtue? We well know he would not, not matter how clever the writer and forceful the announcer. But neither did the citizen rush to the market to buy chlorophyl the moment the new deodorant was first advertised. It took ten years of conditioning to do the job. Americans, who a few years ago were convinced that they were the sweetest smelling persons in the world, today regard honest perspiration with deep suspicion and, as a result, consume advertised chemicals on a grand scale. Is it impossible that the odor of crime could be brought to the same public’s attention? The eager critic will point out, of course, that various criminal acts are in response to natural urges and are therefore beyond the

16 reach of gentle persuasion. Rape, theft, murder, and the like, he will say, result from inadequate housing, lack of recreation, hunger, ignorance, bad companions, or some combination of them. He will speak of secret urges in the dark recesses of the mind. But he will not explain how most of us here, and indeed a significant portion of our countrymen, have endured one or many of these hardships without yielding to those secret desires. It is the truth, as our critic will some day discover, that a man’s convictions will carry him over adversity as surely as his faith carries him over doubt. I do not oppose social improvement. If an equitable way can be found, give every man three bedrooms and a green lawn, fill his belly, and while away his leisure hours with entertainment – but if you fail to find for him something to believe in, if he and his neighbors do not share convictions within which to live, that physical Utopia will lack the vital necessity of ordered life. Whether or not the time, material, and funds for a comprehensive crime prevention program will ever be available, is debatable. Surely it would be an enormous undertaking. However, there is an immediate way that can yield much in the future. Youth is the key. Their beliefs are not yet fortified behind the concrete shell of certainty that adults call maturity. Growing minds are capable of immense faith. They are eager to believe, so eager that when we fail to supply convictions for them, they go out and seek them on street corners and in back alleys. So great is this desire that our juvenile officers, sometimes using only a day in the mountains, a baseball and a sandlot, or a few sticks of wood and a pot of glue to excite curiosity, have left indelible convictions of right and wrong on these young minds, which have fortified them for the remainder of their lives. Since law enforcement’s pitifully few juvenile officers have done so much, is there any doubt what the great resources of this nation could accomplish? If I have pointed the way to a solution, it is no easy one. I wish that crime were a simple plague to be solved by isolating a troublesome microbe, but it is not. I wish it could be eliminated materialistically, by continually supplying Americans with chrome fixtures, softer beds, and shorter work hours, but I know that it cannot be thus eradicated. Certainly I do wish that the police had

17 it within their power to solve the problem alone, but I know they cannot. Crime in America is not a surface disorder – a minor irritation. It is indicative of deep conflicts which enervate the vital strength of the republic. In a nation regulated by brute force, a crime problem is not fatal. But in a nation founded upon faith and held together solely by belief, it is a potent threat. It is the clear duty of the American police to work to prevent crime by all means at their disposal. We have accepted that obligation, and we will continue to perform the task to the best of our ability. But this does not discharge our obligation completely. It is imperative that every American recognize crime, not as a police problem, but as a departure from the deep convictions that bind 150 million persons into a secure, prosperous, and happy nation. The police must help them understand.

Religion and Morality Our theme is taken from the farewell address of George Washington, uttered on September 17, 1796, when he determined to seek retirement upon the conclusion of his term as President of the United States: …Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness--these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule indeed extends with more or less force to every species of free government… In another portion of that splendid address, Washington delivered a prophetic admonition to the American people. He said, “It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and at no distant period a great nation to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that in the course of time and things the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady adherence to it? Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue? The experiment, at least, is 18

19 recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?” More than 156 years have passed and the prophecy has been partially fulfilled. Yes, we have become a great nation in a material sense. But this unparalleled success in the acquisition of worldly goods has been accompanied by a materialistic philosophy that has permeated our people and that threatens to destroy every vestige of human liberty. With reckless disregard of the admonition of Washington, we have attempted to disassociate Virtue from the formula that will guarantee permanency as a free people. Is it possible that our vices have shattered the dream of the founding fathers? I believe it may be. If we continue to blindly ignore the lessons of history, the sins of the father will certainly be visited upon the children, and the generations to come will pay dearly for our selfish stupidity. Let us look at the great civilizations of the past. Egypt, Babylon, Greece, and Rome rose, then fell, as strength gave way to weakness, alertness gave way to complacency, and virtue gave way to corruption. It is possible that our failure to recognize the indispensability of Religion and Morality to our national welfare is rapidly leading us to the same fate that beset these brave civilizations of the past. Full and abiding adherence by responsible citizens to accepted principles of morality, as laid down in the scriptures, would ensure our salvation. Such a return to our early strengths and virtues would dissipate the threat to our survival as a free people. However, it is a fact that we have become a confused nation, and the path back is as difficult as the course ahead. The confusion that has engulfed us must be eliminated, and there must be a return to fundamental honesty, morality, and ethics in every facet of our lives. Who will lead the way? Perhaps a clue to the answer to this question is to be found in our theme of today. If it is a valid premise that Religion and Morality are indispensable to human welfare, it must be concluded that Religion and Morality are indispensable to each other. Therefore, the leadership we require in this compelling return to fundamental virtues must lie among those men who have been privileged to understand the true relationship between God and man.

The Police Profession I want to congratulate the members of the graduating class for proving their ability by surviving the highly selective process used to determine who will serve in the Los Angeles Police Department. We are proud of our department; we believe it to be the foremost in the nation; hence we are particular as to who joins our ranks. You must not gain the impression, however, that you have now accomplished all that is necessary in the way of learning in order to do your job properly and well. Those of us who have had considerable experience in this field estimate that it requires about five years before a recruit becomes a really competent police officer. If you expect to progress or even keep abreast of developments in your chosen field, you must continue to study during perhaps most of the years ahead of you in the police service. I don’t know what motive prompted you to enter the police service. I assume that you were seeking economic location and, after weighing all factors, you decided that the police department offered you some desirable features in the way of security, so you chose to enter this hazardous service. In order that you and your families may be happy in your work, you must develop a philosophy that will suit your service. You do not, I hope, come into our profession with the hope of any great materialistic gain, because the field does not offer that. We expect you to do a good job, and there must be something within you that will cause you to strive hard to perform your work well. There is a philosophy of police service that is embodied in the definition of the term “police.” This term designates “that executive civil force of the state to which is entrusted the duty of maintaining order and of enforcing regulations for the prevention and detection of crime.” In a perfect system of civil administration, the function of the police is to interfere with the liberty of the 20

21 individual only when it degenerates into license, and why material variation from this standard is to be deprecated as being arbitrary and tyrannical. About 90 per cent of police eservice involves public relations, so we are attempting to t each you how to develop a sense of judgment whereby you can determine immediately when the activity of an individual is inimical to the welfare of society; it is then your sworn duty to interfere with the liberty of that individual – but not before. When you have developed this sense of judgment, you will then have become a perfect police officer in terms of a democracy. I do not believe there has ever been a time when honest and efficient law enforcement has been more important from both the local and national standpoint. As we began to fight in the defense of our nation against an outside aggressor we began to realize that perhaps there is more involved in our survival as a democratic nation than merely stemming the onward tide of that outside aggressor; we then began to understand that there may be some need for internal improvement in this nation if we are to survive. We have seen in recent months an uprising of public indignation over the exposure of corruption of men in government in both high and low places. It is a human frailty to look to the law enforcement field when human deficiencies and errors assert themselves in other walks of life and say, ‘Why don’t the police do something about them?” Of course, we can’t control the lives of 153 million people in the United States. There must be a change in public thinking in that respect. The people can’t expect only the police to have ethics and morality; they can’t look only to us to watch the conduct of all others and keep them in line. But we are depended upon to do a great deal in that respect and, of course, the first requirement in the performance of this task is that we policemen be both moral and honest. This gets us back to philosophy again. What will your philosophy be in this service? Will you be inspired by a philosophy of service? Will you dedicate yourselves to the welfare of your country, the welfare of your state, the welfare of your city? Will you take the inner satisfaction of a job well-done as sufficient reward and, out of the very satisfaction and joy of rendering service to

22 your fellow man, be adequately compensated if we continue to provide you with the financial means for at least a modest, dignified way of living? I caution you against temptations to which you have never before been exposed. You must be men of strong moral fibre in order to resist them. If you do not resist them, not only will you be unhappy and mentally disturbed but you will also risk loss of position and possible imprisonment. It is not hard to be honest – that is, it is not difficult if you want to be honest. You will be offered things apparently on a friendly basis and with no strings attached to them at least at that time. But you must look at all such offers with suspicion. I commend to you a quotation from the New Testament, “beware of him in whose hands are iniquity, his right hand is filled with gifts.” Not a bad quotation to remember and carry with you every day. You are coming into a great department to join a group of fine men, who have built the department into what it is today. You walk into a “going concern,” and we certainly have every right to expect that you will do nothing to bring about its deterioration, and that you will strive to add to it, to perfect it and to improve its reputation. Seated behind me on this platform re men who were, not too many years ago, in the same position as you are today; men who have followed the philosophies I am enunciating to you. I am certain they have had their share of joy in life and are just as content as if they had achieved material wealth. If you develop this philosophy of service and of dedication to the welfare of mankind you too will be happy; you also will enjoy the camaraderie of your companions and will serve your nation at a time when it badly needs your assistance. We are a small group of men who are expected to do great things, and we are proud of this badge we wear. We are proud of our profession, and we welcome you into it and commend to you our philosophy of service rather than one of materialistic gain.

Police Philosophy It is true, as your master of ceremonies has told you, that before I entered the service of the Los Angeles Police Department I had commenced the study of law. At that time I was a taxicab driver, and after entering the field of law enforcement, I continued my law studies. In 1930, I was successful in obtaining my degree in law, and what was more remarkable, I was successful in passing the State Bar examination the same year. At that time, as I seem to dimly recall, there was a depression and thus fate decided that I should remain with the police department. Since that time I have learned considerable about this phase of governmental activity. It is this experience with which I intend to concern myself tonight. As we study the pages of recorded history we learn that men banded together with their fellowmen in a social unit for the purpose of promoting a better way of life and for the further purpose of mutual assistance. From the first inception of this social unit, there were found in the group some wicked men with evil hearts who undertook to prey upon society rather than contribute to its welfare. In consequence, it became necessary to establish a system of rules of conduct and a legal profession to aid in their administration. Some form of police was also needed to protect the good people of the society from attack by these wicked members. Since the police were created to serve the majority by protecting their lives, their families, their property, and their pursuits, it sems incongruous that there should be such a breach of understanding and such a wide gap between the police and the public. Some of us in the police profession have been deeply concerned over this breach, and we have attempted to determine the historical basis for its existence. In doing so it is necessary to review the founding of this country by people who came here, primarily 23

24 from Europe, because they were restless under the harsh and unreasonable regulations designed to control their lives. They believed their governments to be tyrannical. They were people possessed of a deep-rooted sense of individual liberty and an ingrained consciousness of the dignity of man. They were prompted to seek some place on earth where they could give full expression to their concept of individual liberty and full recognition to the dignity of man. We are all possessed of concepts. We acquire these ideas during the formative years of our lives. These beliefs are acquired from those who are close about us: our families; our teachers; our churches; and the social influences that mold our lives. Sometimes we acquire false conceptions and spend much of our adult lives in overcoming them. But there is one belief that we have inherited, handed down from father to son and from generation to generation, that is not false, and that is our concept of individual liberty. There is a companion concept that is somewhat peculiar to America. It is the sympathy that we have for the under-dog. We are not always conscious of it but may I give you a simple example of its expression through the medium of a sport called “professional wrestling.” I have observed persons of normal intelligence and temperamental control become thoroughly emotional when at a wrestling match where one of the contestants is put to unfair disadvantage and his apparently maniacal opponent appears to be about to gouge out his eyes and tear his limbs from his body. There you see an emotional expression of American sympathy for the under-dog. When you join together the deeply rooted concept of individual liberty with an abiding sympathy for the under-dog you have the basis for a cleavage between the public and the police. When it becomes necessary for a police officer, wearing the badge of authority of the state, to deprive an individual of his liberty, perhaps remove him from his home by legal process, those who witness this legal invasion of personal liberty are inclined to allow their innate sympathy to turn to resentment towards the police. If the arrested person is the head of a household upon whom others are dependent for their economic support, the situation is further aggravated. The misdeeds of the arrested person are often overlooked, as has frequently been the case, even though the most

25 serious criminal acts are involved. The expression “sob-sisters” stems from the acts of well-intentioned but uninformed persons whose sense of sympathy causes them to accuse the police of inhumanity and to refuse to believe in the guilt of the defendant. There is another basis for this breach between the public and the police that cannot be fully appreciated by anyone except those of us who have experienced the transition of stepping forth from an average role in society to assume the occupation of a police officer. It involves a complete change in social status. Our recruitment processes are perhaps the most exacting in the entire police field. The successful candidates are assigned to the police academy where they are subjected to a rigid course of training of three month’s duration. After successfully completing the training course, the young recruit usually seeks some form of social relaxation. Perhaps some old friends arrange a party in his honor. After arriving at the appointed place he is introduced as a member of the police department. Almost invariably someone in the assembled group will take him to one side and the conversation generally follows this pattern, “Yesterday I was driving west on Wilshire Boulevard and, as I approached the intersection of Western Avenue, the signal light turned yellow. Of course, I drove through the intersection and an officer gave me a ticket. Now wasn’t he wrong?” The young officer is faced with a dilemma. As he did not witness the occurrence he is in no position to judge the relative merits of the dispute. He does not want to take the position of criticizing his fellow officer nor does he wish to disagree with the guest. He undergoes a mental struggle. As time goes on he finds himself constantly faced with demands that he pass upon the relative merits of criticisms about police activities. He soon learns that true social relaxation can be found only among his fellow officers. A great fraternity is thus built with strong camaraderie, but a basis is also formed for a breach between the police and the public. The situation does not contribute to the welfare of either the police or the public. In the early legal history of California, in the case of Clue vs. the Board of Police Commissioners, the court said, “The efficiency of any police department depends largely upon the confidence of the people whom it serves.” It is a truism that a police department having the confidence of

26 the public will frequently receive information that will be indispensable in solving many criminal cases. The inability to obtain existent information is a serious handicap to your police as is evident in the recent slaying of a local attorney whose murder is apparently another chapter in the history of unsolved deaths by violence in our community. With proper support from the people of this area we can change the course of history and eliminate these men of violence from our midst. If a police service loses the confidence of the people, upheavals will follow that are costly to the community. In adjusting the relationship between the police and the public the bulk of the burden rests with the police. In treating this subject, Commissioner Valentine, former head of the New York police, stated, “The citizens will, as long as effective checks of democracy exist, pass upon whether the police meet proper standards, in terms of their understanding and value. To deny this competency to the citizen is to deny the efficacy of democratic control of policing.” An analysis of this statement reveals that the citizens possess an inherent right to sit in judgment on their police service. They are presumed to be competent and the presumption is conclusive rather than rebuttable. To deprive the citizenry of this presumption of competency is to refute, in its entirety, the theory of the relationship between the police and the public under our form of government. It is therefore obvious that incongruities in this relationship must be adjusted and the responsibility rests primarily with the police. It is therefore our task to adjust our procedures and techniques in line with public receptivity without sacrificing efficiency and without departing from the objectives and purposes of the police service. It is a difficult adjustment but the challenge cannot be ignored. As we go about the task of making this adjustment, there are several factors involved that must be appreciated by the public. There is a proneness on the part of the individual citizen to criticize the policeman when a contact occurs. Either he was stupid because he wrote a traffic citation; or he made a poor witness on behalf of a client; or, he appeared incompetent in the presence of the judiciary. There is a tendency for the public to treat the police as a peculiar and outcast group of society. Before succumbing to

27 this tendency you should consider the origin and identity of these persons who wear the police uniform. There is a premise I would like to make; the police department does not sire its own personnel. The young men and women that constitute your police force are products of the American scene. They are products of American schools, American churches, and American social influences. From these young Americans that offer themselves for the police service, we accept only those best fitted – mentally, physically, and temperamentally. What is it that attracts young people to the police service? Very few people, properly suited to the job, actually want to be policemen. The truth of the matter is that those seeking a position in the police service do so for economic reasons. After the close of hostilities in World War II, millions of young men and women were released from the armed forces and returned to civilian life. The majority of this group had no satisfactory employment awaiting their return and were forced to seek jobs. From them we recruited about 3500 young men and women; they constituted about eighty-three per cent of our present force. When it is realized that it requires about five years of experience to develop a competent police officer, the problems our department has faced in recent years during this adjustment period are self-evident. I have been over many of the critical complaints concerning these young recruits. Many of these comments imply immaturity, incompetency, and juvenile status rather than adulthood. What these well-meaning but uninformed critics do not realize is that the young officer they are condemning probably spent from two to five years of his life on a foreign battlefield in combat with a ruthless enemy, jeopardizing his life in order to preserve the way of life that enables the critic to condemn him. The reservoir of manpower from which we recruited such splendid officers after the end of hostilities in World War II no longer exists. The situation is in reverse as the armed forces begin to recall reserve personnel. Over 200 of our police officers have been recalled to military and naval duty. Economic dislocation is causing qualified personnel to turn to other fields; police salaries no longer attract the caliber of personnel our complicated service demands.

28 In order to overcome human inertia there must be some driving force that causes an individual to do a good job. In most cases this drive stems from an aspiration for success in a material sense. The average young person entering a commercial, industrial, or professional field is stimulated by the possibility of ascendancy to a position of affluence. What do we offer the young policeman? All that we can offer him is a modest income during the most productive years of his adult life, and any attempt to establish an improper source of income will probably result in loss of position and risk of imprisonment. The success or failure of a police organization is spelled out by the individual conduct of its members. Our officers serve along or in pairs and their effectiveness depends largely upon the presence or absence of a will-to-do and a desire to observe. Many times an officer is alone and must determine his course of action in a matter of seconds. The propriety of his action may subsequently engage the attention of a court of law for days, or even weeks. Strict and constant supervision and detailed instructions in police service are difficult; it is not like supervising a group of employees working on an assembly line in a factory. Since the will to serve is not based primarily upon the desire for material gain, our officers must be inculcated with a fundamental philosophy of the police function and an idealistic concept of service to the people. The definition of police service adopted by our department embodies a philosophy and reads as follows: “The term police designates that executive civil force of a sate to which is entrusted the duty of maintaining order and of enforcing regulations for the prevention and detection of crime. In a perfect system of civil administration the function of the police is to curb the liberty of the individual only when it degenerates into license, and any material variation from this standard is to be deprecated as arbitrary and tyrannical.” Thus we attempt to develop within an officer a sense of service to the people directed at promoting the welfare of the community, state and nation, as well as a sense of judgment that will enable him to determine when it is necessary to interfere with the liberty of an individual. He must remain calm when all about him are governed by emotion rather than reason. In determining his course

29 of action he must ask himself: “Is the conduct of the individual inimical to the welfare of society?” If the answer is in the negative, the liberty of the individual is not to be interfered with. It is true that every police recruit takes an oath to support the constitutions of the United States of America and of the State of California and to enforce all of the penal laws of the state and city. From a practical viewpoint the recruit will never live long enough to read all of the laws he has sworn to enforce. Furthermore, a strict letter-of-the-law type of enforcement would be rejected by the community. It is realized that there are other bases for the misunderstanding between the police and the public and the blame for some of them are on the police side of the ledger. As we examine the history of police systems in America, we find that policing was done in Colonial times by a form of local draft. When this system proved unsatisfactory, paid police forces were initiated. At that time the police were known as “leatherheads” as it was considered that no intelligent person would take the job. There are other dark pages in the history of police such as the period of prohibition, the greatest black market in the history of the world. During that time great segments of the population were pleased to have the officer turn his back as they obtained the contraband, but these same people condemned the officer for his breach of trust. We are endeavoring to redeem the police service and to establish a force that is objective, honest, and efficient. While the purpose may be noble the necessity is a patriotic one. The American people have forgotten their history and the younger generation are taught too little about it. Sometimes I am led to believe that we are living in a fool’s paradise. We accept the highest scale of living in the history of the world as if it were something that has always existed and will continue for all generations to follow. We are inclined to ignore the background of its establishment. The early Caucasians who settled North America came here primarily from Europe where they were unhappy under governments they believed to be tyrannical. These hardy pioneers carved out of a wilderness the greatest nation in all of history and provided for us the highest level of economy the world has ever seen. Solomon, in all his glory, would be envious of the things we treat today as

30 mere necessities. This nation was not built by a people working eight-hour days and forty-hour weeks. The greatness of our nation was not forged by people possessed of so much leisure that the government had to plan methods for its disposition. This nation was created by a people with iron in their spines, with belief in their souls, with hope in their hearts, a group of people that moved into a wilderness and worked from sunrise to sunset to build, construct, create, and to progress. In those days if a man did not like his neighbors he placed his few belongings int o a wagon, hitched the oxen or the horses to it and moved west. Eventually, he would come to a fertile valley where a natural stream provided water; where the wild grasses of the field would feed his draft animals; where the standing timber provided material for the construction of his dwelling; and where the wild game provided meat for his table and skins for his clothing. As this type of migration continued, we dissipated and destroyed natural resources. Finally, the last frontier reached the Pacific Ocean. I gravely doubt that anyone here tonight is anxious to establish a homestead in Korea. We became a nation of great density of population with a census count of 152,000,000 people. We fought World War II on credit and in doing so exhausted much of our natural resources such as the wealthy copper deposits of Utah. We created a staggering national debt that has not yet been liquidated. We are now preparing for another world war without having paid for the last one. In such a situation, is there anyone who really believes we can maintain the status quo! In reality such a thing as status quo does not exist except as a legal term. Oh yes, we have forgotten history. Soviet Russia believes that the United States contains within itself the seeds of its own destruction, to wit: avarice, greed, and corruption. Russia believes we are rewriting the history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, another nation that became great and collapsed from its internal weaknesses. We could refute all of this as wishful thinking on the part of the Soviets but I have learned that it is not wise to ignore the opinions of others. I remember reading Hitler’s message to his army staff before the invasion of the Lowlands. At that time he knew more about the course America would pursue

31 than did we. He stated that the United States was not yet ready to enter war against Germany as there were local influences preventing it. He went on to say that the United States would eventually declare war against Germany, and in that message he actually wrote the pattern whereby Germany would and did lose the war. Can America survive? Yes, if we are patriotic enough to make the necessary sacrifices along the road of austerity that faces us for many years to come. What is patriotism? It certainly is not the urge that causes you to rush out and buy every commodity that happens to be in short supply for fear that your neighbor will get to the market ahead of you. It does not consist solely of standing at attention as Old Glory passes by or pledging allegiance to the Flag. Patriotism is an attitude or feeling within the breast of man that makes him conscious of a debt of gratitude to the nation that nurtured him and in payment of that debt he is willing to give his life itself if the national welfare so demands. We need that kind of patriotism today. There is another important question that we hesitate to ask ourselves. Is America worthy of survival? We profess to be a God-fearing nation. All over this nation today there are men and women, in churches and elsewhere, appealing to their Creator for divine intervention, “Oh Lord, spare us this travail and let us retain the status quo.” But they forget to ask themselves if we are worthy of such divine assistance. Throughout the history of our nation we have countenanced perverted activities as being an essential part of the American scene. Vice and corruption have become part of Americana and we are labeled as the most lawless nation on the face of the earth. A trite example provides a comparison. While serving in Munich, Germany, I occupied a house on the banks of the Isar River. The house adjoined a public park in which there were trees, flowers, shrubs, footpaths and bridle trails. A horizontal hewn log provided a watering trough for the horses. A spigot projected from a vertical log to provide water for human consumption. To this log was stapled a chain and silver drinking horn. Although little effort would be required to dislodge the horn it bore evidence of years of use. I ask you, “How long would it last in a public park in this country?”

32 Our efforts to establish an honest and efficient police force in Los Angeles are in keeping with the premise that this country can no longer afford to countenance vice and corruption as typical of the American scene. There are those of us who sincerely believe that this nation must undergo a moral and spiritual rebirth if it is to survive. The apathetic manner in which we have allowed human parasites to fasten their tentacles into the legal channels of trade and draw off huge fortunes must be corrected. It is a luxury that this country can no longer afford. These parasites must be eliminated and there must be a return to fundamental honesty. There is no better place to start this crusade than in government. For the past several years the political culture in the city of Los Angeles has enabled us to build a firm foundation along these lines. Our city is fortunate in having leaders in its government possessed of ideals of service and patriotic belief in the future of America – men who hold the commonweal above service to self. Most everything that happens in Los Angeles is scrutinized throughout the nation. It is fitting, therefore, that we should set the pattern for a complete return to fundamental honesty in government, in business, and in our daily lives. The police cannot be expected to force propriety of conduct upon every person in the community. Codes of ethics must b e developed and adhered to in every field of human endeavor. Our very survival as a free people may depend upon this tenet. We are proud of the name of our great city, Los Angeles, the City of the Angels, and your police force is banded together in the firm determination that we shall successfully resist the evil efforts of the handful of parasites in our midst that would substitute the holy designation of our city with another name of Spanish derivation, Los Diabolos, the city of the devils.

Chapter Three

PARKER’S TO BUSINESSMEN

The Businessman and the Police: An address delivered to the Motor and Equipment Wholesalers Association, Los Angeles, February, 1952

Business Principles Applied in Police Service: Prepared for Property Owners Association of California, Incorporated, broadcast over Radio Station KXLA, Los Angeles, January 1952

The Businessman and The Police

I

never meet a group of men whose business is the automobile, that I do not remember a prophetic passage from the Bible: The chariots shall rage in the streets, they shall justle one against the other in the broad way; they shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightnings (Nahum, ii, 4) Frankly, gentlemen, as I threaded my way through our Los Angeles traffic, I wondered if the police should take a friendly attitude toward the group that helped bring this prediction to pass. One thing worries me. In that prophecy, there is one unfulfilled statement, “…they shall seem like torches.” It sounds to me suspiciously like something we can do without. For that reason, I have one request to make: I have not yet had the pleasure of seeing the equipment you will display at this show; but if anyone has produced a jet-engine for Los Angeles automobiles, will he kindly leave our fair city and demonstrate it elsewhere. Seriously, it is a pleasure to welcome you here and to address you. The subject, “The Businessman and the Police,” is one that I have had the pleasure of discussing personally with many of you and that is of great importance to every citizen. The businessman has an important stake in community order. Security of life and property, and the lawful regulation of conduct, are things that affect him, both personally and financially. He looks to the police to maintain these conditions, and rightfully so. There is an important corollary to this fact: since the businessman is inseparably concerned with public order, he is inseparably concerned with the problems of the police. The terrible ordeals

35

36 that a few communities have faced when police protection was suddenly withdrawn have demonstrated beyond all serious doubt that the police department is indispensable to the peaceful and lawful conduct of daily business. Having established two facts (that business needs community order, and that order is the product of police protection) we face a delicate question, but one that must be posed and answered. Does the American businessman recognize his proprietary interest in law enforcement by devoting constructive attention to his local police department? By “constructive attention” I am referring to the support of political and financial policies in the municipality that will produce an effective and efficient police agency. I am referring to the moral support of a police department when it is right, despite whatever pressures that may be contrived by special interests. I am referring to cooperative support for the individual police officer as he goes about his tedious, difficult, and often dangerous duties. I would like to make a point that is sometimes missed by businessmen. Law enforcement is not just another business. It is not a private enterprise, directed from within. It is not a separate agency that either deserves, or does not deserve, support from citizens. Police work is a cooperative community endeavor, and it is part and parcel of every community. Its members are not an alien force, brought from without to do a job. It is made up of citizens who carry the same strengths and weaknesses as other citizens. Law enforcement succeeds in its task only so far as community interest lets it succeed, and it fails when community neglect sows the seeds of failure. It is always a pleasure to discuss police problems with a group such as this because businessmen are, first and foremost, realists. Those who apply emotion to questions of fact are seldom represented at gatherings like this. They have long since fallen by the

37 wayside. For that reason, I feel I can talk objectively here today. If a businessman accepts his full community responsibility toward law enforcement, he must ask himself some questions, and in answering he is morally obliged to apply the same realistic thinking that he uses in everyday commerce. “Does the businessman want highly qualified, alert, and well-educated policemen on the job?” If so, will he support high standards for recruitment, plus pay and working conditions that will attract men of that caliber? “Does the businessman want policemen who are highly trained, capable of handling the myriad tasks of modern law enforcement?” If so, will he support the establishment of adequate training facilities and continuous on-the-job training? “Does the businessman want the police ranks to be characterized by personal integrity?” If so, will he campaign against political control of law enforcement, and will he refuse to accept or demand special favors for himself or his group? Let us suppose that the businessmen of a given community, acting in their capacity as community leaders, take the answers to these questions and apply them. Can results be obtained? The answer can be found in Los Angeles. Most of you know that law enforcement has taken remarkable strides in our city. A revolution in police procedures is underway here. Professional goals have been set, professional methods have been adopted, and professional attitudes are at work. The Kefauver Committee has reported Los Angeles to be a “white spot” in a black national picture of corruption. The Chief of the Federal Narcotics Service has pointed to Los Angeles as having the only “adequate” local narcotics squad in the country. Other agencies, one of them our own Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, has publicly acknowledged the efficiency of police efforts here. I mention these things, not to solicit applause for the Los Angeles Police Department, but to answer the questions I have posed. Yes – results can be obtained. The progress apparent within the Los Angeles Police Department is a source of pride in our city. It

38 is the City of Los Angeles that has accomplished these results – not any individual or group of individuals. The police department has produced results only because the community has given them the tools to work with. The businessmen of this city, along with the rest of the citizens, have already answered the questions I asked a few moments ago. They have recognized their proprietary interests in the community police organization and have devoted constructive attention to its continued improvements. I have not attempted today to illustrate, in minute detail, the many ways in which business and the police can work together. The men gathered here are from eleven states, representing cities with many forms of management. The police departments within those cities are of many sizes, with different forms of organization. Each has its own best way of doing the job, depending on the topography, composition, and problems of the community. It would be presumptuous of me to illustrate the detailed workings procedures here in Los Angeles and then expect other police departments to apply them to circumstances that may be entirely different. However, as I said initially, principles of administration, supervision, and personnel management are not strangers to businessmen. These principles can be applied to any police organization. Underpaid policemen work as poorly in Utah as they do in California. Ill-trained policemen will fail in their task in Montana as certainly as they will in New Mexico. Community apathy will weaken a police department in Colorado as quickly as in Oregon. Police organizations over the entire nation look to the businessman to supply the same realistic thinking to problems of community law enforcement that they have applied to private enterprise. The industrial greatness of our country supplies full proof that these men can produce results. I am certain that I express the feelings of both Los Angeles and its police department when I wish you a pleasant and productive meeting in our city.

Business Principles Applied in Police Service The American public has seldom been known to stint when private or government funds have been collected for worthwhile causes. But at the same time, we retain some Yankee frugality. We may be liberal to a fault in most things, but when it comes to municipal taxes we like to get a dollar’s worth for a dollar spent. Because it may be impossible to squeeze more than forty-five cents of service from our present inflated dollar, we are right when we demand that each of those pennies be spent carefully and wisely. City economy, which when translated into action means efficiency within the various city departments, is always a desirable course. In Los Angeles it became a practical necessity as tremendous increases in population and explosive decentralization of the city herald our shift from a semi-rural economy to a great urban industrial area. A department of municipal government that received the full brunt of city expansion is the police department. As in no other branch of public service, the police find that each new inhabitant and every additional mile of territory creates new tasks. Of the people that migrate to a city, a percentage may be expected to have criminal tendencies. A larger number will become the victims of crime. As new homes are built – or as in our case, as entire new residential neighborhood are created, some the size of small cities – police units must be provided to patrol these areas, answer calls, relieve nuisances, aid the distressed, and quell disturbances. As the city grows, new residential areas require new shopping districts. Some of these retail establishments will become scenes of criminal activity. Patrol must be provided these areas; additional larceny, burglary, robbery, forgery, and shop-lifting teams must be detailed to protect merchants. 39

40 As a city grows, tourists throng to the area, conventions are attracted, and all types of transient persons pass in and out of the community. These people demand and have a right to police protection. At the same time, permanent residents of the city must be protected from inconvenience occasioned by these events. More residents, visitors, homes, and shopping districts throw increased motor traffic upon already strained street systems. Collision, congestion, and parking problems increase the police task. As more workers are attracted to the thriving community, industry grows and industrial disputes invariably occur. The safety of the community requires that the police enter these disputes as impartial protectors of the rights of both sides. If the city owns a harbor, increased dock and waterway patrol must be provided as the harbor expands to meet the challenge of new industry. Finally, as the population density of the area rises and the municipality takes on the aspects of a great city, it also takes on the problems of a great city. Economic and social frictions occur within the great anonymous masses of people. Problems of overcrowded schools, slum areas, and “skid rows” appear. The police are called upon to handle an infinite variety of tasks – regulate dance halls, taverns, and public gatherings; plan and control holiday parades and festivals; issue gun licenses, press passes, and other forms of permits. In short, as we are often reminded by sociologists, when the stabilizing effects of the smaller community are lost in the furious and headlong rush of a great city, the police task increases at an accelerated rate. A doubling of population can easily triple, or quadruple, the police task. Fortunately, while our city has grown there has been another process at work that partially off-sets the seriousness of the new police problems. That second process has been the rapid development of professional attitudes and techniques within the Los Angeles Police Department. This professional trend has been noted and applauded by many enforcement agencies over the nation, and in many instances has been better understood and celebrated outside our community than within it. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the United States Bureau of Narcotics,

41 the late Kefauver Committee, and various state agencies, long with many criminologists and leading police administrators, have pointed to this department as the foremost organization of its kind in the nation. More recently, individuals and civic groups within our city have become aware of these revolutionary changes in techniques and attitudes within the police department, a fact that has been immensely gratifying to the officers and myself. This process of professionalism within the police ranks had its beginnings many years ago when leaders in municipal government placed rigid and rigorous standards upon the selection of police recruits. It should be noted that the depression of the thirties had at least one favorable effect when hundreds of alert and capable young college graduates, faced with insecurity in other fields, selected police service as a career. Other men, before and after that period, entered policework and gained advanced-level education degrees, and status as attorneys-at-law, while working on the job. While it may be interesting to study the reasons for this advance at some future time, we are interested today in the results. We are interested in what has been done to provide more efficient police service and what is being done at present to continue improving our local police organization. Possibly the most interesting development within the police department in some years has been the organization of a planning and research division, which was put into effect last year. As a staff service of the chief's office, this group is engaged in measuring the police task and the effectiveness of our approach to it. Clearly, all tasks must first be planned. Planning is a prerequisite to the accomplishment of any job, however large or small. To plan, you must study what you have done in the past, and measure your relative success or failure. You must study what other organizations have done. You must anticipate future changes in conditions. One of the first tasks of the planning and research division was the study of the distribution of crime over the city. Obviously, the more crime in a certain district the more officers that are needed in that place to combat it. While this has always been done to some degree, we were not satisfied with the accuracy of the

42 old methods. This problem is not a simple one. The amount of crime varies enormously from hour to hour, day to day, and season to season. Specialized police units are needed to handle certain types of crime, for example, forgery and safecracking. On the other hand, certain criminal acts such as crimes of passion, cannot be forecast with any accuracy, and therefore, no part of the city can be left entirely unguarded, however low its past crime rates may be. Evidence indicates that we are succeeding in this tremendously complex task. The city is being provided with more efficient police coverage. Our crime rates have dropped below the national average, and we are experiencing a drop in most categories, as compared with local figures from last year. In connection with the task of deployment, it may be of interest to mention that police divisions are in the process of redesign. To enable us to compare population, family size, income, education, ages, and so forth, with census figures, future police areas will correspond with census tracts. This will enable us to make basic studies comparing the incidence of crime with sociological conditions, the result of which should prove invaluable in future planning. During the past year, the number of police officers in proportion to population has been steadily dropping. Rather than requesting more men, we felt we could gain better results from available manpower by continuing to improve our working efficiency, and by providing better working conditions with more equitable pay to our police officers. As in any branch of private industry or government, fairly compensated workers are happy workers. Fair compensation attracts more competent applicants. And, as in few other occupations, law enforcement depends more upon quality than quantity. During 1951, the police department operated while maintaining an average of 350 men under our allotted strength. Most of this number was made up of police officers on active duty with reserve military units. In another effort to provide greater coverage of the city, we began experimenting with one-man patrol cars during 1951. In the West Los Angeles division, we placed five of these one-man cars on

43 patrol and studied the results carefully. Later in the year, we made similar experiments in divisions with slightly different crime problems. While it is obvious that the highly dangerous nature of police work will not allow us to make a complete shift to one-man units, we are of the opinion that we will be able to make increasingly more efficient use of our manpower by using such one-man patrol units in some areas. We had been aware for some time that the task of processing 100,000 common drunks per year through our jail system was using a disproportionate share of our manhours. Both experience and study made it obvious that a large proportion of these drunks were repeaters, sometimes ranging up to forty arrests per year. We attacked this problem in two directions. First, we have continued the operation of the present 137 acre jail farm in the San Fernando Valley, which is limited to about fifty inmates. At the same time we have acquired 588 acres in the Bouquet Canyon area, about forty-two miles from Los Angeles which will handle approximately 1,500 prisoners in a new rehabilitation center. Work crews are presently fencing the area and preparing the soil for plating in 1952. Such rehabilitation centers will allow the department to continue its efforts in rebuilding alcoholics physically, morally, and mentally. Healthy outdoor farming activity is available to those jail cases who might benefit from such activity. The centers can be operated at less cost than more formal institutional facilities, and they return a part of their cost by providing food to the entire jail system. Finally, they offer a superior opportunity toward rebuilding alcoholics into useful citizens, eventually saving the cost on repeated imprisonments. Second, in order to eliminate the time-consuming details of fingerprinting, photographing, and preparing long typewritten record forms when processing repeaters into jail, we have inaugurated a "drunk-repeater" file. Regular offenders are listed in a huge "wheel-dex" file by name, alias, thumb-print, photograph, and description. When such an individual is identified as a repeater, he is processed into jail by means of a simple form, saving many thousands of man-hours which were once spent collecting arrest information already in our files.

44 This is probably a good time to mention police paper work and records. As every businessman knows, however time-consuming and cumbersome the keeping of records may be, they are a prime necessity to any operation. This is even more true in law enforcement where we deal with millions of individuals and crimes in a relatively short time. Our entire system of criminal justice rests upon the existence of this information. Much of our investigation and detection of criminals is dependent upon recorded knowledge of their past habits and methods. As mentioned previously, our system of deploying personnel depends upon records of where and when crime is being committed. While the total cost of such a system may be large, it is appalling to consider the size and the futility of the police task if such records did not exist. Late in 1950 we began a systematic study of this paperwork. Each file, each classification, and each form is being carefully scrutinized to determine its final value. We are coldly measuring the effectiveness of each page, and comparing its value to the cost involved in accumulating and storing it. Since a full discussion of this intricate analysis would require many hours, I will give only a few examples of our progress to date. When I was appointed Chief in 1950, I found that we had a total of 757 separate forms in use on the department, all necessary to one or another aspect of the police task. They had not been idly accumulated. They existed because there were needs for them. However, by October 1951, we had succeeded in reducing this total to about 300 forms, by combining several uses into single forms. The considerable time saved in eliminating duplication in typing and filing has been put to good use. Our crime report forms, of which thirteen varieties exist, accumulate at a rate of 60,000 reports per year. They were considered the nations' finest example of police records. However, upon study of recent developments in government and industrial forms, we felt that we could effect several improvements. By late 1951 we had designed a new series of crime forms which effected savings of up to thirty-five per cent in time consumed through dictation, typing, and filing. Certain improvements in our records system led us to the belief that many officers working indoors could be replaced by well-trained

45 civilian help. This would serve the double purpose of accomplishing those routine tasks by lower salary grades, plus releasing additional police officers for basic police work. During the year, a total of 108 police officers were transferred into the field in this manner. Other economies we are effecting are the tire and battery rebuilding shops for our motor equipment. We maintain and repair our own motor transportation. We now operate the nation's largest police radio system, again maintaining our equipment. Our advanced police training program makes full use of the police facilities at Elysian Park, which was built by police officers at no expense to the city. Juvenile welfare work is carried on by our Deputy Auxiliary Police Program, largely supported by private funds, and in our many scout troops and other youth organizations, which are totally self-supporting. I think it exemplifies the progressive spirit of our police officers that nearly half of the department is engaged in college level training on their own time and at their own expense. There is always a certain danger in listing the achievements of an organization, particularly a public one. If you dwell too long on past errors, you may destroy confidence in present activities. If you list too many improvements, you may seem to cast aspersions on fine administrations that have preceded your own. At best, if you succeed in making your point, there are always those who will cry "white-wash!" We do not boast that the Los Angeles Police Department represents perfection in the law enforcement field. Mistakes will be made, perhaps serious mistakes, but they will be made in good faith. We do not claim perfection within our ranks. We have attempted, within the limits of our authority, to enlist the finest personnel available. However, since the City Charter limits us to selecting mortal human beings, we may continue to experience some mortal weaknesses. At a time in which various peoples over the world are losing faith in their departments of government, we are proud that the current of opinion in Los Angeles runs in a reverse direction. We do not feel that we run the risk of being accused of complacency when we say we are proud of the service we are rendering the citizens

46 of our community. There is a feeling of progress and accomplishment within our ranks. We do not seek, and have no need for applause. We need only continued confidence and support from the citizens of our community. We are confident that this will be granted.

Chapter Four

PARKER ON CRIME Invasion from Within: An address delivered to the National Automatic Merchandising Association, Chicago, Illinois, September, 1952.

Crime Prevention: Excerpts from an address before the Los Angeles Exchange Club, commemorating Crime Prevention Week, February, 1954, and February, 1955.

Invasion from Within

In our country's 176 years of existence, it has been subjected many times to attack. We have taken no joy in warfare, but as enemies appeared we have fought…we have paid the price…and we have won the victory. It is a comforting thing…this habit of winning. It makes easy the belief that we shall always win…that we are a chosen people…that victory forever is a sort of birthright of ours. I earnestly hope it is so. I hope that we represent civilization's pinnacle, as some people believe. I hope the hard and immutable rules which have governed other civilizations do not apply to us…that even though we give way to weakness, complacency, and corruption, we are foredestined to endure to the end. I say "I hope" but I cannot say "I am certain." A lifelong pleasure of mine has been the study of history and that pursuit is not conducive to shallow optimism. Egypt, Babylon, Greece, and Rome rose, then fell, as strength gave way to weakness, alertness gave way to complacency, and virtue gave way to corruption. It is interesting, and perhaps productive, to recall that the high walls of these civilizations were never toppled by barbarians from without. But the walls crumbled into rubble and the enemy poured through when BARBARISM within rotted the moral supporting timbers. Today America faces the kind of attach which destroyed these brave civilizations of the past. We face a three-pronged threat, a simultaneous assault in three dimensions: the armed might of Soviet Russia, the Communist Fifth Column within our borders, and organized crime. Let us gauge the strength of these enemies and the security of our defense against them. To speak at length about the dangers presented by an aggressively militant Soviet Union is scarcely necessary today. The 49

50 Soviets present an external danger, a danger that can be clearly defined and squarely faced. Security from this threat demands a protective force of soldiers and rifles, tanks and field guns, guided missiles and nuclear weapons, naval vessels, aircraft, and production of the vast supporting paraphernalia of modern war. We may disagree for a time about the necessary size of armies, design of equipment, or level of production. But, you may be certain, as in the past, America will armor herself and raise her walls in time to meet these barbarians from without. The second threat is posed by a communist fifth column within our borders. By force, violence, and sophistry, they hope to destroy our government and supplant our ideals with an alien philosophy. This threat, more insidious than invading armies, is dangerous because it is something unique in our own experience. During the last war a few sympathizers with the Fourth Reich and Imperial Japan scored some minor successes within this country. However, in all fairness to history, we cannot recall them as a major threat to our security. They furnished as much material to our screen writers as they did aid to our enemy. Compared with the disciplined agents of International Communism, they were country bumpkins cast in second-rate Gilbert and Sullivan. The danger created by the communist fifth column is not a comic opera. It is real and it is potent. its doctrine is cleverly fashioned. To the weak it promises strength; to the hungry it promises food; to the sick it promises medicine. It is Townsend Plan, Pyramid Club, and perverted Platonism combined with just enough intellectual half-truth to make it palatable to all classes. Our greatest error in the past was the underestimating of this threat. We thought a little good-natured Fourth of July oratory at the right time would dispel the menace and bring the faithless back into the fold with tears in their eyes and the Pledge of Allegiance on their lips. We were surprised when it did not work that way. We were amazed to find adherents to this alien philosophy encamped in our churches, our schools, and in our government. We were shocked into a re-discovery that Democracy requires more than garrulity; it requires a constant practice of its tenets as a way of life. Communism came to these shores disguised as a vision of hope

51 and pleasure. To the everlasting credit of a few Americans, the age-old enemy in new disguise was recognized in time. They ripped away the sequined veils, and we saw communism for the ancient and diseased harlot it is. I do not despair or fear for an America alert to the dangers of these first two threats. We have always known how to meet armed aggression and we have learned to meet ideological intrusion. As we approach the even of a national election, whatever our political alignment, we are pleased to note that the major political parties differ only on the details of meeting these threats and are in full agreement that they must be met. The third dimension of the attack on America, organized crime, comes wholly from within. So uninformed are we as to its true nature that to give the elemental facts known to every practicing policeman is to brand the speaker as an alarmist. So complacent are we that to speak of it in the same breath with a fifth column and war is to court ridicule. And so warped are some of our early virtues that to actively combat it at every level is to incur the displeasure of those who regard it as a right and the wrath of those who use it as a livelihood. Organized crime, unlike the other prongs of the attack on our country, has not been recognized for the potent threat it is. Like earlier civilizations, we build our walls high without attending to the moral timbers which sustain the structure. We arm against barbarians without and seek their agents within, but calmly ignore the fact that barbarism within can accomplish our downfall more quickly than an enemy. To understand organized crime, it is necessary to know something of the growth of crime in America. Until the early 1920's, lawlessness in America was seldom conducted as a business operation. A few criminals banded together for self protection and profit, but theirs was usually a temporary association – a hit-or-miss arrangement. In those days the criminal preyed much like a wild animal, with no purpose except that of the moment and with little organization and planning. In those days, crime in the United States was not regarded as a major problem. Experts viewed it, and with some justification, as part of the social friction generated during the nation's growth.

52 They reasoned that crime would diminish as America settled down and prospered. As so often happens with experts, they were wrong. They forgot to allow for the fact that the American criminal, however warped his nature, possesses the peculiar American genius for organizing. It was probably inevitable in a country where business became huge, complex, and spectacularly successful, that illegal business would develop along the same pattern. During the twenties, crime experienced a genuine revolution. Taking a leaf from the book of honest merchandising, the criminal elements decided to organize and adapt to environment in order to profit in the expanding market. They learned the value of business fronts and legitimate appearances. They learned the value of quiet suits, manicured fingernails, and soft voices. They learned the value of public relations. They created a hierarchy of investors, boards of directors, supervisors, and workers. And finally they created an invisible government within a government, with its own laws, courts, and executioners. Robbery, burglary, mayhem, and murder could be conducted quietly and efficiently as a last resort when threat and chicanery failed. It takes only a single fantastic fact to round out this picture. While paying an annual tax of billions of dollars to this invisible government and faced on every hand with indisputable proof of its reality from victims, courts, and the police, the American public persistently refuses to believe in its existence. When I speak of organized crime, I do not refer to the penny-ante hoodlum, the half-tramp half-thief, the alley prostitute, or any of the several million cheap criminals who are a nuisance and hazard on our streets. When I speak of organized crime I speak of a tightly-knit, disciplined, arrogant, and worldly wise group who make crime pay, and pay well. I speak of an enterprise which has driven an unholy wedge into our ideals, dividing personal interest and morality into separate spheres, from which division flows a stream of gold into the coffers of the underworld. I speak of an immensely wealthy cartel which controls mayors, state legislators, judges; a cartel that, for whose control of vital voting blocks, has brought candidates for high and revered offices, importuning and humble to its door.

53 Let me make it abundantly clear that this is not guess work. This is not theory formulated for some dubious advantage by a Police Chief from a far western state; views which may, at best, reflect only provincial problems. Perhaps a few quotations will dispel such doubts. First, a Democrat, The Honorable Estes Kefauver, whose investigation, although it merely scratched the hard veneer of organized depravity, planted at least a seed of doubt in the minds of some thinking Americans. The Senator had this to say: A nation-wide crime syndicate does exist in the United States of America despite the protestations of a strangely assorted company of criminals, self-serving politicians, plain blind fools, and others who may be honestly misguided, that there is no such combine.

Next, a Republican and respected ex-President of this nation, The Honorable Herbert Hoover, had this to say: The greatest danger (today) is not by invasion of foreign armies. Our dangers are that we may commit suicide from within by complaisance with evil or by public tolerance of scandalous behavior. These evils have defeated many nations many times in history.

I do not believe it is necessary to amplify these statements with those of prominent jurists, clergymen, and educators, and of respected industrialists and labor heads. Leaders from every segment of our society have voiced similar warnings My purpose here today is not to repeat that warning. The cry "wolf" has already been given. Lest that cry be ignored, I propose to identify the "wolf," chart the direction in which it is moving, measure its distance from your door, and describe the methods of its attack. A good beginning is to measure the volume of crime in America. There are 3,500,000 known criminals residing in our midst, a group about equal in size to our entire armed forces. This group injures us at the rate of one major crime every eighteen seconds, a million and one-half major crimes annually. A murder is committed every forty-five minutes – during the last twenty-four hours, thirtyseven persons died violently in this manner. It is estimated

54 that 150,000 murderers are at large on our streets and that another 200,000 persons now living will murder 300,000 persons before they die. Ignoring for a moment the suffering represented by these figures, let us assess the damages in dollars and cents. A conservative figure on the cost of each major crime, taking into account injuries, property loss, arrest costs, court costs and, in event of conviction, prison costs, would be in the nature of a thousand dollars. Thus the immediate and direct cost of major crime would be between one and two billion dollars. The indirect cost of crime is somewhat higher. If you take a garment to the cleaner, purchase a fryer for dinner, or seek entertainment in the evening, a sizeable part of the payment goes as tax to organized crime. Part of your rising insurance rates have been influenced by crime. The smallest part of this cost, and the only part which the public appears to recognize and regret, is the cost of maintaining law enforcement services. This ludicrous attitude is similar to complaining about the cost of water used to keep a conflagration from destroying your home. In addition to the direct and indirect cost of major crime, our economy is affected by dollars siphoned out of creative economy and into gambling. Approximately twenty billion dollars change hands annually in this manner. Is this important to the business man? Are his profits influenced by the fact that a significant portion of the nation's wealth – twenty billion unproductive dollars – circulates outside the sphere of legitimate business activity? To answer this, I want to introduce a slogan adopted by the businessmen of Los Angeles: "The buck that goes to the bookie does not go to business!" The consumer dollar lost on the horses, at the crap table, into the slot machine, or in the poker parlor, does not purchase food, clothing, housing, or, to bring it close to home, the product of the automatic vending machine. Your industry's share of that unproductive twenty billion – that parasitic twenty billion – that lost twenty billion – might well mean the difference between profit and bankruptcy in lean years ahead. These billions have not only made organized crime wealthy and powerful, but they open the way to expansion of the underworld empire through legitimate and quasi-legitimate investments. The

55 identity of the organizations which make up this empire are known. The most ominous of all criminal cartels is a group known as the Mafia. While some may doubt that the Mafia that had its roots in Sicily is the same organization that exists in America today, no authority will question the existence of a Mafia-type organization of tremendous proportions, and the end result is the same. The Mafia is marked by an ancient code that binds all of its members to the following tenets: (1) Reciprocal aid in case of any need whatsoever. (2) Absolute obedience to the Chief. (3) An offensive received by one of the members must be considered an offense to the entire organization and must be avenged at any cost. (4) Never resort to the state's authorities for justice. (5) Never reveal the names of members of the organization.

The early password of the Mafia bespeaks its character: E morte solo non returnero; E dementicato returnero, which means "only the dead do not return; he who has forgotten will return." The purpose of the password is to fully impress upon the members of the Mafia that the penalty for the failure to remain silent is death. It is difficult to believe the Mafia exists. Even to a policeman who knows its members, traces its activities, and investigates its murders, there is something unreal about an ancient code of "silence or death" existing in the twentieth century. Yet it does exist, and its inner circle of members do control organized crime in America! The interests of the Mafia are varied. It is active in gambling and wire services, narcotics, counterfeiting, white slavery, and slot-machine rackets. Its semilegitimate interests include produce distribution, the olive oil industry, the tomato paste industry, breweries, distilleries, nightclubs, hotels and, again closer to home, vending machine supply and service. This is only a partial list. In one city it may control laundry service, in another transportation, in another union activities, and in still another only the political offices necessary to allow open vice activities. In view

56 of the growing narcotic menace, it is interesting to know that the Mafia plays an important part in the illegal narcotic trade. In recent years organized crime, thorough this organization, has moved increasingly into the field of legitimate business enterprise. The coin machine industry is one of their targets. They plan to take over supply and service, distribution and, ultimately, manufacturing. They plan this because the coin machine industry is considered ideal for their needs. They have available intimidation and strong arm experts so successful in persuading small proprietors of the advantages of one machine over another. Existing punch-board, horse-race information, and bookie chains can be counted upon to supply new customers and control old ones. You have informed me of your interest in preventing such an eventuality. On this score, let us be frank. A legitimate operator, limited to operation within the law, alone cannot compete with the criminal. If his machines are wrecked, his only recourse is civil suit or criminal complaint. Both are lengthy processes dependent upon proof, which may be an illusive thing if the city is inefficiently policed. If employees are strong-armed, he can only hire and train new employees – if he can find men willing to face injury or death for a modest salary. If his own life, or the life of his loved ones, is threatened, he can complain to the police – and trust those lives to a guard who may prove incompetent. And finally, if the businessman elects to fight fire with fire and employ weapons, thugs, and intimidation, he will find himself in a strange field where he is unacquainted with the tricks of the new trade, and he himself may be the one whom the law punishes while the criminal is left free to take over the business without resistance. Professional considerations do not allow me to list all the Mafia and underworld leaders. In many cases Mafia leaders and their associates assume the role of leading citizens, contributors to worthy charities, and solid men of affairs. Their real identity would come as a crude shock to many of the civic leaders of the communities in which they reside. The Mafia is nationwide in its scope, and its tentacles reach into cities and towns throughout the length and breadth of America. With the exception of the Grand Council, the Mafia is in the nature of a loose federation. Common interest has long since

57 placed a ban on gangland warfare, and the federation, based on unwritten agreements, grows stronger each year. Warfare has been replaced with execution under the unwritten laws of this invisible government. May I cite to you two timely instances of this cooperation which occurred on the Pacific Coast. During the investigation of two murders in the City of Los Angeles, we obtained information which had caused us to conclude that these murders were Mafia executions. We believe that the decree of death was handed down by a Mafia court that convened in the Midwest. The Mafia court is unique in that the defendant does not appear before the court and is not represented by counsel. There is no provision for bail, writs of habeas corpus, or appeal. After the court rendered its decision in this particular case, a member of the mafia was summoned from the Pacific Coast to another Western city where he received instructions to put into effect the order of the court. His task was to arrange the details of the execution. Upon his return to our area, he consulted with the local head of the Mafia, and shortly thereafter, in a bizarre but perfectly planned and executed plot, two men met their death in expiation for the crime of having violated the code of the Mafia. As the investigation progressed, it was definitely established that the widow of one of the deceased was withholding information from the police and misrepresenting facts within her knowledge. When confronted with this accusation, she in effect invoked the age-old tenet of the Mafia code that is members never seek or accept the aid of lawfully constituted authorities even though they themselves may be the victim of a crime. A second case which remains unsolved involves a narcotic peddler who was arrested while transporting narcotics and who consented to appear as a witness in federal court and testify against his superiors. Before the trial court could convene, this narcotic peddler was found stretched out in death in another city and the bullet hole in his head bore mute evidence that the code of the Mafia had once more been invoked. At this point, I would like to pause and pay personal tribute to Mr. Virgil W. Peterson, Operating Director of the Chicago Crime Commission. In his recently published book, "Barbarians in Our

58 Midst," he gives an erudite recitation of the alliance of politics, crime, and vice. I commend it to you. The menace of crime is found, not so much in the fact that it exists, as in the fact that it daily grows in size and power. Crime statistics, although they reflect continued and alarming increases in certain categories of major crime, do not give an accurate reading for two reasons:

(1) The movement of organized crime into quasi-legitimate operations has created a vast twilight zone of criminality which never leaves an imprint upon a police blotter. (2) Crime statistics are based on offences known to the police. This knowledge embraces those crimes which are either observed by the police or reported to the police. Many times, through carelessness in minor cases or fear of reprisals in major cases, crimes are not reported.

For example, one of the most lucrative sources of income to the lesser minions of the underworld is the crime of blackmail. These criminals have become expert in creating an aura of fear in the minds of persons who have exhibited human frailties and who pay continuous tribute to prevent exposure. Even though the police may be aware of these situations, the victim of the crime will rarely reveal his predicament. Also, comparative criminal statistics for the nation as a whole are based on the reports contributed to the Federal Bureau of Investigation by the local law enforcement agencies. Inaccuracies in such reporting destroy the validity of these statistics as is evidenced by the fact that one of the large cities in the nation does not contribute to this pool of crime data as their reports are considered inaccurate, and are not acceptable to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. 1 Furthermore, the entire gamut of criminal justice affords innumerable opportunities for the guilty to escape punishment, and individual criminal records reflect relatively short terms for those convicted of serious crimes. As our penitentiaries become overcrowded, there is compelling necessity for the premature release of inmates in order to accommodate the constant influx. All of this,

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Crime statistics from this city were incorporated in Uniform Crime Reports, Vol. 23, No. 1, 1952, and in subsequent volumes. [Ed.]

59 of course, is discouraging to the conscientious police officer who represents you in this war against the criminal. It is extremely frustrating to professional law enforcement, after a diligent investigation and prosecution, to witness the criminal either escape punishment or obtain early release because of connections. In a recent study of the trends of three selected crimes – robbery, burglary, and auto theft – and using the data reported to the FBI by ten of the largest cities in America, we determined that since 1940 these cities experienced a 20 per cent increase in these three felony offenses. Today, crime is on the march in America. The tide must be stemmed if we are to survive as a free people. This is probably a good point to begin a discussion of solutions. In seeking answers, there is always a temptation to discuss public morality. Full and abiding adherence by responsible citizens to accepted principles of morality, as laid down in the scriptures, would vanquish the problem overnight. Such a return to our early strengths and virtues would be the happiest and quickest solution. However, it is a fact that we have become a confused nation, and the path back is as difficult as the course ahead. Many confuse morality with legality. Many have accepted the double standards, adjustable to private and business life. Many view morality as a philosophical enigma and pride themselves as being "practical" men, convinced that "good" and "gold" and "God" are spelled in the same manner. Another temptation also occurs. It is the temptation to find a scapegoat – a political party preferably – upon which to blame the whole problem. To most of us here, this temptation is nearly overpowering. However, despite our inclinations, we must be practical and realize that solutions are not found in scapegoats. The "mess," as it has been described, is not confined to any one political philosophy, any one place, or any one level of government. It has been repeatedly stated that law enforcement is primarily a local responsibility and that, even though criminals may be organized on a nation-wide basis, the majority of their criminal acts involve the violation of local laws. Therefore, it is the local police that must be depended upon to combat the criminal activities of crime syndicates. AS we accept this premise, it must be

60 concluded that between the law-abiding elements of society and the criminals that prey upon them stands a thin blue line of defense – your police officer. It is upon this group that we must depend to defeat the invasion from within. If the battle is to be won, it is imperative that local police agencies operate on a truly professional level. By the word professional, I mean honest, ethical, competent police service, completely free of political manipulation and control. We have enjoyed the typica of political culture in the City of Los Angeles for the past several years that has enabled us to act as a laboratory in testing the formula. Our officers perform their daily task without regard to classes of persons secure in the realization that the only demand upon them is the proper performance of their duty. The business leaders of our community have long since realized that countenanced vice is not necessarily an integral part of a large American city. As I remarked earlier, they realize that the buck that goes to the bookie, or to any other criminal activity, does not go to business. Thus, we have their full support in the suppression of gambling, prostitution, and the other facets of organized crime. The result has been nothing less than spectacular. Today Los Angeles is referred to by authorities as the nation's "white spot" in the black picture of nationally organized crime. Let me cite some statistics which may indicate what professional law enforcement can accomplish. While the ten major cities reporting to the FBI were experiencing a twenty per cent increase in robberies, burglaries, and auto thefts since 1940, these crimes have actually decreased 2 per cent in the city of Los Angeles during that same period, and this decrease has been achieved in spite of the phenomenal growth in population with all of the social dislocations that are attendant thereto. Since 1945, a period in which the police there consolidated professional gains, these selected crime totals in Los Angeles decreased thirty-seven per cent while the ten major cities experienced a nine per cent increase. Finally, taking into account increases in population, these crimes per 100,000 residents in Los Angeles have been reduced since 1945 by the astonishing total of forty-six per cent. Moreover, the twilight zone of quasi-legitimate crime is not tolerated in Los Angeles. Recently, a Pacific Coast representative

61 of a national vending machine company – who is here today – was contacted by Mafia representatives from the Ohio Valley. These criminals had organized a California corporation and established an officer in a city to the south of us. This Pacific Coast representative was instructed to meet these men at a certain time, in a certain room, of a certain hotel. When he demurred on the basis he was accustomed to doing business in his office, he was told in no uncertain terms to carry out his instructions, and that it was their intention to purchase cigarette vending machines. Shortly thereafter, the appointment was cancelled without explanation. When he called these facts to my attention, I was able to give him a complete explanation as to the reason for the cancellation of the appointment. The answer lay in the operation of our Intelligence Division which is charged with the single responsibility of combatting organized crime. Jack Lait, in referring to our Intelligence Division in his newspaper column, stated: "I have found only one local set-up that recognizes the peril of this situation. Los Angeles has the only police agency designed to combat the Mafia and its collateral mobster combinations. It has a full-blown intelligence squad, which has concentrated on this field for years, and has compiled a file second only to the F.B.I." Through expert operation, members of our Intelligence Division uncovered the entire plot on the part of these hoodlums to invade the automatic vending machine industry in our area. Subsequent action on the part of our officers discouraged these predatory migrants from pursuing their original objectives. I bring these facts to you, not to seek praise for our department, but to show that the crime picture needs not be discouraging. The gangland menace has an Achilles Heel and every discerning businessman and policeman is aware of it. Organized crime cannot operate in the face of determined and honest local law enforcement. If organized crime continues to operate in your city, it does so because someone locally profits from its existence. This is not to indict the administration of the city or the police department. It is a fact that the average policeman and police administrator is honest, alert, and devoted to your welfare. He cannot be blamed if he is forced to operate under archaic regulations, political pressure,

62 and public apathy. The very fact that competent and honest policemen remain on the job in the face of these obstacles is prima facie proof of their deep loyalty to you, a loyalty that could be shaped by you into a potent weapon against these enemies within. However, from a quarter-century of police service under administrations corrupt and honest, weak and strong, foolish and wise, I saw to you – if organized crime exists in your city, somewhere a weakling, a fool, and a despicable traitor is betraying you as surely as if he were selling the key to our armed defenses. The first step then, in the battle against organized crime, is the freeing of the police from political control. Following this, the next moves are logical and need little amplification to businessmen who deal every day with problems of administration, personnel, budgeting, planning, and other organizational fundamentals. High-standard recruiting must be adopted. Rotten wood or deadwood must be eliminated. High-quality training must be instituted. Adequate salaries must be provided to attract and hold the quality of men needed. I invite you businessmen to take an interest in the internal police affairs of your communities for three very good reasons:

(1) I invite this interest because you hope to remain in business and escape control by criminal combines. Law enforcement is a "thin blue line" which stands between you and the organized forces of crime. Therefore, your interest in this bulwark cannot be an abstract interest – it is an extremely practical matter affecting you and your family's personal future, and as patriots, the future of your nation. (2) I invite your interest in police affairs because organization and administration is "right down your alley." If you operate at a profit, you are demonstrating practical knowledge of organizational techniques. The same techniques apply to a police department. If the businessmen of a community cannot see and correct the faults in the local police structure, then no one can – the cause is lost. (3) I invite your interest in local law enforcement because your business will prosper if it is effective and it will suffer if enforcement remains weak. Whether you like it or not you have a sizeable financial investment in the political and social health of your community.

It is nothing more than sound fiscal policy to look to affairs affecting the soundness of that investment.

The second step in the battle against organized crime will take a little more doing. As you have seen, criminal syndicates operate on a national scale. Local police agencies can be effective against them, but only by the expenditure of great effort and sums of money. To protect Los Angeles from this menace, the police department has found it necessary to know more about mobsters in other cities of the nation than you know about your own business associates. We maintain liaison with individuals and police officers in every major city in the country and thus have built up files that threaten to expand us out of our own officers. I contend this nationwide study of criminal syndicates is not justifiably a local responsibility but belongs on the federal level. I am certain the founders of our nation did not foresee a day when citizens, criminal and lawful alike, could span the continent in a few hours and travel from city to city in a few minutes. A major factor in the spread of crime is the fact that there is in existence no federal agency supplying intelligence on syndicated crime to local law enforcement agencies. Congressional crime committees, however useful they may be to Congress, do not fill the need of the local police. Needed today is a permanent agency of the federal government dedicated to the continuous study of syndicated crime in America and charged with the responsibility of supplying to local law enforcement information concerning the identity of members of criminal organizations and their methods of operation. Otherwise, local law enforcement is not equipped with the necessary information to protect your community. This recommendation on our part is not new. A similar recommendation was made to the Kefauver Committee on November 16, 1950, when, accompanied by the head of our Intelligence Division, Captain Hamilton, I appeared before the committee in executive session. In his report to the press following this session, Senator Kefauver stated: "The Chief and Captain Hamilton stressed the necessity of authorizing some federal agency or creating

64 some federal agency for the purpose of disseminating information about organized criminals and crime to the local enforcement officers." For the past two y ears, the American Bar Association has conducted an extensive study of syndicated crime in America through its Commission on Organized Crime. Sometime ago, this Commission requested recommendations from Mayor Bowron of Los Angeles. In his reply, Mayor Bowron reiterated the recommendation that we had previously made to the Kefauver Committee. The American Bar Association's Commission on Organized Crime is submitting a report to its national convention in San Francisco this week. In line with Mayor Bowron's recommendation, that report states as follows: "Nowhere is the need for federal action to assist local law enforcement stressed more urgently than in the field of collecting, coordinating, and disseminating information about organized crime." The third step toward controlling syndicated crime demands a critical evaluation of our system of laws. The voice of the criminal, the communist, and the self-appointed defender of civil liberties constantly cries out for more and more restriction upon police authority. At the present time, I am the defendant in a civil action designed to test my legal authority to use the dictograph in obtaining evidence in criminal cases, despite the fact that there is not one shred of evidence that this authority has been abused, and despite the fact that, through the use of the dictograph, many vicious criminals have been brought to the bar of justice that otherwise would have escaped detection. It is a fact that much of the nefarious business of the underworld is transacted through the medium of the vast intracontinental system of telephonic communication. Nevertheless, the police are generally precluded from "listening in" under pain of criminal prosecution. The Magna Charta was extracted from King John on the pains of Runnymede in 1215. There were no telephones at that time, and do you believe it was the intention of the founders of liberty that in contemporary times we should provide to the criminals who would destroy us a sanctuary within the present vast communication network? I do not. Every attempt we make to avail ourselves of technological advancement in combatting

65 crime is challenged again and again. It is readily apparent that the freedom of action of the individual must constantly be restricted in the interest of the welfare of society as a whole, and that the police must meticulously obey the law. But it is equally apparent that the criminal flaunts all rules of order, and the police organization, heavily shackled by legal restrictions, is little match for a well organized and extensive underworld. Since internal crime is jeopardizing American freedom, we must re-examine the balance between the criminal army and society lest a misconception of individual liberty result in the destruction of all liberty. The final step in the control of syndicated crime is a full recognition of its threat by the parties who formulate the nation's policies. I do not believe that either major political party has fully recognized the threat of organized crime to the vitals of American freedom. Both parties give every evidence of an alertness to our peril from the Soviet and from the Communist Fifth Column. But I have not perceived in them a clear understanding of the fact that our national life is dependent upon order and that order is dependent upon the impartial enforcement of our laws. There must be a common appreciation that our nation and its defenses rest on virtue and morality, not in Washington alone, but in every city and hamlet across this land. It has been a pleasure as well as an honor to be invited here today to address you. I trust you will not view these remarks as just a tirade by a policeman against the enemies of society. We need not be philosophers or historians to mark a menace and to squarely face it. You have seen how crime can engulf a nation and destroy its freedom and how the underworld has risen and may rise still further in positions of political influence over important office holders who then become mere puppets, executing the will of their criminal overlords. We expend vast resources in fighting foreign enemies. Let us not be blind to the internal dangers which can destroy us as quickly and as certainly. The day has come when, in the preservation of our freedom, the law abiding people of this nation and the police who serve them must join hands in a relentless war upon the invasion from within.

Crime Prevention I deem it a privilege to address you on this occasion of the observance of National Crime Prevention Week. While I shall utilize my experience during almost twenty-seven years of work in law enforcement in speaking to you today, I would prefer to be considered in the role of an American citizen who is vitally concerned with the welfare of his country and alarmed over the internal trends. In approaching the subject of crime in America, permit me to quote from a paper recently issued by Richard A. McGee, Director of the Department of Corrections of the State of California: …The number one domestic problem of the United States is crime and its associated social and political evils. In spite of billions of dollars spent to combat and control it, crime continues to feed upon the vitals of the nation with increasing vigor. We continue to pass laws which we do not enforce; we authorize crime prevention programs which we do not support; we spread crime information of a sensational nature with morbid avidity; we have set up laws and judicial systems which are often more protective of the individual criminals than they are of society; we give open countenance to organized vice which corrupts our police and our public officers; we give lip service to moral precepts which we do not practice; we pay two billions of dollars a year for running the machinery for the administration of criminal justice; we lose another billion dollars each year through the economic damage done by criminals. The intangible and unhappy concomitants of all this, in terms of broken lives, personal unhappiness, and moral degeneration, are beyond the possibilities of objective measurement. Crime and its evil associates constitute the real soft spot in our American social system…

Concomitant with this statement, in which I concur, the testimony of J. Edgar Hoover in a recent appearance before the House Appropriations Committee revealed that a serious crime was committed 66

67 in the United States every 14.9 seconds during 1953 for an all-time high. He estimated the annual average cost of crime for each United States family at $495, and the nation's total crime bill at twenty billion dollars a year which is ten times the total given each year to all of the churches in the United States. There are some of us who sincerely believe that our democracy is being destroyed by this criminal invasion from within. In order that the police may be properly positioned in this situation, I submit to you that crime is a product of contemporary civilization and the unprecedented increase springs primarily from two major factors. In two generations a kaleidoscopic change has swept over America as we have gone from a simple rural life to heavy concentrations of people in large cities subject to complex influences with which the human being is hardly equipped to cope. Historically, changes from rural to urban bring with them waves of crime. The other factor consists of the ever-growing emphasis upon materiality with less and less regard for moral and spiritual values. It is estimated that the ever-increasing criminal army in our midst consists of approximately six million people. This is a far greater force than have overthrown whole nations in the past. It continues to expand as crime increases at a more rapid rate than the population. In order to have some degree of protection against its criminal by-products, society employs a police force whose primary responsibility is to contain the criminal army away from the society which produced it. It is not dissimilar to the role assigned to the United Nations Forces in Korea whose mission was to contain the Chinese Communist army. The police do not create crime. Despite all of the internal efforts of the police to professionalize their service, to increase their efficiency, and to adopt new and modern techniques, we are losing the war against crime. One of the inherent difficulties in the situation is the failure of the people to properly appraise the crime problem. We are inclined to look upon crime as an individual incident that has come to our attention and disregard the mass. We must become more realistic in our appraisal of the criminal situation and squarely face up to crime in America with all of its ugly proportions.

68 I should like to select as my theme today a statement contained in an editorial on crime prevention published in a metropolitan daily of this city under yesterday's date line. "…Our penal, parole, and probation systems obviously fail to consider public interest and public protection as paramount in far too many cases…" In his testimony before Congress on December 9, 1953, Mr. J. Edgar Hoover had this to say about parole and probation systems: "There is one factor which may be the cause of the increase of crime, in my estimation. That is the abuse of parole, probation, and other forms of clemency which, to my mind, almost makes justice a mockery. I am strongly in favor of proper parole and probation and any form of clemency that tends to rehabilitate men, but I am vigorously opposed to the type of clemency which turns confirmed criminals loose upon society. I feel very strongly about that." Continuing, the FBI Chief said that 11 of the 18 FBI agents who have died in line of duty were killed by criminals who had been paroled or placed on probation or who got lenient treatment in the courts. In turning our attention to parole in California, we must examine a report entitled "California Male Prisoners Released on Parole." The report is a study of the disposition of prisoners in state penitentiaries during the four-year period from 1946 through 1949. During that time, 8,954 men were paroled. By January 1, 1953, 51.3 per cent of those released to California supervision were found to be in violation of parole. Of those experiencing their first parole under California supervision, 50,6 per cent were in violation of parole during the period studied, and the median time served between release on parole and suspension thereof was 6.3 months. Those prison inmates paroled more than once are known as re-parolees. Of this group, 1,013 were released from the state penitentiaries during the four-year period, and by January 1, 1953, 67.6 per cent were found to be in violation of parole. The median time served by this group between parole and suspension thereof was 4.7 months. It is not my purpose to castigate the parole system in California but the people of the community must understand and appreciate the problem faced by the local police in dealing with those released

69 from our penitentiaries that revert to their former criminal habits or in some other manner violate their parole. The emphasis in the field of penology today is upon rehabilitation. Without quarreling with this principle, it must be emphasized that the consequences of its misapplication will be recurring crime, and, if we are to be fair in our evaluation of the situation, the greater share of the responsibility must be placed upon the parole system and not the local police. It is my belief that the persons charged with the administration of the parole system in California are competent and are conscientiously discharging their responsibilities in conformity with established policies. It must be assumed that a prison inmate is released on parole when the processes to which he is subjected indicate that he can successfully fulfill the conditions of such parole. Nevertheless, the following conclusions are inescapable: The parole system fails in more than one-half of the cases of all prisoners released on parole under California supervision, and in more than two-thirds of all cases where the prison inmate was paroled on two or more occasions. Fortunately, affirmative steps have already been taken to attempt to alleviate this situation. Just this week a meeting was called of representatives of all facets of the machinery of criminal justice in Los Angeles County together with the Adult Authority. At that meeting, refined processes were agreed upon that will give to the Adult Authority a more complete profile upon all persons entering the penitentiaries of this state. This will permit a more accurate determination to be made of the disposition of applications for parole from California penitentiaries. This progressive co-operation among law enforcement agencies is both commendable and promising.

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Perhaps no branch of municipal government is more dependent upon the co-operation of the public than your Police Department. Good police work has its inception in good citizenship, with all the responsibilities that term implies. One of the most effective deterrents to crime is an alert public – a public aware of its responsibilities

70 and eager to co-operate with law enforcement officers. This co-operation entails the prompt reporting of all crimes, the giving of necessary information to investigators, the willingness to act as witnesses in criminal cases, and the acceptance of jury duty. Law enforcement is so dependent upon the co-operation of the individual citizen that credit for police progress must go primarily to the citizen. Acting through his elected representatives, the citizen patterns the police organization, sets its standards, passes on its effectiveness, and pays its cost. Largely by his political ethics, the citizen determines the ethics of the police. By his recognition of the principles of administration and management, he sets working conditions which attract the quality of personnel desired. Safety and order in the community is a partnership of a type which can exist only in a working democracy. Public attitudes toward the police directly affect crime rates. Disrespect for law enforcers breeds disrespect for law. A child who is raised to laugh at "cops" is not likely to grow up with any great respect for the laws which the police enforce. Decades of misrepresentation and abuse in media of public entertainment and education have left their mark. National crime rates are rising steadily, increasing at a greater rate than the population. Society is finding that it cannot ridicule the enforcer of law on the one hand and build respect for law on the other.

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It has been aptly stated that the greatest crime is the tolerance of crime. Therefore, I suggest that the Exchange Clubs of the United States (who are to be highly complimented on sponsoring National Crime Prevention Week) in a concerted action request the President of the United States to call a National Conference on Crime in the immediate future in order that representatives of business, industry, labor, the judiciary, the bar, and law enforcement may sit down together in an appraisal of the length and breadth and depth of the criminal scourge in America, and formulate plans to meet this threat through the use of every legal means at their disposal.

Chapter Five

PARKER ON POLICE PLANNING

Practical Aspects of Police Planning: An Address at the Training Sessions, the 61st Annual Conference, International Association of Chiefs of Police, New Orleans, Louisiana, September, 1954.

Practical Aspects of Police Planning Lecture I Introduction

Planning is an activity that has occupied the mind of man since the beginning of time. We've all personally planned since we first learned to reason – we've planned week-ends, our vacations, our finances, our recreation, our schooling – even our choice of mates. Our wives have planned our dinners, our living-rooms, and are right now probably planning jobs for us to do on our return home. Our children plan their allowances – and even the types of breakfast food we shall buy. Our military establishment plans for peacetime training and wartime operations; our government plans for national disaster, depression, and for expanded services to the people. Planning is an all-pervasive concept, with individuals and organizations alike, and occupies a great deal of our time and energy. Police agencies are not immune from the duties and hazards of planning, but, when the word "planning" is coupled with the word "police," the resultant concept is nebulous, difficult to pin-point, and subject to a myriad of interpretations. One can attach the word "planning" to every function and activity within the police service and thus form material for almost interminable discussion. Not only is the subject of "planning" capable of indefinite extension, but it is always a matter of controversy. In the police service, there are those who believe that "police work is largely emergency in character and does not lend itself to longterm calculation and planning."1 (Even in the sphere of governmental planning, there are those, such as Friedrich A. Hayek, who believe 73

1

International City Manager's Association, Municipal Police Administration. Chicago, International City Manager's Association, 1950, p. 44.

74 that any detailed planning results in the suppression of freedom.) 2 In spite of such criticism, the bulk of opinion concedes planning to be an essential element in police operations. All police agencies plan continuously – policies, procedures, deployment, patrol, juvenile, vice, traffic, personnel, finances – in fact, the whole of police administration is basically a planning activity. It is due to the fact that planning is so closely interwoven into the fabric of police services that it seems an indeterminate and evasive process. Yet, there are certain aspects of planning that are of vital importance to the police administrator. Rather than an extensive survey of vague planning theory, these two sessions will be devoted to the more practical facets of planning; therefore, at the outset, I suggest that we amend the title from "police planning," to "practical aspects of police planning."

Definitions of Planning At the start of this session, I think it advisable to pinpoint this word planning. Professor John M. Pfiffner, of the School of Public Administration, University of Southern California, states that Planning simply involves the process of securing all of the facts within the limits of time, distance, and the powers of man and bringing these facts to bear upon the administrative problems concerned.3

V.A. Leonard, of the Department of Police Science and Administration of Washington State College, states that planning is "the working out in broad outline of the things that need to be done and the methods for doing them in order to accomplish the purpose set for the enterprise." 4 O.W. Wilson, whose text on police planning was recently published, states that planning "is the process of developing a method

2

Friedrich A. Hayek: The Road to Serfdom. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1944, passim. John M Pfiffner: Public Administration. New York, The Ronald Press Company, 1946, p. 195. 4 V.A. Leonard: Police Organization and Management. Brooklyn, The Foundation Press, Inc., 1951, p. 3

164.

75 or procedure or an arrangement of parts intended to facilitate the achievement of a defined objective."5 Any discussion of planning will tend to obscure and confuse basic issues due to the variety of interpretations of the term itself. To an economist, planning may refer to the choices available in utilizing resources; to a city planner, almost any conceivable subject could be deliberate – and Harold D. Smith points out that "even the city planners argue at length about 'what is planning?'" 6 – to an industrial manager, planning might mean the development of detailed estimates of work loads, methods of production control, or the applications of cost accounting procedures; to a public-service executive, planning might largely consist of the preparation of performance budget and personnel audits. Many times planning is but a vague, ill-defined activity carried on by an organization, regarded as a "good thing" by the administrator, but misunderstood and improperly utilized. In this regard, they tell the story of the city planner who was "oversold" on the effectiveness of planning. He had four girls, and had all the while desired a son and heir – but he gave up, and decided not to try further, because, as a planner, he knew, with certainty, that every fifth child born into the world was a moron! Planning can be misunderstood and improperly utilized! In the police service, it is axiomatic that the police administrator must plan. This function is exercised by every police executive – whether he be the manager of a large, or of a very small, police agency. I think that we can all agree that police planning, basically, is the consideration of future operations (determining ends) as related to the evaluation of current information (determining means).

Importance and Limitations of Planning There is one basic assumption that we must state, which will underlie all considerations of the topic; it is: The scientific approach

5

O.W. Wilson: Police Planning. Springfield, Illinois, Charles C. Thomas, Publisher, 1952, p. 3. Harold D. Smith: Administration and Planning. Address before the Society for the Advancement of Management, Washington, D.C., February 17, 1944. 6

76 to the problems of police administration is based squarely upon planning and research. The personal judgment of competent police administrators, buttressed by their long experience, can never be eliminated as a key factor in effective police administration, but that personal judgment must, in all cases, depend upon knowledge. Intuition, "feel," and "hunch" are not magical qualities – rather, they imply the ability to assess a situation accurately and make effective decisions. The more facts at hand, the less margin for error. Effective police planning places more facts at the disposal of the police administrator. There is, today, great emphasis upon improvement of municipal government operation – and in every instance of progressive civic betterment, planning is given key emphasis. What does this mean to the police executive? Simply this: Planning in governmental operations is here to stay and if the police administrator doesn't engage in planning, someone else will do it for him! And when someone else engages in police planning, ofttimes the results are unpleasant for the police administrator – and for the police service. Whether or not there is too much or too little police planning going on today is a question that we will leave to others for comment. Of primary import is the matter of effectiveness of current planning in police operations. There is little doubt that much police planning is ineffective and little doubt that much of this ineffectiveness is due to the failure of police planners to appreciate the difficulties of the problems that they set for themselves. Planning is more than visualizing a "brave new world" of police operations. While it is true that idealism in police administration is not to be disparaged, it is also true that planning, of itself, is incapable of reducing ideals to practice. Overconfidence in planning is a common failing – and usually due to a lack of definition of goal, a misunderstanding of obstacles, misuse of methods and means, and inability to accurately predict the future. As one observes the tangled traffic congestion in the nation today, he is struck by the inadequacy of roadways, lack of mass transportation media, and the general failure of traffic planning. For example, it was estimated that the state of California

77 would have six million vehicles by 1970. Early this month, it was announced that the six million registration was a fact – sixteen years prior to the original estimate! Since 1947, one billion and twenty-two million dollars have been spent in roadway construction in California – with no end in sight and traffic congestion compounding itself incessantly. In the Los Angeles area, there is a current attempt to solve the traffic problem by construction of a giant freeway system. I am not opposed to the thinking that they are a total and final solution to the traffic problem. I wonder if we can continue to build roadway and freeway networks as rapidly as the demand for their use. If vehicle registration increases as expected in California, we will need to double the existing road network by 1970 – just to keep congestion on the same level as it exists today. I point that out because, from a planning perspective, the facilities for mass transit are grossly inadequate and underdeveloped. Over 500,000 automobiles pass daily over the five major freeways of the City of Los Angeles – and the city freeway system is but thirteen per cent completed! But what does this have to do with planning? Only this: if planning were the panacea that some would have it, we would not see these conditions. It is obvious that planning is limited – due to the dynamic and expanding social and economic factors with which modern governmental agencies must deal. We've said that planning is an activity that pervades every part of the structure of police administration. It is an activity concerned with goals, and with the means necessary to achieve these goals. Because it is concerned with goals, it can never be politically neutral (unless the goals are politically neutral) and many facets of police planning must be realistically evaluated in this light. Because it is concerned with means, planning is closely integrated with the normal and routine operations of the police agency and cannot be isolated for inspection, such as is possible with activities of a strictly functional nature. Nonetheless, there are practical aspects of police planning that are worthy of our consideration; aspects that are concrete and workable. The first that we will consider is a planning unit.

78 Planning Unit Effective administration of any police agency, large or small, involves the formulation of a program of operations, the development of an organization, the coordination and control of that organization, methods of appraisal and evaluation of accomplishments, and the preparation of plans for the future. All police administrators are constantly called upon to make decisions; the wisdom of these decisions will depend, in large measure, upon the information and advice available to them. If decisions are made without proper analysis of facts, or without regard for standard practices developed as the result of research, the chances are that they will be mediocre decisions – and it is the accumulation of mediocre decisions that produces mediocrity in police administration. How, then, may the police administrator make sure that his decisions will be rendered upon the bases of adequate information, objective analysis, and qualified advice? The first requirement, an obvious one, is for competency of the administrator. Yet, even competent administrators are beset by great volumes of daily routine duties, to such extent that they cannot personally give sufficient time to study adequately more than a small part of the many problems that confront them. In a small agency, the administrator may be able to keep appraised of problems and to develop adequate solutions; in these situations, there may be no need for formalizing the planning and research activities. However, as the agency grows in size and as new responsibilities are attached to it, it becomes ever more necessary for the administrator to provide for a staff arm to analyze organizational problems, to assist in solving difficulties of management, and to make recommendations for improving methods and procedures. It is important to realize that, if a planning unit is to succeed, the assistance and help of all operational units is mandatory. If the men in the field feel that they are being ignored in the planning of agency operations, the planning program will, in all probability, find little acceptance among the working personnel; on the other hand, if the experience and know-how of the line officers

79 is sought after and utilized, these men will not only accept the idea of a planning and research function, but will actively support it and boast of its usefulness. If a police executive is to plan and research, basic data must be collected, analyzed, and interpreted. These data may come from census surveys, from uniform crime reports, from local social and economic studies, and from various standards references, such as the Municipal Year Book. The manner in which data are handled can be crude or highly technical, depending on the resources of the agency. Where one large agency will utilize an extensive business machine operation, another may find it feasible to use hand sorted cards for the manipulation of data. At any rate, most of the large business machine companies, and office supply firms, are more than willing to extend considerable assistance and advice on the installation of processes for the handling of basic data. In the City of Los Angeles, police service is effected by a somewhat complex police organization, with many bureaus, divisions, and units performing a variety of functions and activities. This has produced a necessity for effective and economic operations. In 1950, the Planning and Research Division was formed, its energies devoted to the analysis of departmental problems, with the goal of determining the most efficient methods of providing police services. In a recent issue of Collier's, Albert Deutsch has written an article entitled "Is Your Police Force Obsolete?" and in this article he states: The quality of the Los Angeles setup is reflected in its highly professionalized police organization, undoubtedly the most scientifically operated large-city force in the nation… The department's Planning and Research Division…carefully analyzes current trends in crime, locally and nationally, and uses spot maps showing where various criminal activities are concentrating, as a basis for drafting police strategy on short-term and long-term lines. The division also evaluates the present effectiveness of police work with a view toward constant improvement. In monetary terms alone, Chief William H. Parker observes, the savings are tremendous. Recently a single year's study conducted

80 by the division returned the entire cost of its operation for many years ahead.7

The objectives of this unit are as follows: 1. To assist the chief and his managerial staff in planning, initiating, and disseminating department policies and procedures. 2. To provide staff services for the chief in the realm of long-range planning and in problems of organization, budgeting, and administrative reporting. 3. To provide statistical, legal, and other pertinent information that will aid the decisions of management and assist operations in the field. 4. To provide staff services to bureau and division commanders by reviewing the tools and systems used, or needed, to carry out departmental functions. The unit is composed of four sections, which function as follows: 1. The legal section surveys the departmental orders and practices in light of actual or proposed changes in state or local law; it answers questions on legal points, and maintains files of legal opinions. What has it done? Item: Rendered a legal report, sustained by subsequent review by city attorneys, invalidating a claim of $40,000 for maintenance of city prisoners committed to county jail. Item: Prepared a legal report in reference to the impounding of vehicles on private property. Item: Prepared legal bulletins for departmental dissemination on problems of ex-convict registration and dangerous or deadly weapons in California. Item: Researched and answered some 1,100 legal questions posed by department members in 1953. 2. The second unit, manuals and orders, investigates the need for orders; researches and plans the most effective system of procedures; and codifies orders into the manual. Item: Supervised and assisted in preparation of the Accident Investigation, Juvenile, and Jail Division manuals.

7

Albert Deutsch: Is Your Police Force Obsolete? Collier's, 134:7, October 1, 1954, p. 32.

81 Item: Continued research and writing on departmental manual. Item: Published 111 orders and memoranda in 1953. 3. The third section, analysis, assists in the preparation of the budget and annual report; designs and prepares graphic presentations; analyzes modus operandi and crime patterns and disseminates information; and accumulates, records, and processes statistical data. Item: Preparation of the performance budget. Item: Preparation of the departmental capital improvement program – a 190 page document. Item: Preparation of the departmental budget guide. Item: Preparation of monthly personnel utilization reports and quarterly work program. Item: Preparation of the civilian personnel deployment report. Item: Preparation of a work measurement study of allocation, assignment, and deployment of field units. Item: A special study of the use of the felony warrant list. Item: Survey of the Property section. Item: 1953 Annual Report. Item: 1953 Statistical Digest. Item: Survey of Field Time and Activity. Item: Renumbering Reporting Districts. Item: Preparation of periodic crime reports. Item: Preparation of special M.O. bulletins. Item: Special survey of Juvenile Traffic Unit. Item: Preparation of some seventeen periodic reports by statistical unit. Item: 605 M.O. requests processed and delivered. 4. Finally, the forms section examines forms and procedures to determine how they may be improved, combined, simplified, or eliminated. It designs new forms or revises existing forms to implement new or existing procedures. Item: Revision of the Police Permit Renewal application. Item: Completed 282 forms investigations which resulted in 60 new forms, 113 revisions, and 109 cancellations. The addition of a planning and research unit to a police agency, in times of limited funds and manpower, might be considered

82 ill-advised. Because the expense is overhead, the unit must be more effective toward accomplishing the objectives of the agency than a proportionate expenditure in direct field service. The general efficiency of the agency, especially on a long-range basis, should increase as a result of the activities of such a planning unit – and this would form the criteria for justification of the unit's existence. I do not intend to discourse on the accomplishments and merits of the Planning and Research Division of the Los Angeles Police Department – the copies of the 1953 Annual Report of the Planning and Research Division will provide a basis for your judgment. However, I do intend to review a few areas of police planning which may point up problems. The first is the area of organizational planning.

Organizational Planning One of the primary responsibilities of practical police planning is the study of the effectiveness of the basic plan of organization of the agency, and the development of means to accomplish the objectives for which the agency is responsible. This phase of organizational planning is concerned with the division of work and its distribution within the organization; the establishment of a workable structure of authority and control; the provision for necessary staff services; the elimination of conflicts; and the coordination of program. If the police force is decentralized to any degree – and what large police agency is not? – there are problems of geographical distribution of services. The availability of police services in an area is recognized by most civic-minded groups as an important municipal function to the general welfare of the community. Although most citizens seldom call upon the police agency for assistance, the public is extremely impatient when police services are needed. In addition, many residents and businessmen receive a gratifying sense of security from those activities which indicate an omnipresence of the police. Despite the fact that the technical need for police effort in a community may be relatively low, the residents of such community may expect as much or more from

83 the resources of the police agency as another section of the city which contains a high crime-frequency area. The residents in a suburban, or peripheral area, is not concerned with deployment or workload statistics as a determinent in the allocation of police manpower. For this reason, the police executive with limited resources must frequently reconcile the exigencies of a police problem in one area against the public pressure for a commensurate degree of police coverage in another. It might not be out of place to note that in the City of Los Angeles patrol and reporting districts were recently re-designed to follow boundaries of governmental census tracts. This change has allowed the department to make crime studies in specific areas which could be correlated with the census material relative to population, social, and economic factors, and which could be subjected to more precise statistical study. Also of interest to you might be the workload study of the uniformed patrol officer which was undertaken by our Planning and Research Division. This survey attempted to measure field activities for the purpose of more effective deployment. It concerned itself with the allocation of personnel among the various geographic patrol divisions, the assignment of personnel to watches, and the deployment of field units according to areas of need. Another problem is the relation of staff services in decentralizing operations; another, the reorganization of services. No police agency remains static – and no police agency can be established or reorganized in final form. There must be provision for constant readjustment to meet changes in technological methods and social conditions. When this appraisal and planning is ignored, the police agency will tend to become inflexible and unable to progress. As an example of appraisal and planned reorganizations, we've recently decentralized our traffic operations to a certain extent so that line control of the accident investigation, traffic enforcement, and pedestrian and intersectional control officers was given to certain of our outlying geographical divisions, the traffic bureau retraining staff responsibility. Changes in program must be adjusted; all too often, a needed change is deferred indefinitely, with the result that new functions

84 are inadequately handled and old activities continued long after their utility is at an end. Organizational planning assumes a continual audit of agency program and operations, and an appraisal of the effectiveness or need for curtailment of every facet of operation. The final topic that I would like to touch on today is that of manpower planning.

Manpower Planning At the 1953 IACP Conference in Detroit, Mr. A.F. Brandstatter point out in his address that The unpleasant dilemma of every police chief will continue to be one of providing more and better police service with little, if any, increase in personnel, while at the same time eliminating the causes of damaging criticism of police service suffered in the past.8

Manpower planning – concerned with effective recruitment, selection, training, rating, promotion, deployment, discipline, morale, retirement – is a matter of grave importance to today's police executive. O.W. Wilson, in assessing progress in police administration, stated that "the increased cost of police manpower has stimulated attention to economies made possible by its wise direction."9 Whether the police agency operates its own personnel unit independently, or whether it operates as an adjunct of a central personnel system – the planning of personnel operations is always a personal concern of the chief. For example, the Los Angeles Police Department is currently 223 under authorized strength. Yet, even so, the department has consistently raised entrance qualifications and maintained rigid selection processes, a seemingly foolish procedure in times of manpower shortages. To offset this, the department, in cooperation with the city Civil Service, determined to increase its recruiting

8

A.F. Brandstatter: Improving Our Standards. Address delivered at 60th Annual IACP Conference, Detroit, Michigan, September 15, 1953, The Police Chief, 21:34, January, 1954. 9 O.W. Wilson: Progress in Police Administration. Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology, and Police Science, 42:153, July-August, 1951.

85 efforts. To tap the entire nation's manpower pool, entrance examinations were conducted in every city in the nation which could muster sufficient candidates; posters and pamphlets were distributed at the Separation Centers of the Armed Forces; placement directors at 180 colleges and universities were provided with information regarding the job, and recruiting films starring Jack Webb were prepared for television and motion picture theaters. The full effect of this expanded program was not realized in 1953; however, a steady increase in job applications has resulted. Almost every police agency is faced with problems in the recruitment and selection of candidates for the service; planning to fill gaps is a problem which faces all of us. How to adequately train new recruits; refresh the knowledge of older officers; equip our supervisors with education on supervision, control, and human relations; and how to develop the executive talent of our administrators requires extensive planning and research. Personnel planning cannot be overlooked as a major problem of the police executive.

Practical Aspects of Police Planning Lecture II Introduction In the last session, we began a treatment of the practical aspects of police planning. I pointed out some of the problem areas of planning – whether or not a planning unit was necessary; some of the facets of organizational planning; and touched on a few of the questions of manpower planning. Today, I wish to treat topics, which, in my opinion, form the heart of the police planning operation. They are: Operational Planning, Fiscal Planning, and Physical Planning.

Operational Planning Operational planning is a concept into which we will arbitrarily lump program planning, procedural planning, and tactical planning. When we speak of program planning in the operational area, we form a concept of work programs in relation to available manpower, funds, and equipment. Whether or not to engage in a juvenile recreational program is a problem of operational program planning. Whether or not to inaugurate processes for the rehabilitation of the chronic alcoholic is another. For instance, in Los Angeles, the taxpayer foots an annual bill of over two million dollars to handle the repeated arrest and custody of the habitual drunk – and the police department each year is charged with the custody of some 65,000 prisoners sentenced for being drunk. In order to attempt the solution of this problem, a Rehabilitation Center has been established in Bouquet Canyon. This center cares for some 500 prisoners in its 588 acres, and will have a capacity for 1500 if expanded. This radical departure from traditional jail confinement offers 86

87 therapy in the outdoor activities, balanced diet, planned education and recreation, and medico-psychiatric treatment – and should save money. It is a minimumsecurity institution which meant low construction costs; fewer officers are needed for its operation; and it will ultimately provide fresh and canned food for all the jail kitchens. Operational planning in the procedural area can provide for the effective utilization of a planning unit – for it entails the review of policy and operating procedures, the preparation of manuals and orders, and the elimination of duplication and confusion in routine activities. Our unit made a study of jail procedures, and by reducing the time of processing prisoners into the City Jail, saved the city an annual amount equal to the cost of the Planning and Research Division. The unit, too, developed a completely new system of police manuals bringing to each officer the latest technical information necessary to the efficient performance of his duties. However, the key operational planning concept is in the area of tactical planning – the preparation for specific situations such as traffic matters, crowd control at major events, labor disturbances, and the like. Almost every police agency must engage in this type of operational planning – which may range from the maintenance of order at a small picket line to the massive planning problems of the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena. The planning unit may be used in tactical planning – our unit instituted improved methods of crime analysis which give field officers speedy and exact knowledge of criminal personalities, methods, and conditions in their assigned districts. The statistical unit engages in M.O. Operations – a typical case exemplifies the possibilities: Valley detectives had a group of suspects in custody who stated that they had committed hundreds of thefts and burglaries throughout Los Angeles and other cities as far south as San Diego. The crimes were committed in all divisions of the city, the time varying greatly, with three separate M.O.'s used: 1. Safe jobs – service stations – carried safes away. 2. Burglaries – service stations – money and accessories.

88 3. Thefts – service stations – money from vending machines. By machine analysis, 200 cases were selected – all but two of the cases selected were cleared! The Planning and Research Division also instituted a continuous study of the distribution of crime over the city's area, which enables supervisors to assign field officers in the proper area at the proper time to secure maximum results against specific crimes. One of the largest problem areas of operational planning is in the traffic field, and this problem is faced by all police administrators The liaison between the police and the other city departments which handle traffic matters is often spotty; many times, the traffic engineering department will install signals, design roadways, or place markers without prior consultation with police traffic sections. The resulting situation can be disastrous. If the traffic analysis of a police agency – the result of a 24-hour observation by the traffic section – is ignored, much valuable information goes to waste. The police are in the uncomfortable position of being not only directly responsible for the enforcement of traffic laws, but also for gathering data upon which all educational and engineering efforts are based – and yet, engineering, particularly in the design phase, has exhibited stubborn reluctance to accept either data or experience from the police agency. For example, the first completed limitedaccess roadway in the West was the Arroyo Seco Freeway connecting Pasadena and Los Angeles. As the result of accident investigation analysis, a list of recommendations suggested physical barriers between opposing lanes, sufficient to eliminate "head on" accidents; elimination of abrupt changes in roadway width; adequate provision for disabled and detained vehicles; longer acceleration and deceleration lanes; and larger signs, directional and informative. Certain changes were made on this Freeway to correspond with these recommendations, but when newer facilities were planned the recommendations were largely ignored. Such a situation would seem to indicate a lack of advance coordinated planning on the administrative level. The problem of congestion in traffic is constantly worsening.

89 In California, it is estimated that by 1970 there will be nine-and-a-quarter million vehicles registered. The increases in automobile registrations have not been accompanied by a proportionate increase in available roadway. Traffic planning has offered certain compensating devices: more stringent parking regulations, offset lanes at peak hours, synchronization of signals, manual intersection control, and the freeway programs have produced some alleviation of congestion. Yet, even such a device as the freeway has not produced remedies commensurate with its cost; the land used is land taken from the tax roll; the center strip does not contain space for future expansion of rapid transportation means; and the cost of a mile of freeway is so staggering that it is impossible to visualize its increased use proportionate to the increase in vehicle registration. Planning for traffic problems entails a great deal of the police administrator's time; the three E's that you are all familiar with require planning for education – the preparation of programs for school and civic groups, coordination with local safety councils, the printing of hand-out material, the use of radio, TV, and film media; planning for enforcement – the analysis of traffic accident investigations as a basis for selective enforcement; and planning for engineering – the coordination of police traffic research with the traffic engineering departments of the city. As we have indicated, it is this last area that is in need of attention in most jurisdictions. The problems of education and enforcement are receiving varying degrees of attention by every agency – but how many agencies are engaging in adequate engineering planning? In many areas, the city traffic engineering department is completely isolated from the police organization, and conducts its operations independently, often ignoring the practical experience the police have recorded. Enough of traffic for the moment; I would like to take you now to the "never-never" land of finance – a "never-never" land because the police executive "never-never" considers his budget adequate!

Fiscal Planning Since I was appointed Chief of Police in 1950, it has been my pleasure to attend quite a few meetings, conferences, and conventions

90 wherein I have been able to converse with my colleagues about common problems. One of the areas of almost universal confusion, doubt, and misunderstanding is that of fiscal operations. Specifically, fiscal planning is concerned mainly with matters of the budget. Primary factors are the determination of the volume of work, how it is being performed, whether it can be measured, whether better methods can be devised, how many people are necessary, how much and what kind of equipment is necessary, and how much money will be required to operate the agency. I have heard police executives say, "I don't want to have anything to do with the budget – whatever the taxpayers or council want to give me, it's up to them – I'll do the best with whatever I get." Or others who state, "I always ask for twice what I expect to get, and after the council prunes the request, it's just about right." I have heard city managers say, "I never ask my police chief to prepare his budget – he wouldn't know how, and he shouldn't anyhow – I'm supposed to administer the city." It's my opinion that police administrators hurt themselves by shying away from budgetary matters – and hurt the police service. They end up with the equipment that may be adequate for the parks department, but grossly inadequate for police operations; they end up with the emergency problems that continue indefinitely; and they lose the control necessary for the effective discharge of their office. Program budgeting – or, as it is sometimes called, performance budgeting – is now a potent force in municipal fiscal operations. The old "line-item" budget is rapidly being replaced in many jurisdictions with the performance budget. As you know, the simple distinction between the two is that the performance budget requires justification in terms of program or performance, correlated against the request. Forecasting the exigencies of future police operations in terms of personnel and equipment required to do the job is not an easy task, but it is necessary. The budget system must be designed to

91 initiate, review, and formulate unit estimates into the general fiscal plan. It is axiomatic that a plan of operation is unsound if it cannot be logistically supported. The problems of police management would be simple, indeed, if the physical resources at our command were unlimited. However, realism dictates that the operations of a police agency must be within the financial capacity of the government, despite increases in workload and other things which would logically justify additional expenditures. The program budget usually is designed to estimate the work to be accomplished for the coming fiscal year in terms of work units and gross manhours; but to apply this method to the police service assumes the development of a highlyrefined system of work units and work measurement. Now, the projected work program in private industry and manufacturing is amenable to this method of analysis; also, city departments dealing in tangible items or services which are countable and consistent can be forecast accurately. But in police service, much of the work performed is unmeasurable. Fundamentally, the police task consists in providing a level of protective services which are calculated to meet the exigencies that may arise. Generally speaking, crime, traffic accidents, and other things which necessitate police action are merely the results of a social hazard which has overcome the deterrent efforts of the police. For this reason, the repressive aspects of the police function are not adaptable to any precise method of quantitative measurement. The budget, actually, is a plan for future action, and it is not practicable to isolate the budget from the planning process. The future needs of the police agency are translated, by the budget, into estimates of financial requirements – and the justification of these requirements are often strong statements of the agency's longterm program. The budget affords the police administrator an excellent opportunity to evaluate the efficiency and accomplishments of each unit. With a profit and loss statement from the various divisions or sub-units, the managerial staff is better equipped to evaluate

92 progress in the entire organization and to eliminate or modify those activities which have fallen short of defined objectives or have outlived their usefulness – management action regarding these activities can be reflected in fiscal plans for future operations. I would like, now, to turn to the areas of long-term planning and capitalimprovement programming. They are usually aspects of physical planning.

Physical Planning Every police organization is responsive to technological advancements and to changes reflected in changing social and economic environments. New territorial divisions must be planned to care for increased population growth and movement; old divisions must be revamped to meet declining populations. As police activities become more specialized or decentralized, building and equipment needs require greater planning thought. In past years, many public improvements were deferred for various reasons. During World War II, the shortage of labor and materials was a major factor; since the war, limited finances and inflated costs have prevented many essential projects. Capital-improvement budgeting and long-term planning consist of evaluating current deficiencies in facilities and services and in forecasting future needs based on trends in population, industrial expansion, and other such factors. The program usually is developed for a six-year period and revised annually, with all items justified and given a relative priority. Projects included in such programs are usually those with a life of not less than ten years. The heart of such program is in timing it – ascertaining time required for site or right of way acquisition; time required for preparation of final plans; and probable time of awarding construction contracts. This allows money to be spread over a larger a rea, sites acquired prior to congestion and inflation of values, and more detailed research. Studies of population growth will disclose patterns, or absences of patterns, and consideration can be given to the number of residents who will be helped by a particular project, and to the

93 number who will be harmed or inconvenienced if the project is deferred. The population density per acre becomes an important factor, so much so that priority is given to projects affecting high density areas. In most jurisdictions, the police service is not an independent and isolated government unit; usually it is thoroughly enmeshed with most other governmental operations. This condition results in police physical planning being shared with other units of the city -Board of Public Works, Art Department, the Department of Building and Safety, and others. If the police executive neglects this important planning function, all too often will he find himself at the mercy of those who do not understand the complexities of police operations. This may result in a police agency with a jail that is almost inoperable, a sub-division station that is grossly inadequate, or emergency police housing that continues indefinitely. Would you believe me if I told you that the Central Division police station in the City of Los Angeles was condemned in 1913? And that we are still occupying the structure? But, on the other side of the picture, I can inform you that within a few more months, this division, as well as many of our scattered downtown units, will move into a structure which will represent the finest police administration facility in the country. This eight-story building will enclose almost 400,000 square feet of floor space; it represents thousands of hours of careful planning and coordination with other city departments. In long-term planning, several departments may be affected by the location or plans of any one; this infers close coordination of the planning activity. For instance, freeway construction may alter existing street patterns, and if not considered, may result in inaccessible sites, or inconvenient locations requiring total or partial abandonment at a later date. The planning of capital improvements is one project of our Planning and Research Division. The written program consists of 190 pages of narrative, statistical tables, and maps. Unlike many urban centers, the growth of metropolitan Los Angeles has been unrestricted by insurmountable natural barriers, and each influx of new residents has touched off a new subdivision

94 division flurry. The city has some 45 separate municipalities within and about its periphery – this due to desire for local autonomy and civic recognition which is reflected throughout the county. To take care of 453 square miles and 2,000,000 inhabitants, the city has decentralized much of its operations. At the present time the city maintains 5 administrative centers – Van Nuys, Hollywood, West Los Angeles, Venice, San Pedro; in addition two more are incomplete – Watts and North Hollywood; and five others have been requested – Canoga Park, SunlandTujunga, Jefferson, Eagle-Rock, and Westchester. The availability of police services is recognized as an important function to the general welfare of the community – physical planning through the capitalimprovement budget will serve to maintain police services in keeping with the general expansion of the community. I might add that capital-improvement budgeting not only concerns itself with future plans for new police facilities, but with the maintenance and improvement of existing facilities, with the mechanization of procedures (such as machine records, or one-man patrol operations), with new technological devices (such as radar speed meters, or helicopters, or closed-line television circuits), and with general deficiencies in police facilities. Summary and Conclusions Police planning is a nebulous concept, to be sure, but it is a fact that all police agencies must plan continuously. Because planning is so closely interwoven into the fabric of police service, it is difficult to isolate sectors for study; Nonetheless, there are some very practical problem areas. I pointed out, as a basic assumption, that the scientific approach to police administration is based squarely on planning and research, and that this specific approach places more information at the disposal of the police executive with which to temper his decisions. I defined police planning as the consideration of future operations (the determination of ends) as related to the evaluation of current information (determining the means), and called attention to the fact that planning, although important, has definite limitations,

95 offers no panacea for all evils affecting the police service, and, in some cases, has failed to produce – notably in the realm of traffic. I stressed the fact that planning is here to stay – and that if the police executive can't or won't plan someone else will; and that when police planning is done by non-police the results can be unpleasant and harmful to the service. Further, I pointed out that planning is applicable to every police agency, large or small, but that the question of installing a planning unit will depend on the size, character, and special problems of the agency. I pointed out that the planning organization was important to effective police operations – but that no police agency could be established or reorganized in final form – and that organizational flexibility was necessary in police operations. On the subject of manpower planning, this area is always of importance to the police executive; planning to fill gaps is a mutual problem. I pointed out that operational planning was utilized by police administrators when they evaluated work programs, when they reviewed policy and procedures, and when they developed tactics for meeting special problems. Fiscal planning is often confused, misunderstood, and its value doubted by police executives, and yet it is vital to the executive if he is to retain control of his agency. I pointed out the difficulties of applying the performance budget to the police service, and finally discussed the capital-improvement budget and its facets in relation to long term programming. If there is one conclusion that we might all agree upon, it is this: police service does not stand still; it either improves or deteriorates; if it is to improve, there must be careful planning. Finally, I suggest that planning is not a process limited to top police executives, but it is the responsibility of every policeman in the organization from the upper-brass to the patrolman in the field. Any "ivory-tower" aloofness of planners will result in the frustration of their efforts – in other words full cooperation of all personnel is mandatory if effective planning is to become a reality.

96 Recommendations In respect to police planning I recommend the following: 1. A central clearinghouse for research findings and for dissemination of newly developed techniques. 2. A project aimed at standardizing police-planning activities and research methodology. 3. Closer integration of police planning with that undertaken by other departments of government. 4. Subsidizing advanced research in the development of work-measurement units applicable to the police service. 5. That retention of police-budget preparation be held by police administrators and not relinquished to non-police officials.

Chapter Six

PARKER ON LEGAL RESTRICTIONS IMPOSED ON POLICE Surveillance by Wiretap or Dictograph, Threat or Protection?: An article published in the California Law Review, December, 1954.

The Cahan Decision Made Life Easier for the Criminal: A statement filed with the California Judiciary Subcommittee on Illegal Searches, Seizures, and the Laws of Arrest, at hearing in Los Angeles, January, 1956.

The March of Crime: Excerpts from an address delivered at the Assembly Dinner of the Ebell Club, Los Angeles, March, 1956.

Surveillance by Wiretap or Dictograph: Threat or Protection?

Adequate intelligence of underworld activities is the police administrator's most potent weapon against organized crime. Any combination of patrol and investigation alone will not serve to suppress clever criminal operations – as the shockingly low arrest and conviction rate of known syndicate members vividly attests. Traditional police techniques are not the answer to this problem – organized crime can be reduced and stamped out by the police only when knowledge of its methods, personalities and plans produce conviction hazards so great that operation becomes unprofitable. Whether we like it or not, we must face up to the distasteful conclusion that today's police service fulfills its task with no greater success than it did a quarter or half-century ago. Inaccurate as our statistical knowledge is, it leaves little doubt that the crime rate has been on the increase for the past several decades. It is estimated that there are 6 million persons in this country who exist primarily by criminal means – and this figure does not include the casual criminal or occasional offender. J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the Federal Bureau of investigation, has testified that the annual cost of crime to our nation is greater than twenty billion dollars.1 Crime pays and pays well! This is obviously not a game in which the police play "cops and robbers" for the amusement of society. This is a case of a lawless criminal army warring against society itself, and the police comprise that part of society which has been given the task of being the first line, and sometimes the only line, of defense. It is often a dirty business – a very dirty business – because of 99

1

In testimony before Appropriations Committee, House of Representatives, February, 1954.

100 the warped nature of the criminals with whom the police must often deal. But history has shown and is continuing to show that it is a necessary business, and that the responsibility must be placed on someone. The men of the police service are aware of this responsibility, and in choosing their profession voluntarily assume it. They can discharge that responsibility only to the extent that society supports them. If society chooses, for reasons of its own, to handicap itself so severely that it cannot or will not deal effectively with the criminal army, it is doubtful that free society as we now enjoy it will continue; for either crime will increase until there is no internal security worthy of the name, or the police force will be so expanded that the crushing financial and moral burden of a police state will be here whether we like it or not. I do not propose that the answer to this dilemma is to give the police a free hand. No responsible police official that I know takes such a stand. However, until society finds a more effective way of controlling criminals than by the use of a police force, society should control police activity by holding the police strictly accountable for the proper exercise of their power, but should not tie their hands to the extent that their effectiveness is critically impaired. There are people who, well knowing that the modern criminal has availed himself of every modern technical advancement, would nevertheless restrict the police to the methods available at the time of the lantern and the "hue and cry." These people are obviously ignorant of the first rule of warfare which is "Know Your Enemy," applying as well to domestic as to foreign enemies. The threat that there will develop in our society and all-powerful police of potentially greater danger than the criminal army is, in my opinion, so remote as to be negligible. The police have no sources of revenue of their own; they must justify their existence and their operations each year to representatives of the people who provide the funds for police operations, fix the number of employees who can be hired, designate their salaries, and, in general, prescribe the conditions of their employment. As long as the police must come before the people and the people's representatives, and justify their past activities as a basis for asking financial

101 support for their next year's operations, I foresee no danger that police activity will be an instrument of tyranny. The people would not stand for it; the city government would not stand for it; the press would not stand for it; and the police themselves, since they are citizens first and policemen second, would not stand for it. It is my opinion that if crime continues to increase for the next fifteen years at the rate it has grown in the past decade, the internal security of this country will be gravely threatened. The solutions for these problems are not the responsibility of the police alone. Criminal activity often has its origin in unfortunate social conditions, in subnormal mental or physical health, or in society's failure, in the home, the school, the church and other agencies, to inculcate in child and adult alike a proper respect for the law and the necessary self-discipline and other desirable traits of a welladjusted and mature personality. Again, society as a whole, through its governmental agencies, has responsibilities not primarily assigned to the police: the administration of criminal law and the conviction treatment and rehabilitation of criminals. The fact remains that society must deal not only with crimes which are being committed today but with those which are planned and proposed for tomorrow. It has assigned the police a grossly unbalanced share of the task of prevention plus the whole task of detection, apprehension, and the securing and preparing of evidence for presentation to the courts. The task of the police does not cover the entire field of crime prevention because the police are not assigned the tasks of guardianship, child rearing, education, religious instruction, correction of mental or physical illness and social maladjustments, or otherwise dealing with the root causes of crime. The fundamental role of the police service is not crime prevention per se. Rather, policemen consider themselves as a "containing element" – a thin blue line which stands between the law-abiding members of society and the criminals who prey upon them. The function of the police insofar as prevention is concerned lies in two general fields: (1) the prevention of criminal acts by actual or potential physical intervention, and (2) performance so effective that the fear of apprehension conviction and punishment tends to

102 prevent criminal actions; in other words, crime repression The first of these is accomplished through such police procedures as uniformed and plain clothes patrol on foot and by vehicle, and by the maintenance of such organization and communications as to place men at a scene of planned disorder or other crime within the shortest possible time. Crime repression is accomplished through educating criminals to fear, not only the policemen in Plainview or on patrol in the area, but also the policeman who may be keeping them under surveillance without their knowledge. This involves, not only observation by the police themselves, but observation by responsible citizens and informants. An important part of such crime repression can be accomplished through intelligence surveillance by means of two techniques: one, the use of electronic amplifying devices – commonly called "dictographs," and the other by "wiretaps." 2 Before proceeding further in this exposition, I feel it mandatory that I declare myself on the matter of civil rights. I believe that we cannot pass lightly over those inalienable rights of individuals which are the greatest possessions of a free people. I do not believe that the police service can afford either to ignore or to trample upon these priceless possessions, and I believe that history will indicate that every police organization which has assumed a tyrannical attitude has been doomed to oblivion. We still suffer today from the abuse of power by those who preceded us in the police profession. I believe that to avoid these fatal errors we must know and recognize the legal rights of individuals and be fully cognizant of when the law permits us to invade personal liberty. The American people are noted for their sense of fair play. In various types of contests, rules are carefully laid out in advance and adherence required by impartial officials. In contradistinction to this noble characteristic of the American people, the police are expected to enter a contest against criminal elements in which

2

Dictograph: an electronic listening device, the use of which (sometimes called "bugging") consists of placing an open microphone in a room in an inconspicuous place, thus enabling the listener to hear and record all sounds which take place in that room. Wiretapping: the use of devices enabling the operator to detect and record messages transmitted over telephone or Telegraph wires.

103 the rules governing the actions of the police are indistinct, ill-defined, vague and uncertain, and in which their adversaries recognize no rules whatsoever. Illustrative of this is a decision handed down on February 8, 1954, by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Irvine v. California.3 As a lawyer, I am fully cognizant of the obedient recognition that must be given to the decision of our courts. As a police officer, I am aware of the absolute necessity for the recognition of the civil rights of individuals. But many of us in the law enforcement field are disturbed and confused by the decision in the Irvine case, and this confusion results more from what the court failed to state than its specific pronouncement. This is not intended to be a criticism of the Supreme Court, and I touch upon this subject only to illustrate the plight of the police. Since the advent of appropriate electronic devices, the police of this state have utilized such devices to gather information and evidence concerning criminal activities. In 1941, the Legislature of the State of California recognized this practice by adopting section 653(h) of the Penal Code4 which in substance prohibits any person other than the police from installing dictate graphs on premises without consent of the owner, lessee or occupant. It further provides that such installations are permissible when expressly authorized by the head of a peace officer agency or by a District Attorney. This is not to be confused with wiretapping, as section 640 of the Penal Code 5 of the state of California prohibits wiretapping without exception.

3

347 U.S. 128 (1954) Cal. Pen. Code § 653(h): Dictograph. Any person who, without consent of the owner, lessee, or occupant, installs or attempts to install or use a dictograph in any house, apartment, tenement, office, shop, railroad car, vehicle, mine, or any underground portion thereof, is guilty of a misdemeanor; provided, that nothing herein shall prevent the use and installation of dictograph by a regularly salaried peace officer expressly authorized thereto by the head of his office or department or by a district attorney, when such use and installation are necessary in the performance of their duties in detecting crime and in the apprehension of criminals. 5 § 640. Tapping Phone or Telegraph Wires – Reading Messages. Every person who, by means of any machine, instrument, or contrivance, or in any other manner, willfully and fraudulently, or clandestinely taps, or makes any unauthorized connection with any telegraph or telephone wires, line, cable, or instrument under the control of any telegraph or telephone company; or who willfully and fraudulently, or clandestinely, or in any unauthorized manner, reads, or attempts to read, or to learn the contents or meaning of any message, report, or communication while the same is in transit or passing over any telegraph or telephone wire, line, or cable, or as being sent from, or received at any place within the State; or who uses or attempts to use, in any manner, or for any purpose, or to communicate any way, any information so obtained; or who aids, agrees with, employees, or conspires with any person or persons to unlawfully do, or permit, or cause to be done in any of the acts or things herein above mentioned, is punishable as provided in section 639. 4

104 Three years ago the District Attorneys' and Peace Officers' Associations of California sponsored a bill in the State Legislature to permit law enforcement agencies to intercept telegraphic and telephonic communications when authorized to do so by court order based upon an affidavit setting forth probable cause. 6 The proposed legislation was similar to a law now in effect in the State of New York. 7 (Police officials in the City of New York who have the responsibility for the investigation of organized crime attribute to this statute the solving of every major racket and violence case in that state within the past decade. As examples, the Erickson and Harry Gross bookmaking scandal, the "basketball fix" and several extortion cases first came to light through wiretappings.) Our purpose in asking for such legislation was not stimulated by idle curiosity or inquisitiveness. It was merely an attempt to restore some semblance of balance between individual freedoms and the welfare of society as a whole. I believed then, and I believe now, that it was never intended by our founding fathers that the criminal cartels of our nation should b e given a privileged sanctuary within the vast telegraphic and telephonic communications network of the United States within which to plan and transact their illegal activities with impunity. Even though the police of this state are precluded from intercepting telephonic conversations that might lead to the knowledge of the whereabouts of a kidnapped child and his subsequent rescue, our petition fell upon deaf ears.

6

Report of Law and Legislation Committee, California Peace Officers' Association, 31st Annual Convention, September 6-8 (1951). 7 N.Y. Const. Art. I, § 12.

105 In the Irvine case, the court specifically found that wiretapping was not involved, and limited its deliberations to the installation of a dictograph in the home of Irvine without his knowledge or consent for the purpose of obtaining evidence concerning alleged bookmaking activities.8 As a result of the evidence obtained, Irvine was prosecuted and convicted in the California courts and sentenced to eighteen months in prison. The United States Supreme Court sustained the conviction in a five to four decision and in connection therewith, the majority opinion of the Court reads in part as follows: 9 The Chief burden of administering criminal justice rests upon state courts. To impose upon them the hazard of federal reversal for noncompliance with standards s to which this Court and its members have been so inconstant and inconsistent would not be justified…

It is certainly true that the chief burden of administering criminal justice rests upon state courts. If we project this principle upon local law enforcement agencies we find, with but rare exception, that the state's machinery of criminal justice is an inert and lifeless thing until put in motion by the police. Collateral to the disposition of the appeal in Irvine, the clerk of the court was instructed to refer the matter to the Attorney General of the United States for investigation to determine whether or not the police officers involved were in violation of the Civil Rights Act.10 This section makes it a crime for any person under color of any law or custom to deprive any inhabitant of any state of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States. The Court pointed out that in 1949, for the firs time, it ruled that the basic search and seizure prohibitions of the Fourth Amendment were applicable to the states under the Fourteenth Amendment, and thus suggested that a violation of the Civil Rights Act may be involved in the Irvine case. Since the Court made no reference to Section 653(h) of the Penal Code of the

8

Irvine v. California, 347 U.S. 128, 129 (1954) Id. at 131. 10 18 U.S.C. § 242 (1952) 9

106 State of California,11 the broad language contained in the majority opinion and the dissenting opinions is such that no clear course of procedure is spelled out for the local police to follow in searching for and seizing evidence. It is not even clear that obtaining a search warrant would alter the Court's opinion as far as the activities of the police officers were concerned. The utilization of dictographic equipment has solved countless serious crimes and led to the apprehension of many dangerous criminals who would otherwise have gone unpunished. A reputed overlord of crime in the Los Angeles area is now serving a term in a federal prison as a result of a prosecution in which information obtained through the use of dictographic equipment contributed materially. Two reputed members of the Mafia, who escaped federal prosecution for narcotic violations when a key witness against them was found murdered, were convicted of crimes in the courts of this state based upon evidence obtained through a dictograph installation. One such installation alone aided the Los Angeles Police Department in solving forty-three serious felonies. It cannot justly be said that the police are lazy because they avail themselves of scientific devices. Rarely will be found another occupation where men labor more unstintingly far beyond the hours of normal duty with no hope of additional financial reward. The bravery of the police cannot be questioned as they daily risk their lives in the apprehension of vicious criminals. Certainly, society cannot expect the police to risk criminal prosecution when their only sin is the valid enforcement of the law as they have been led to understand the law. The rules must be more clearly defined if the police are not to be driven into inaction for fear of unanticipated consequences. The real danger to society is in organized activity by groups, mobs and gangs of professional criminals. Effective police action supported by appropriate statutes and wise functioning of the courts and penal authorities can largely curtail the profits of crime, thus materially reducing the activities of the professional criminal. It is my considered opinion that society must take effective action if it is to protect its very existence. In so doing, society

11

See note 4 supra.

107 must realistically recognize certain facts concerning professional criminals. These men are extensively organized and their activities in various fields are controlled by a relatively few who do not, themselves, often appear on the scene. The professional criminal is clever and resourceful, quick to take advantage of every invention or technique that can be adapted to criminal purposes; he knows the law, and he knows the ways in which it can be distorted to provide loopholes for his escape from detection and conviction. Some are highly skillful in disguising their operations as legitimate business enterprises; they are extremely resourceful in concealing their operations from ordinary observation by law-abiding citizens and neighborhood patrolmen. I wish again to emphasize that the most dangerous criminals are professionals – people who refuse to work productively or legitimately, people who sneer at those who do and refer to them as "suckers" and "chumps." These people are most often organized according to their particular rackets or types of activity. Thieves and burglars are organized with one another and with "fences" – people who make a business of buying and selling stolen property. Robbers, safecrackers and other strong-arm men are organized with each other, and, in turn, often with fences. People who are in one or another of the vice rackets – prostitution, gambling, narcotics and the like – are organized among themselves, and thus it is with almost every type of crime against person or property. Above the "little man" in each of these rackets are the "big men," who often do not physically participate, but who control the activities of the men below them, arrange for their bail and for their representation in court, and who see to it that a substantial part of the proceeds is delivered to them. Crime by its very nature is largely a thing which is carried on in the dark, behind closed doors our out of sight of hearing. Society has determined, for example, that it will not tolerate prostitution, not only for its deleterious effect on the morals of the community and its threat to public health through the spread of venereal disease, but also because experience has shown that prostitution engenders pandering, procuring, thefts, strong-arm robberies, assaults and many other such crimes. Consequently, the

108 laws of the state and the ordinances of the city are directed toward the suppression not only of organized, but of occasional prostitution. It is impossible, however, to detect prostitution and to obtain evidence which will support prosecutions and convictions by ordinary patrol work. The crime goes on behind locked doors. Watches are kept. Only patrons are admitted. Sometimes even they are required to have introductions or be identified. A prostitute does not solicit uniformed policemen nor admit them to her chamber. Patrons do not complain, nor are they willing to testify. The prostitute is an outlaw; arrests or police records mean nothing to her as such. She will not testify against her confederates nor against her employers. She is part of one branch of organized professional criminality. There are other types equally as organized, equally as insidious, equally as secretive. When these organized mobs are operating with their accustomed secrecy, there is no technique known to police science by which their criminal activities can with certainty be detected and the criminals brought to account. One of the most effective techniques ever devised for such work – wire tapping – is barred under federal and state law. When wire tapping cannot be carried on, the most effective method of suppressing crime and ferreting out criminal activities is to keep the men known to be engaged in these activities under constant and close surveillance. This is not only more costly than any police department can afford, but in the vast majority of cases it is impossible. The most effective substitutes for constant and close surveillance are to have an undercover agent inside the organization, which is extremely difficult to achieve and very hazardous, or to have some means of overhearing what is said, whether by listening at the transoms, outside windows, down a ventilator shaft or by dictograph. It is my opinion that if the police were deprived of the power to use dictographs, or if the police were restricted in the use of dictographs to such an extent that the element of secrecy would be destroyed, the ability of the police to detect crimes of the sort referred to as "organized crime" would be greatly hampered, and the power of the police to cope with many of the crimes which

109 are committed only in secret would be substantially eliminated. The use of dictographic equipment should not in any way be interpreted as a laborsaving device to free policemen from more arduous tasks. The monitoring of an installation requires endless hours of the most tedious concentration and confining toil, sometimes under conditions of great discomfort. But experience has shown that it is work that must be done if crime is to be controlled. There is no available substitute for it. Elimination of the use of dictographs would doubtless be a welcome respite to the men who are assigned to that kind of work; but any elimination would provide organized crime a sanctuary in the very midst of society which the forces of law and order could not penetrate. Wittingly or unwittingly, those who would deprive society of this means of containing the criminal element are, in effect, giving aid and comfort to their enemy. The question ahs been raised: is the installation of a dictograph an illegal act? It would seem that common sense, reasoned thought and impartial evaluation yields but one answer to the question. The common good and public interest posits the subordination of the individual to the community. Thus, rights to life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness are not absolute rights; if they were so construed, the electric chair, the state prison, and the Office of Price Administration would be of necessity precluded as instruments of government. So, too, with the guaranties offered under the Fourth Amendment, guarantees against unwarranted searches and seizures. Wise men, indeed, placed the word "unreasonable" in that provision.12 Those who would deprive law enforcement of its vitality seem to regard the guaranties of the Fourth Amendment as absolute guaranties against any and all searches and seizures. How could the police service operate under that construction of the law? Could police enter on private property without first obtaining the consent of owners? Could prowler complaints be investigated? Complaints about strange activity? Complaints that a house is suspiciously quiet? Reports that someone has not been seen for a suspicious length of time? Reports concerning

12

U.S. Const. Amend. IV: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures…

110 neglected children who have been left alone? Searches, where a fugitive is known to be in the area? Searches, where a car resembling a reportedly stolen car is seen from the street? Rescue from burning buildings? From gas-filled bedrooms? Major disturbances on private property? Obviously, many operations of the police service require reasonable searches or seizures which otherwise would be trespasses. Objection is made that the above cited cases are all discriminate, but that dictographic techniques eavesdrop on the innocent as well as the suspect, and that such techniques smack of the general warrant and cannot be selective in nature. Also, it is contended that the use of the dictograph implies unbridled arbitrary discretion on the part of police officers, their use of expedient principles to justify their actions and their indiscriminate application of law. Yet, the one who makes that objection sees no unreasonable action when he is a passenger in a vehicle and the driver of that vehicle is stopped by a traffic officer. His liberty is curtailed; he is surely discommoded – and yet he is an innocent party who does not question the action. Does not the analogy hold? Can we ask our traffic officers to overlook all vehicles which carry passengers lest some passenger's constitutional guarantees be violated? Obviously, in the general interest, the actions of the traffic officers are deemed reasonable, in respect to both driver and passenger. Is modern traffic enforcement deemed a police state method? Does the passenger regard police traffic activity as an insidious kind of intrusion upon his personal liberty? Do we brand that traffic officer with the stigma of unbridled arbitrary discretion? With use of expedient principles? Indiscriminate application of law? We might find objectors who say, "But this ignores the sanctity of the home." I believe, as do my colleagues in the law enforcement profession, that the privacy and the sanctity of the home ought to be constitutionally protected; that the protection of individual rights is paramount to governmental expediency; and that secret search by way of general warrants is an unjustifiable infringement upon the rights of a free people. American citizens may have their privacy violated by impatient, overzealous and opportunistic officials just as millions of people

111 are faced with arguments of "state necessity" in other parts of the world which have a totalitarian regime. We do not argue a "fight fire with fire" philosophy – because such a premise could reduce the Bill or Rights to a heap of ashes! History shows that bad police methods breed disrespect for law, shake the confidence of lawabiding citizens in the administration of justice and weaken the national morale. Police tyranny is no substitute for police protection – nor is an exaggerated conception of individual rights! In a consideration of the morality of wiretap and dictograph, we may apply the principle of ethics entitled "The Law of Double Effect." 13 This law posits that when an action produces two effects, one good and one bad, as long as the good effect is intended, and as long as the means are either morally good or morally neutral, the act may be morally justified. Thus, when this nation was faced with the ethics of warfare in the use of the atom bomb, it was obviously morally justified according to this principle. So, too, when the traffic officer arrests the driver: the good effect only is intended; the bad effect (deprivation of the personal liberty of the passenger) is not intended. Hence, this activity is morally justifiable. In the case of the wiretap or dictograph the identical rationale may be applicable. We would not attempt to justify a wiretap or dictograph if the ends sought were extortion, blackmail, or like evil. If these techniques are used they must, of necessity, be rigidly controlled. But if the end is the protection of the commonweal, then the evil effect (eavesdropping upon the conversations of the innocent) is not intended, and the action may be morally justified. It is up to the legislatures and judiciary of this nation carefully to spell out the authority and powers and procedures to be followed by the investigatory agencies in their enforcement of the laws of this land, if there is doubt as to the constitutionality or morality of a particular process or technique. Until this is done, it would seem that the test of reasonableness would be adequate as a criterion to guide the law enforcement administrator. We are not arguing that the ends justify the means; on the contrary, we

13

Fagothey Right and Reason 85 (1953).

112 argue that the means are neutral – as is any mechanical technique, and that the use of these means is justified by moral as well as by statute law. Behind all statute law stands moral law. If an action is morally defensible, then, too, it is legally defensible. It is my opinion that the use of wiretap and dictograph do not violate a moral precept, and that, therefore, the state law should echo this viewpoint. Far from being a threat to our freedoms, the use of modern technological devices by the police service may well be its most powerful weapon in combatting our internal enemies, and a vital necessity in the protection of our nation's security, harmony and internal well-being.

The Cahan Decision Made Life Easier for the Criminal

The Supreme Court of California, in a four to three decision on April 27, 1955, in the case of People v. Cahan1, imposed the exclusionary evidence rule upon the courts of this state. The decision is contained on page seventeen of the opinion and reads as follows: Despite the persuasive force of the foregoing arguments, we have concluded, as Justice Carter and Justice Schauer have consistently maintained, that evidence obtained in violation of the constitutional guarantees is inadmissible. People v. LeDoux2, 155 Cal. 353, People v. Mayen3, 188 Cal. 237, and the cases based thereon are therefore overruled.

113

1 Cahan and fifteen other persons were charged with conspiring to engage in horse-race bookmaking and related offenses in violation of section 33a of the Penal Code. Six of the defendants pleaded guity. After a trial without a jury, at which evidence obtained through the secret installation of a microphone was introduced, the court found one defendant not guilty and each of the other defendants guilty as charged. Charles H. Cahan, one of the defendants found guilty, appealed the case to the California State Supreme Court and obtained a reversal of the guilty finding, the Court holding that evidence obtained in violation of the constitutional guarantees agaisnt unreasonable searches and seizures is inadmissible. This decision had the effect of overruling Peo. v. Le Doux 155 Cal. 535; Peo. v. Mayen, 188 Cal. 237, and cases based thereon, which had governed for 59 years and thus made California one of the minority states to come under the "Exclusionary Evidence Rule." 2 This case, decided in 1909, held that the search and seizure was absolutely unwarranted in law and constituted a clear violation of the constitutional guarantee, state and federal, of the right of the people to be securei n their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures. The court then applied the rule, "Whatever wrong may be perpetuated by the invasion of one's constitutional rights against unreasonable search and seizure, the redress for that wrong is not in the exclusion of pertinent evidence which may be obtained by the seizure." 3 This case, decided in 1922, also involved an illegal search and seizure and the court cited and followed the rule of the LeDoux case, then made the following statement: "There might be some reason, on grounds of public policy, for the state to refuse the use of evidence thus wrongfully seized, on the ground that its admission encourages and in a sense condones the lawless acts of overzealous officers of the law in their methods of obtaining evidence in criminal cases, but in the absence of any legislative or judicial declaration to that effect after the litigation of the question in numerous cases in nearly every existing state jurisdiction, dating back over a hundred years, the courts may properly wait on legislative action to change the rule."

114 The effect of this decision has been catastrophic as far as efficient law enforcement is concerned. Subsequent events have more than justified the warning sounded by Justice Spence in his dissent when he said: The experience of the federal courts in attempting to apply the exclusionary rule does not appear to commend its adoption elsewhere. The spectacle of an obviously guilty defendant obtaining a favorable ruling by a court upon a motion to suppress evidence or upon an objection to evidence, and thereby, in effect, obtaining immunity from any successful prosecution of the charge against him, is a picture which has been too often seen in the federal practice. In speaking of an obviously guilty defendant, I refer by way of example to one from whose home has been taken large quantities of contraband, consisting of narcotics or other commodities, the very possession of which constitutes a serious violation of the law. The abovementioned result, however, is the inevitable consequence of the application of the federal exclusionary rule in those cases in which it may be ultimately determined that a search or seizure has been made illegally, either because of the absence of a search warrant or because of some technical defect in the affidavit upon which the warrant was based.

Both as a lawyer and a peace officer, it is my solemn duty to observe and respect constitutional guarantees and I will never be consciously guilty of advocating the flaunting of constitutional safeguards. It is my contention, however, that many searches and seizures branded as "unreasonable" by the courts are in fact reasonable under attendant circumstances and do not violate the purpose and intent of the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution. It is further urged that the true unreasonableness of the situation lies in the insurmountable handicaps placed upon the police. In People v. Cahan the court made no attempt to define the

115 areas in which a police officer might properly search for and seize evidence. In fact the confusion created by the decision was further magnified by the following language appearing in the majority opinion: We are not unmindful of the contention that the federal exclusionary rule has been arbitrary in its application and has introduced needless confusion into the law of criminal procedure. The validity of this contention need not be considered now. Even if it is assumed that it is meritorious, it does not follow that the exclusionary rule should be rejected. In developing a rule of evidence applicable in the state courts, this court is not bound by the decisions that have applied the federal rule, and if it appears that those decisions have developed needless refinements and distinctions, this court need not follow them. Similarly, if the federal cases indicate needless limitations on the right to conduct reasonable searches and seizures or to secure warrants, this court is free to reject them.

In the vast majority of cases the machinery of law enforcement is activated by the affirmative exercise of the powers and duties of a police officer. Yet the lowly police officer is told, in effect, that his actions will be justified or condemned in a piecemeal fashion as the facts of each particular case come before a high court of this state. It is my contention that this is an unfair burden to place upon those whose sole objective is the protection of the people against the vast predatory criminal army that exists in this country today. At this point it might be well to remember that the police officer is civilly liable for any tortious act he may commit in the performance of his duties while the courts and prosecutors have been granted immunity by judicial decree. Since the Cahan decision we have watched with interest the decisions of our State Supreme Court dealing with the exclusionary rule. It now appears that this Court will approve the introduction of evidence seized without a warrant only when the officer had probable cause to effect an arrest and that whether the search is conducted before or after the arrest is immaterial. The question of what constitutes probable cause is a question of fact to be determined in retrospect and does not necessarily depend upon the state of mind of the officer at the time of the search and/or

116 arrest. Authority to search the person is apparently limited to the individual for whom there is probable cause justifying his arrest and does not include companions that may be with him. In a recent local case, an officer observed a speeding motorist. Upon being overtaken, the motorist stopped his vehicle at the curb. The officer observed two male passengers and a typewriter in the rear seat of the vehicle. He inquired as to the ownership of the typewriter and ownership was claimed by one of the passengers. This person was subjected to search and a quantity of heroin was taken from his person. It was later determined that the typewriter had been stolen in Bakersfield and was the subject of an all points bulletin. At the preliminary hearing the evidence was excluded and the charges dismissed. The court concluded that, while the officer was justified in arresting the motorist for speeding, he had no probable cause to believe the passengers had committed a criminal offense and therefore the search of the defendant was unreasonable. This premise seems to have been sustained by our Supreme Court in its decision in the case of People v. Charles A. Simon handed down November 29, 1955. In this case a San Diego police officer observed two young men enter and leave a warehouse district about 10:40 P.M. The defendant's companion, a minor, was found to be in possession of alcoholic liquor, and the officer then proceeded to search the defendant and took from his person a marijuana cigarette. The court held this search to be unreasonable on the basis that the officer did not have probable cause for the arrest at the time the search was conducted. In the opinion in this case the court made the following observation: Even if it was conceded that in some circumstances an officer making such an inquiry might be justified in running his hands over a person's clothing to protect himself from an attack with a hidden weapon, certainly a search so intensive as that made here could not be justified.

This statement leads me to inquire as to the proper course of action for the officer to pursue in the event a concealed firearm were found on the person searched and for which he had no permit to lawfully carry the weapon. No successful prosecution

117 would lie if the officer lacked probable cause to make an arrest at the time the search was conducted. Could the officer seize the weapon if it was the personal property of the person searched? Sometimes I wonder if we are not launching into a sea of hypothetical abstracts. It appears to many of us in the law enforcement field that our ability to prevent the commission of crimes has been greatly diminished. The actual commission of a serious criminal offense will not justify affirmative police action until such time as the police have armed themselves with sufficient information to constitute "probable cause" for an actual arrest. In contradistinction to the San Diego case, I invite your attention to a recent local incident wherein an alert officer effected the arrest of the suspects shortly after an armed robbery had been committed. On Monday, December 5, 1955, while on routine patrol, an officer of this department observed two men in an automobile being operated on Wilshire Boulevard. The general appearance of the men and the car, and a slight bend in the license plate aroused the officer's curiosity. After causing the car to be halted he searched the vehicle and recovered two toy guns and the loot of an $18,000 robbery that had occurred about four minutes before. The officer's actions in this case were roundly applauded by a grateful public. In retrospect would this case stand the test of "probable cause?" The officer was unaware of the robbery until after the apprehension of the suspects. True the license plate was bent but does probable cause depend upon the degree of the bend? A similar situation is found in the recent decision handed down by our State Supreme Court in the case of People v. Beverly Michael. The officers contended that they were voluntarily admitted to the premises and the evidence was voluntarily handed to them. The defense contended that the presence of four officers constituted such a show of force that the admission to the premises and the surrender of the evidence was involuntary. In its opinion the dilemma of the police is highlighted when the court said " – the cases that have determined this question under varying factual circumstances are difficult if not impossible to reconcile – ". Also, in its opinion the court stated:

118 We are not unmindful of the fact that the appearance of four officers at the door may be a disturbing experience, and that a request to enter made to a distraught or timid woman might under certain circumstances carry with it an implied assertion of authority that the occupant should not be expected to resist.

From this statement it might appear that the number of officers seeking voluntary admittance to premises in criminal investigations should be gauged by the timidity of the occupant if such could be determined in advance. Tremendous strides have been made from within the field of law enforcement to upgrade the police service. One of the greatest hurdles is the tendency of many courts to separate the government, the people, and the police into three separate alien camps. Lincoln referred to a government "of the people, for the people, and by the people." The police are the servants of the people and it is contrary to public welfare to so hamper the police in the conscientious performance of their duties, through the gratuitous imposition of the exclusionary rule, that the question of the conduct of the officer in obtaining evidence is paramount to the question of the guilt of the defendant. Quoting from page nine of the Cahan decision: "The federal exclusionary rule," in the words of Mr. Justice Black, "is not a command of the Fourth Amendment but is a judicially created rule of evidence which Congress might negate."

It is conceivable that the imposition of the exclusionary rule has rendered the people powerless to adequately protect themselves against the criminal army. According to the statistics released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, crime increased in the United States during the period 1950-1954 at four times the rate of the population increase. Even the proponents of the rule will not deny that its application will result in the freeing of some criminals that would otherwise be punished. In this connection, I believe the time has come to take a hard look at the results of the Cahan decision upon the crime picture in this city. During the first quarter of 1955, selected major felony offenses (those offenses that constitute the most accurate crime barometer) decreased fifteen per cent over the same period in 1954. With the

119 advent of the imposition of the exclusionary rule on April 27, 1955, there was a progressive diminishment in the crime decrease with the result that at the end of the year the decrease over 1954 was less than four per cent. This situation cannot be blamed upon

any lack of diligence upon the part of the police for the total arrests during 1955 increased more than twelve per cent over 1954. You will note in Chart A entitled "Crime Trends" that the Los Angeles crime experience during the first four months of 1955 precisely followed the five-year-average and was appreciably

120 below the 1954 experience.4 Following the Cahan decision, there was a departure from the trend of an accelerating nature with such a skyrocketing effect that December 1955 reflected the worst crime experience in the history of Los Angeles. In attempting to determine cause, it must be concluded that the greatest single factor representing a change in the current situation was the imposition of the exclusionary rule at the close of April 1955. As the criminal army became familiar with the new safeguards provided to them, the acceleration in crime was an inevitable result. A projection of the trend existing at the time of the Cahan decision, compared with the actual experience during the period from May 1, 1955, to the end of the year, reveals the following number of crimes in Part I Property Offenses committed that would not have been committed if the trend had remained constant:

It is entirely probable that these 5,714 crimes would not have occurred if the underworld had not been aided by the exclusionary rule. The trends in the prison population of this state bear further evidence of a changing condition that can be attributed to the handicaps placed upon law enforcement by the imposition of the exclusionary rule. Since 1944 the California prison population has steadily increased with the exception of one or two months during the Korean conflict. The monthly increase has ranged from ten to 200 percent. The population of the state prison system reached an all time high in March 1955 with a count of 15,668. It was estimated by prison officials that the count at the end of 1955 would

4

The crime trends shown in Chart A are based on robbery, burglary, auto theft, and burglary of and theft from auto.

121 total about 16,020. The trend reversed itself, and at the close of 1955 the population count was about 15,230. Thus, there are more than 790 fewer persons in our state prisons today than were anticipated by the prison authorities. Who can refute the fact that the change in the rules of evidence in criminal cases in California may have resulted in more than 790 criminals at large to prey upon the people of this state that would otherwise be serving sentences in a state prison. A further evidence of the severe blow dealt to efficient law enforcement under the exclusionary rule is contained in Table I.

The average monthly arrests for certain offenses during 1955, before and after the Cahan decision, are set forth in the table. In order to refute the spurious claim that these are seasonal changes, the identical comparisons for the year 1954 are enumerated. The most significant figure in this table is in the field of narcotic arrests. During 1954 the comparative periods reflected at 15.7 per cent increase in such arrests, while a 4.5 per cent decrease followed the Cahan decision. When it is considered that many authorities in the field of law enforcement estimate that narcotics play a part in fifty percent of al major criminal offenses the significance of this decree in narcotic arrests is, in itself, an indictment of the exclusionary rule.

122 Another great state of this country, as a result of an unhappy experience with the exclusionary rule, took affirmative action to modify it in a manner that might well be emulated by the Legislature of California. By popular vote, first in 1935, and again in 1952, the people of the State of Michigan amended Section 10 of their constitution to prohibit the barring of evidence in criminal proceedings when the evidence consists of dangerous weapons or narcotics seized by a peace officer outside the curtilage of any dwelling house in the state. The text of this section in its present form is as follows: SEARCHES AND SEIZURE; drugs, weapons, admissibility in evidence. SEC. 10. The person, houses, papers and possessions of every person shall be secure from unreasonable searches and seizures. No warrant to search any place or to seize any person or things shall issue without describing them, nor without probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation: Provided, however, that the provisions of this section shall not be construed to bar from evidence in any court of criminal jurisdiction, or in any criminal proceeding held before any magistrate or justice of the peace, (any narcotic drug or drugs), any firearm, rifle, pistol, revolver, automatic pistol, machine gun, bomb, bomb shell, explosive, blackjack, slungshot, billy, metallic knuckles, gas-ejecting device, or any other dangerous weapon or thing, seized by any peace officer outside the curtilage of any dwelling house in this state.

If the exclusionary rule "is not a command of the Fourth Amendment but is a judicially created rule of evidence which Congress might negate" as stated by Mr. Justice Black, then does it not necessarily follow that the Supreme Court of California created a judicial rule of evidence in the Cahan decision which the California Legislature might negate? The creation of rules of evidence is the historic responsibility of the legislative branch of government and some believe that the usurpation of this power by the courts is an intrusion upon the legislative function. There appears in Vol. 45, No. 6 – March-April 1955 edition of The Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology, and Police Science, published for Northwestern University School of Law, an article by John L. Flynn, Editor, entitled "The State Exclusionary Rule As a Deterrent

123 Against Unreasonable Search and Seizure." In this article the following statement appears: Justification for the rule demands a choice between individual and public security. Some difficulty in law enforcement is the price which must admittedly be paid for the right of privacy. To justify its continuance and extension, therefore, the rule must be shown to be more beneficial to the individual than it is harmful to society.

The statistical history of crime in Los Angeles since the imposition of the exclusionary rule clearly demonstrates that it is more harmful to society than it is beneficial to the individual. Therefore, the continuation of the rule is unjustified and immediate legislative remedy is in order. While the complete abolition of the rule through legislative action is justified it is my considered opinion that the least the Legislature of the State of California should od is to enact the rule of law contained in Section 10 of the Constitution of the State of Michigan.

The March of Crime In a four to three decision in the case of People v. Cahan the Supreme Court of California, on April 27, 1955, for the first time in California's history, invoked the exclusionary rule upon the courts of this state. This case involved the same Charles Cahan who has since been convicted of assault, bookmaking, and robbery and who was the recipient of six bullets in a barroom brawl on March 10, 1956. It is always difficult to discuss a complicated legal subject in terms that can be easily understood. The rule purports to protect constitutional guarantees by rendering evidence inadmissible in any criminal proceedings in this state which, in the opinion of the court, has been seized in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The purpose of the Court's action is to discourage certain police conduct by turning the criminal free if the evidence necessary to convict has been obtained by the police in a search deemed by the court to be unreasonable. When this decision was handed down I believed it my responsibility to inform the people of this city that a substantial increase in crime would be the inevitable result. Almost immediately my position was misunderstood and misinterpreted. My statements were erroneously classified as political in connotation. The very persons who proclaimed support of the rule on the basis of constitutional guarantees were the first to deny freedom of speech to the police. All I was trying to say was that the rule is extremely harmful to the law-abiding segment of society; that the only one who really benefits is the criminal; that, as a lawyer, I realize the decisions of the Supreme Court must be respected and obeyed, but that I disagree with their definition of unreasonable search. During all of these years that California has been a state, our legislature has been in a position to invoke the rule if it deemed conditions required its adoption, but it has not done so. 124

125 The Los Angeles Police obey the law as they understand the law to be. I have never permitted wiretapping because it is forbidden by state law. Although there is a state law that purports to permit the installation of dictographic equipment by the police, this practice was stopped when the United States Supreme Court indicated that such action might be a violation of the Federal Civil Rights Act. We will meticulously abide by the California Supreme Court's decision in the Cahan case and subsequent cases dealing with the exclusionary rule. The criminal will continue to benefit and the law-abiding public will continue to pay the bill. To those who may be critical of me for daring, as a police officer, to be articulate, may I remind them that the exclusionary rule could leave as it entered, by a four to three decision. Unfortunately, my prophecy of crime increase has come true. While major crime in Los Angeles decreased fifteen per cent during that portion of 1955 prior to the Cahan decision, it increased five and one-half per cent during the remainder of 1955. December of that year was the next to worst crime month in the history of Los Angeles exceeded only by January, 1956. During the period from January first through March 4, 1956, major felony crime in Los Angeles increased 36.6 per cent over the same period last year. The exponents of the exclusionary rule refuse to even look at these statistics. They seem to have adopted the philosophy that if they close their eyes crime will go away. Many men of distinction in the juridical field share my opinion in this matter. One of the outspoken critics of the rule is John Barker Waite, University of Michigan Law Professor Emeritus and former editor of The Michigan Law Review. Writing in the January, 1956, American Mercury, in an article entitled "Why Do Our Courts Protect Criminals," he closes with the following comment: How are we to halt this travesty on justice, make the guilty pay for their crimes, and bolster the public safety? One way would be for the informed and incensed public, through letters and telegrams, through the pulpit and the press, through public forums, radio, and television, to cry out against each and every miscarriage of justice and against every criminal turned loose on a mere flyspeck of technicality. An outpouring of indignation sooner or

126 later would be heard by the courts, despite their paper buttresses of precedent, and they would cease to encourage criminals and criminality at the expense of the public safety, public decency and public good.

In an address delivered in San Francisco on March 1, 1956, Assistant Attorney General Clarence A. Linn was critical of the exclusionary rule. In commenting on the plight of the prosecutor he had this to say: There is a school of thought that regards a criminal proceeding as something akin to a game of golf in which the defendant is to be given a generous handicap, allowed to lift the ball out of traps, permitted to scream at his opponent when he is about to sink a putt, occasionally interfere with his opponent's ball, and last but not least, is to be furnished with a pencil with a large eraser when he adds up the score in his closing argument. This same school of thought would require the prosecution to be penalized at least once on every hole, maintain a discreet silence when he catches his opponent cheating, and finally buy everyone a drink at the 19th hole.

At one point in his address Mr. Linn suggests, "that in our present controversy we have forgotten our history." He follows with the statement that: These British statesmen and the Founding Fathers had no quarrel with the local law enforcement agencies. Their verbal denouncements were directed to the Special Messengers of the King. They had no argument with the local constabulary. Murder, arson, rape, gambling, and narcotics were no concern of theirs…Political oppression by the crown was the motivating force behind the movement which pressed for the adoption of the Fourth Amendment. The ordinary law enforcement agencies of the colonies were not involved in the controversy.

In dealing with the adverse effect of the exclusionary rule on law enforcement, Mr. Linn has this to say: We cannot conclude a discussion of the Cahan case without a reference to the damage this case and some other cases have done to those organizations which are devoted to law enforcement. In Cahan, the court said: "today, one of the foremost public

127 concerns is the police state, and recent history has demonstrated all too clearly how short the step is from lawless although efficient enforcement of the law to the stamping out of human rights." Contemporary history does not support the implication contained in the quoted sentence from the Cahan case. The activities of the local law enforcement officers have never been a factor in setting up a police state. Political upheavals have resulted in dictators who have in turn set up their political police who, when they do not entirely supplant the local police, work separate and apart from them. Little wonder then that adolescents will attack the police when they attempt to enforce the law. Perhaps they think they are resisting the efforts of the "police state" to enslave them. The almost positive implication to be drawn from the Cahan case is that the activities of the police are a greater social menace than are the activities of the criminal. This, even as a suggestion, is terrifying. Has our democracy failed? Have the executive and legislative branches of the government so far neglected their constitutional duties that the judiciary must enact a new rule of evidence for the purpose of indirectly punishing law enforcement officers? The suggestion that the police are lawless persons who continually engage in activities so likely to endanger the liberties of a free people that the courts cannot wait for the processes of legislation to correct the evil is unfair to a large body of men and women. These public servants walk the streets of our cities in the daytime and in the nighttime. They do not knock on your door at midnight and carry you from the bosom of your family, throw you into a jail and finally lead you out to be executed at the whim of a dictator. They are not the agents of a police state. They make mistakes – but they are not alone in that. When we consider the number of policemen, sheriffs, constables and their deputies and the number of arrests made, we find a percentage of error so low that other governmental agencies might well envy them…The British Commonwealth and approximately twenty-nine States of the Union still follow the old rule and are without the protection provided by…Cahan. We submit that none of these jurisdictions exhibit any of the symptoms of the police state or totalitarianism.

There is another aspect of the exclusionary rule which the proponents thereof choose to publicly ignore. It is touched upon by Clarence Linn when he says:

128 Illinois has for some years operated under the exclusionary rule. During this period the crime capital of the country has moved from New York, and its environ, where the non-exclusionary rule prevails in the New York and New Jersey jurisdictions, to Chicago.

Edward L. Barrett, Jr., Professor of Law, University of California, Berkeley, writing in the October, 1955, issue of the California Law Review treats this aspect of the exclusionary rule as follows: In the first place it should be emphasized that excluding evidence and freeing criminals does not punish "evil" policemen. The exclusionary rule cannot be expected to improve a police force which is generally corrupt, inefficient, and lawless. it is not a magic wand which will solve the complex problems which constitute the "police problem" in so many of our communities. The police problem is far broader than the question of illegal searches and seizures; problems of police lawlessness are inextricably bound up with the more general problems of police organization, governmental corruption, and modern crime. The fundamental problem, of course, is the general public morality of the community in which the police serve. If the public tolerates graft-ridden political administration, if the public really does not want adequate law enforcement but prefers to keep the lid off (or even tilted) for gambling, prostitution, liquor violations, and the like, then the police department will reflect this attitude. Characteristically the corrupt police department is the lawless police department. The deterioration of morality which results from the acceptance of payoffs and the preferment of officers who "play the game" results in police brutality, petty graft and blackmail, and intolerance of citizens' rights generally. Such police abuses which are unrelated to conscientious efforts to curb crime cannot be controlled by judicial decision. The threat of excluding evidence illegally obtained has no impact upon the officer who is planning blackmail rather than prosecution, nor upon the police administrator who is seeking to "regulate" vice rather than suppress it. In fact, there is some evidence that the rule assists a corrupt police department in making a false public impression of its attempts to enforce the law. One way to extend protection to favored criminals is to make periodic raids and arrests, knowing that the prosecution

129 will be quashed after a successful motion to exclude the evidence thus obtained. The failure of the exclusionary rule as a means of coping with the lawless activities of the corrupt police department is best demonstrated by the situation in Illinois. Despite the fact that the exclusionary rule has long been enforced in a most rigorous fashion in that state, a journalistic surveyor of the police problem reported recently that he was "prepared to accept the widely held opinion that the Chicago police force is by far the most demoralized, graft-ridden, and inefficient among our larger cities."

In this connection it is interesting to note, in the April, 1945, issue of the Atlantic Monthly, an article entitled "Case Dismissed" denouncing the exclusionary rule which was written by Virgil W. Peterson, member of the Illinois Bar, for twelve years a special agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and, since April 1942, the Operating Director of the Chicago Crime Commission. Another interesting aspect of the effect of the exclusionary rule is treated in an editorial appearing in the February 25, 1956, edition of the Hollywood Citizen News. The editorial reads in part as follows: The Cahan decision deters unlawful enforcement of the law, however, by making it clear to officers that they will not be allowed to profit by their own violations of the Constitutional provisions, but must obey the law like everybody else. In the use of the expression "officers…will not be allowed to profit" the Court has raised the question in the public mind as to who profits when a criminal is apprehended. Heretofore the public has believed that it profited with the apprehension of criminals. It never considered that officers profited any more than any individual citizen profited. Possibly what the Court meant was that the public could not be permitted to profit from the illegal acts of its servants who are trying to prevent crime. Only the criminal should profit, the opinion implies, if the officers made a mistake. The criminal is just as much of a criminal whether the evidence against him is obtained in one way or another, but the law says that he is to profit if the officer makes a mistake. Some of the Court's recent decisions were split, five to two, but majority rules. There is no penalty when judges make mistakes in their opinions. It is to be

130 hoped that the officers will continue to catch the criminals and leave to the courts the responsibility of turning them loose.

It is estimated by experienced officers that about fifty per cent of major crime involves the use of narcotics. The average narcotic user cannot legitimately support the habit and must resort to thefts and other illegal acts to obtain sufficient money to buy the drug. One of our chief complaints is that the exclusionary rule has seriously hampered our efforts in the suppression of the illicit narcotic trade. When the true proportions of the illegal narcotic traffic are exposed, the people of this community will be shocked. In this connection it is interesting to note that the special committee of Cabinet officers appointed by President Eisenhower to study the narcotic problem recommended among other things: Action by Congress and State Legislature to remove obstacles imposed by court decision on enforcement officers in obtaining and presenting evidence in narcotic cases, to provide "the optimum" in law enforcement.

If the exclusionary rule "is not a command of the Fourth Amendment but is a judicially created rule of evidence which Congress might negate" as stated by Mr. Justice Black, then does it not necessarily follow that the Supreme Court of California created a judicial rule of evidence in the Cahan decision which the California Legislature might negate? The creation of rules of evidence is the historic responsibility of the legislative branch of government and some believe that the usurpation of this power by the courts is an intrusion upon the legislative function. There appears in the March-April 1955 edition of The Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology, and Police Science, published for Northwestern University School of Law, an article by John L. Flynn, Editor, entitled "The State Exclusionary Rule As a Deterrent Against

131 Unreasonable Search and Seizure." In this article the following statement appears: Justification for the rule demands a choice between individual and public security. Some difficulty in law enforcement is the price which must admittedly be paid for the right of privacy. To justify its continuance and extension, therefore, the rule must be shown to be more beneficial to the individual than it is harmful to society.

The statistical history of crime in Los Angeles since the imposition of the exclusionary rule clearly demonstrates that it is more harmful to society than it is beneficial to the individual. Therefore, the continuation of the rule is unjustified and immediate legislative remedy is in order. As long as the Exclusionary Rule is the law of California, your police will respect it and operate to the best of their ability within the framework of limitations imposed by that rule. We feel obligated to present the case against this rule of evidence, to gather and print the statistics of its cost in public security, to speak of how it affects our ability to protect you against the criminal army. We would do the same and you would expect the same if, instead of police officers, we were medical doctors, attorneys, or engineers discussing a law that affected efficient performance in any of those fields. You have trained us, encouraged us to build an honorable profession, paid a considerable cost to bring some ability and proficiency to law enforcement. And so we believe we have a solemn duty to respond by being articulate in matters affecting your return on your investment in professional police work. We hope the people will listen and respond to the honest assessment of the social dangers created by the rule. We hope the State Legislature will hear the voice of the people and enact remedies. We hope the cost in life and suffering and property imposed upon the citizenry by the rule, will soon be eliminated. Whether or not this is done, your Los Angeles Police Department will continue the finest and most effective police service that is within our power to provide.

Chapter Seven

PARKER ON PUBLIC RELATIONS The Police Administrator and Public Relations: An address delivered at the annual meeting of the Police Chief's Section of the League of California Cities, San Francisco, September, 1955.

The Police Role in Community Relations: An address delivered at the National Conference of Christians and Jews, Institute on Police-Community Relations, Michigan State University, May, 1955.

The Police Administrator and Public Relations

The time has come when it is a pleasure to talk about police public relations. Not many years ago the subject was a delicate one – opinions were sharply and widely divided. In those days many excellent police administrators held that public relations activity was highly impractical – almost a criminal waste of government funds. They took the attitude that they were paid to be policemen, not salesmen, and that the public was going to get old-fashioned police work pure and simple – no frills, no information, no explanation. I do not long for those "good old days." It is true that they were simple times – the lines were clearly drawn. The police considered themselves and the public to be separate entities. It was a case of the police versus the public – the police department decided what was good for the community and delivered just that and nothing else. They were simple times, but they were also ugly times. With a few exceptions, I do not remember them with any great pride for the American police service. Today, the role of the police in a democracy is more universally understood. We accept the principle that the police derive their powers from the public and must be held continually responsible to the public for the use or misuse of those powers. Any other arrangement, any other philosophy, cannot be tolerated under our political system. Our dependence upon the public is so complete that it seems inconceivable that past administrators could have overlooked it. We depend upon the public for the first cry of warning, for the complaint, for the identification of the culprit, for the security of evidence, and for the witnesses necessary for prosecution. We depend upon them for necessary equipment. We depend upon them 135

136 for the adequate salaries, benefits, and pensions without which we cannot attract qualified personnel – personnel which, incidentally, we also depend upon the public to furnish. This leads us to a puzzling aspect of the problem. We find police departments which have accepted the necessity for good public relations; they have created public relations units, they talk in staff conferences, and teach it in their training classes. And yet, having observed all the prescribed rituals, they find themselves and the citizenry encamped in familiar positions, lines drawn up for the old battle of criticism, resentment, and more criticism. All too often then, we hear the familiar cry "public relations do not pay," and the old whine that "police work inevitably incurs resentment." The police administrator, disappointed and disillusioned, rationalizes that police work is an underprivileged, persecuted, and peculiarly distinct class of endeavor to which the basic rules of organization, management, and social-psychology do not apply. In his disappointment, he becomes, as Shakespeare put it, "A wretched soul, bruised with adversity." Public relations, the great panacea – the one-shot cure-all – has failed to produce results. Perhaps we have been guilty of too much glib talk about public relations with too little real understanding of what it implies. Certainly, no other term I know of has been so misinterpreted and abused. Public relations is not an organizational position, or a subdivision, or something you consciously do. It is a state of affairs. It is the relationship between the public and some identifiable group. As such, it is not something you can either accept or reject. It is in continual existence. The only choice an administrator has is whether this state of affairs, this relationship, is to be good or bad. The things we do to improve that state of affairs is public relations activity. Let us analyze that term. What does it really mean? I would like to suggest an alternate term which, I believe, will eliminate some of the confusion and dispel some of the mystery which seems to attach itself to the subject. Public relations activity is nothing more than communication between a group and the public. The problem which faces us today is not whether we believe in public relations – we have no choice but to believe in it. It exists.

137 Our problem is inter-communication – dependable and clear two-way channels of information. The methods of securing it may vary – the necessity for it never changes. If a definition of public relations activity is simple, the execution of it – the securing of those channels of information – is not. This tremendously complex question of group relationships and intra-group frictions is not a thing to be solved solely by creating public relations officers, detailing men to disseminate information to local news outlets, or creating colorful pamphlets and annual reports. These small tasks are an insignificant fraction of the total effort necessary to maintain what we loosely refer to as good public relations. With this in mind, perhaps it is time we stopped referring to public relations or public relations activity as something we assign to a personality, or unit, or even to the administrator himself. Every look, every word, very motion made by every man in the organization, every moment of the day, communicates impressions to the public – and as such is public relations activity, good or bad. The other things we do, the pamphlets, the radio appearances, and so on, are supplementary activity. They have some effect, but it is totally outweighed by the effect of the complete organization. The conduct of the field officer provides citizens with firsthand impressions, direct and lasting. When he does a sloppy job, no amount of secondary public relations activity can hide the fact. Abiding public cooperation is earned the hard way – mile-by-mile of alert patrol, hour-by-hour of tedious investigation, both backed up by a sincere devotion to our profession of public service. But even this verges on an over-simplification of the problem. Efficient and courteous police work can go not only unappreciated but, in some instances, unwanted. To ignore this possibility is to be guilty of perpetuating the glib talk which adds confusion to our subject. Unfortunately the impression has been created that public relations is a relatively simple thing. Leading textbooks on administration dispose of it in a single chapter. Our professional magazines are filled with articles which purport to solve this enigma through simple organizational diagrams. Even some leading exponents treat it as something one should do occasionally, suggesting clever publicity stunts and advertising gags. This

138 surface treatment creates the disillusionment felt by administrators when they execute the recommended motions and then seek in vain for results. Perhaps the first step in formulating realistic communications between the police and the public is to take a critical look at the problem. I believe such an analysis will destroy forever any illusions that good public relations can be created with small expenditures of effort. It would be difficult to devise a combination more conducive to inter- and intra-group friction than that found in the typical American city. Rarely does history record so many people of varied beliefs and modes of conduct grouped together in so competitive and complex a social structure. The confusing variety of religious and political creeds, national origins and diverse cultures is matched only by the extremes of ideals, emotions, and conduct found in the individuals which make up that social structure. Although proud of their independence, these people live so interdependently that food, shelter, and even their very movement on the streets require delicately balanced cooperation. Although sharing a tradition of individual liberty, their activities are regulated by the greatest and most complicated concentration of laws to be found anywhere. Charged with maintaining this precarious order by enforcing this confusion of laws, is the law enforcement agency. Although this would prove a difficult task under ideal circumstances, it is aggravated by unusual factors. The police function is rarely considered by the public to be a vital element of their life together. Further, the police past is often one of alternating inefficiency, corruption, and brutality. As a result, the individual police officer operates with a remarkable lack of public support, cooperation, and trust. Although this past is a legacy from corrupt political machines erected and supported by the people themselves, the policeman has become a public symbol upon which the wrath for such conditions is vented. This is our so-called public relations problem. If there is a panacea, a oneshot cure-all, it has never been revealed to me in either lecture, textbook, or experience. I have become extremely wary of the so-called public relations expert whose stock in trade

139 consists solely of recommendations concerning contacts with the press and television, sound movies, and three color pamphlets. Far better that the administrators have a firm grasp and insight into the roots of the problem and the factors which create it. Given this, a capable administrator can be trusted to apply the mechanics of solution. If a specific police department's dilemma stems from the fact that it is poorly administered, unprofessional, or corrupt, its problem cannot be solved by public relations activity. The cause is much deeper. If such a department has a public relations program, it usually consists of a stream of propaganda and special privilege to dominant community groups. It is not that type of problem which concerns us today, but rather that of the well-managed, somewhat idealistic, hardworking police agency which would like to do an event better job but needs an improved police public relationship if it is to do that job. Let us assume for a moment that the police service offered to a specific community is of good quality: If police public relations are bad in that community, it follows that the administrator is faced with a marketing problem. There must be created a desire and a demand on the part of the community for the quality of police service that is offered. In this respect, law enforcement does not differ greatly from private industry. The one factor which predetermines the success of any business is the market. Unless the ultimate recipient of a product or service is convinced that he needs it, the most skillful organization and techniques are wasted. A second lesson the police administrator can draw from industry is that markets are created – they seldom spring full-blown from the unshaped desires of the people. The vital elements of civilized life, including our most sacred institutions, at one time or another have been laboriously sold to the people. In this respect, it is heartening that unreceptiveness is not one of the faults of Americans. They respond quickly to new ideas and paradoxically often relish being proved wrong. Despite opinion to the contrary, they respond to large ideas as well as to the small and trivial. This is of tremendous importance to the police administrator, because the ideas and ideals he must communicate are not trivial ones.

140 The police administrator's first step toward building a foundation for a good police public relationship must be to introduce to the public a fact which is elemental to every society. This fact is: the police function is a basic component of man's government by man which has determined the character and permanence of every social structure since human beings first sought collective security. In the face of the extremes of conduct possible in human affairs, we manage to exist only because we establish and enforce certain limitations. These rules or laws are promulgated, not because men agree on what is right or wrong, but because they do not agree. Thus law, an artificial standard, is necessary to mark the limits of activity beyond which society is injured. Law, standing alone, is a fiction, It achieves reality only when it is observed. The character of every society lies in its method of establishing observance, and its permanence lies in its success in securing it. There may be an element of the community to which it will have to be said in a simpler manner: "We can't get along without the police and the better the police do their job, the better off the community is going to be." But regardless of which way it is said, regardless of whether the listener is a man who can understand the philosophical connotations or a man who measures community welfare solely by personal profit, the message can be sold. Most citizens today are well aware of the exorbitant cost of ineffectual law enforcement. They are not entirely unfamiliar with the experience of other communities. The creation of the market need not be so much the sale of a startling new concept as it is the calling to memory of some well-known facts. Immediate tangibles which will be recognized are more effective security of goods, a higher rate of recovery of stolen property, lower insurance premiums, and better traffic conditions. It must be emphasized that we are now talking about communications performed at the administrator's level. His relationship with the business and professional groups of the city is most important. Included is the press, since it is primarily a business enterprise with a stake in community welfare. It should be noted that the administrator's concern here is not solely with newsgatherers. He is not seeking good publicity. He is not a press

141 agent. He is a community leader seeking the solution to one of the community's most pressing problems. His business is with publishers, editors, stockholders, directors. He will talk to advertisers and radio-station owners and to members of the chamber of commerce and transit, banking, insurance, veterans, and other associations. Similar powerful influences on community thinking are school, religious, and inter-racial groups. By strict definition, this is not yet public relations activity. It is, in essence, an attempt to negotiate a contract – an attempt to find a market for the brand of service offered. I suggest that unless this solid and sustaining market is created, unless that brand of service offered is desired, a foundation for further public relations activity does not exist. The initial problem requires a considerable amount of courage in the police administrator. He must have firm convictions and the courage to be true to them. Although willing to accept criticism for his own and his organization's errors, he must have courage to point out mistakes by others. For over a century the American police have been the subject of castigation. We have no complaints on this score – it is part of the painful process of growth and improvement. But there is a danger in this history of abuse. A point is sometimes reached where all other groups seem to become wise and faultless and self reproach becomes the total answer. Establishing a base for good public relations is not accomplished by pleasing vocal groups, but rather by being right, staying right, and having faith in the people that they will support right. I am reminded of a general order which I singed shorty after becoming Chief of Police in Los Angeles. It instructed officers that while cooperation with the press is important, our primary responsibility is the investigation of crimes and the apprehension of offenders. Assistance to the Fourth Estate must be kept in balance with basic police tasks. It must be recognized that many times there is a conflict between the immediate objectives of the police and of the press at crime scenes. Priority must be given to the discovery and preservation of evidence. The new order necessitated some changes in newsgathering procedures and could have resulted in a serious difference of opinion between the two agencies.

142 But because a market for professional law enforcement had been created, because communication had been established with the administrative level of the press, the situation was brought into balance with each side respecting the importance of the other. Let us face the unescapable fact that the requirements for a police administrator are much more severe than those we impose on our raw recruits. If he is a tender soul, if he is easily frightened, if his sense of values places security ahead of ethics, then he has no right to be at the helm. And if such a man is at the helm, the strongest public relations activity can only put off the inevitable day when his many compromises, the confusion of sails he has set, will sweep him from his course and spell ruin for himself and his department. The disorders inherent in our highly urbanized society create many frustrating problems for which there are no easy solutions. Typical of these are freeway congestion, trash littering sidewalks and streets, shifts in ideas of moral responsibility resulting in weakened family discipline, and in some communities, an atmospheric pollution known as "smog." some of these problems are mere nuisances; others present a grave danger to social and physical health. In both cases, there appears to be a growing tendency to attempt to legislate the problem out of existence. Too often, such legislation is passed during a wave of heated indignation with but little sober consideration to the problem of enforcing the new law. The solution to these urban problems does not always lie within the power of the police. The public tends toward an exaggerated opinion of our authority, of the efficacy of citation and arrest, of the number of man-hours of police work actually available and of how much can be accomplished during those man-hours. A grave public relations dilemma is created in these instances because the police administrator is likely to be condemned if he fails to order zealous enforcement of the new statute – and is certain to be condemned when enforcement fails to solve the unsolvable. And, of course, his officers will be loudly condemned by the citizens who become the target of the new wave of enforcement. Typical of this situation is the "litter law," a statute becoming

143 increasingly common. Each day, millions of pounds of wood pulp are transformed into Kleenex, advertising handbills, and the various other throw-away paper products. This is all a part of our way-of-life – our enormous paper consumption is rooted deep in our highly competitive social structure. Whether we like it or not, a certain amount of this litter is going to miss the trash-can and be deposited on the street. A few days ago I saw a child of about five years in the rear seat of a car, mother's Kleenex box in hand, gravely throwing these paper-handkerchiefs out of the window, one at a time. It was probably worth nineteen cents to the mother to keep the child occupied during the drive. But there is a statute which prescribes a "litter-bug" citation for this offense. We write almost one million traffic citations a year in Los Angeles – with some effect on the traffic problem. Perhaps a million "litter-bug" citations would have some effect on the city's waste-paper problem also. If you will consider the difficulty encountered in selling the necessity of strict traffic law enforcement, you can guess at the disastrous result of strict "litter-bug" law enforcement. Turning from the public relations to the economic aspects of the problem, I question the cost of detailing highly trained and moderately well-paid traffic and crime specialists to the task of keeping the streets clean – even assuming that police activity could, in this one instance, change human nature. When presented with a dilemma of this type, the only approach the police administrator can adopt is that of facing the issue squarely, even at the cost of offending those who are promoting the legislation. A good public relations program is not a matter of pleasing everybody all the time. At times, despite our warnings, we will be given the task of enforcing this type of fringe legislation. While we must accept responsibility when it is placed upon us by constituted authority, we must also make it clear to the public that enforcement is not necessarily the solution. The police will continually be offered new tasks which they do not have the man power, the training, or the authority to accomplish. Another excellent example is the freeway problem. There is a considerable public outcry today against the use of those express-highways by heavy trucking. Although the trucking industry is one of the integral supports of our economy, no one seems to

144 want these cargo-carriers in front of him on the freeway. A new statute has been enacted which limits these vehicles to the extreme right lane if they gross over a certain tonnage. No one appears to have given much thought to the problem of enforcement. How is tonnage determined? By estimate? At one of the weighing pay-stations which may be miles from the location of the offense? What of the increased freeway congestion and traffic hazard created when one of these giants must be stopped for investigation or citation? And what of the unbroken stream of trucking, traveling radiator to rear-gate in the extreme right lane of traffic – how then does the passenger vehicle get in the right lane to exist from the freeway – or does he have to travel it to its terminus? More than one person has actually suggested that the police should so rigidly enforce the traffic statutes against trucking that it would scarcely pay these operators to use express-highways – in other words, a regime of organized persecution against one segment of industry. And this suggestion has been made in all seriousness. The public relation danger of applying police measures against nonpolice problems, or even of remaining silent and hoping the wave of indignation will subside, is that the administrator will find the police suddenly saddled with responsibility for the existence of the condition. I was startled the other day to hear a citizen berating the police for not eliminating "smog." I was not even aware that the atmospheric pollution problem represented a proper police activity. The citizen was following an all-too-common line of reasoning in which the police represent authority and thus, when authority fails, the police are therefore responsible. It is not a new thought. We have heard the police blamed for crime, delinquency, traffic deaths, skid row conditions, criminal recidivism, and any number of other social ills. I would suggest that the best way to add to this list is to take on new tasks involving problems which cannot be solved by police activity. The police administrator who has not developed direct and clear channels of communication to responsible segments of the community will find his public relations program shattered by impossible demands. The police department cannot be all things to all men. Your marketing contract must include some limitation

145 on how much and what type of service your organization is capable of providing. Once communication has established a marketing contract, then the more common forms of public relations activity can be used with effect. I have disparaged the use of a public relations officer or unit as the sole medium of communication between the police and the public. But it should not be assumed that there is no place for such a unit in the organizational structure. As a staff activity, as a guide to the administrator and his chief deputies, as an instrument of selective communication with the city's many groups, it is an important phase of the public relations program. The department's public relations officer or unit commander should be a member of the administrator's advisory staff. He must be given considerable freedom to criticize, to innovate, to act on the spur of necessity. He must have the full confidence of the top man. He works in the difficult field of human relations where to be fifty-one percent right is close to genius. The relationship must be one of close mutual respect. If, on occasion, the public relations advisor cannot tell the administrator that he is wrong, one of the two men is superfluous. if a department creates a public relations position, let it be a virile, active, creative position. I have purposely avoided discussing the mechanics of communicating with the public because it is my belief that it composes the smallest part of the public relations task. Comprehensible news-releases, readable annual reports, intelligent radio and television interviews, interesting lectures to service clubs – these are relatively easy things to provide. The securing of efficient and courteous performance in the field should present no problem to the capable administrator. The real problem is not that of doing a good job; it is not even that of telling the public that it is being done. The most important and most difficult task is the securing of a market for professional police work – a public that will demand it, pay the cost of it, and stand behind it. The market theory is not an untried one. During the past five years it has been the core of the public relations program of the Los Angeles Police Department. The history of that department's rising international prominence in law enforcement, its unprecedented

146 public cooperation and approval, is too well known for its mention here to be construed as praise-seeking. Rather, it is evidence that a sound public relations policy is not an administrative appenditure, but rather, a broad foundation necessary to efficient and effective law enforcement. As long as democracy exists in our country, the police will be shaped and controlled by the public. To deny the wisdom of this arrangement is to deny our very birthright. Public relations activity is merely recognizing and complying with that state of affairs. It is not a synthetic procedure, adopted as a means of relieving external pressures. It is a full realization of the true place of law enforcement in the scheme of things – it is a full grasp of the philosophy of democracy.

The Police Role in Community Relations Within a few hundred miles of this point, a group of scientists are devising what they call "an improved nuclear device." We do not know its range of total destruction or its date of completion. But this much we do know – its power is such that its designers live in dread and apprehension of the forces they have created. And across the seas, other scientists, using other languages, race to surpass our weapons. The power of total destruction may lie within our immediate future. Each second which passes brings man nearer the moment of awesome and irrevocable decision. As this moment of supreme crisis draws near, we have gathered to discuss community affairs. And I think it is only right to ask whether our subject is rendered meaningless by the uncertain future; whether our preoccupation with simple dayto-day matters, is really very important. In answering this question, I believe we approach the true import of this Institute. The small problems, the seemingly petty issues we discuss today, are in reality neither small nor petty. Our subject is not overshadowed by the great international disputes and their deadly consequences. Rather, the reverse is true. The great crisis which compels our attention was born in the inequities, the blind passions, and the senseless conflicts which furnish our subject. Conflicts begin not between nations or blocs of nations, but between men. If there is an absolute and enduring solution to conflict, it will not be found at levels where ministers of state propound compromises. It will be found at the everyday level of social intercourse – in our homes, or on our streets, and in our individual consciences. My initial premise, then, is that community relations problems are not an unrealistic and relatively unimportant concern, but a vital issue – a question of human weakness and society's future to control that weakness. 147

148 You will note I did not say "correct" human weakness. Let me repeat. Community relations is a question of human weakness and society's failure to control that weakness. If social equity and tranquility were dependent upon perfection of the species, then despair might well keynote this conference. If our discussions are to produce results, there is one fact which must dominate all our thinking – we have not solved the human equation. Lacking a solution to human imperfection, we must learn to live with it. The only way I know of safely living with it is to control it. When one man assaults another or one group violently flaunts the rights of another group, the immediate and pressing issue is the conflict, not the beliefs which incited it. We have not yet learned to control what men believe, but we can control what men do. I do not deny for a moment that the final solution is the perfection of human conscience. But in the interim, and it may be a long interim, we must have order. My second premise, then, is that social order is the first concern of those interested in improved community relations. It provides, not a perfectly equitable pattern of life, but at least a peaceful arena in which those inequities can ultimately be solved. Community order works another advantage which, to my mind, has never been properly assessed. Man is a creature of habit, not of hate. Order, even though it is enforced order – nonviolent conduct, despite intolerant and discriminatory beliefs – creates among the peoples of the community habitual patterns of conduct. I suspect that this habit of order, like any other habit, can be so ingrained into the human mind that it will displace baser instincts. Let me make it abundantly clear at this point, I do not recommend and will never support a police state. My interest is not in more regulation or tighter restrictions on human liberty. I have no interest in broadening police powers. I am concerned that existing police responsibilities, those vital to a peaceful productive society, be professionally and effectively discharged. Our laws are far from perfect, but even so they are sufficient for the maintenance of human intercourse without violent conflict. That these laws have not prevented violence is not the fault of the laws but of the manner in which they are construed and enforced.

149 I intend to outline here, a realistic and immediately practical program for securing and maintaining social order within the limits of existing legislation. Some will question the confinement of the discussion to the bare limits of legal propriety. I would like to dispose of those questions now. What of freedom of economic opportunity? What of effective de-segregation in business and professions, as well as in schools? What of the multitude of "gentlemen's agreements," the harmful, though not actually illegal actions, which relegate some groups to second-class citizenship? Are these not also important questions, some of them as damaging and painful as actual physical violence? The answer must be in the affirmative. But these evils will never be eliminated, so long as conflict keeps alive the beliefs that created them. In the ruins of mob action, in the pain of physical assault, and in the renewed and intensified hates and fears which follow violence – there are no solutions. Conflict does not beget peace. But where people can walk together and live together and do business together without violence, an affirmative step has been taken. Under our system of government, any discussion of enforced order is necessarily a discussion of local police agencies. We have no national police; legislative and judicial branches of government are prohibited from usurping police powers; our armed forces can be used civilly only under the gravest and most extraordinary emergencies. Our rich and complex economic system, our political freedom, the very conduct of our way of life, is made possible because of the security provided by local police agencies. Indeed, the entire social structure is balanced upon patterns of order created by community law enforcement. This is quite a balancing act. Historically, it is a rare concept; few nations have rested so much on so slender a foundation. Recognizing this, it would appear that excellence of the police would be a principal and constant concern of community leaders. Their selection, their training, their morale would seem to be of critical importance. Understanding all this, certainly our leaders should have provided the police with the finest young men, the most capable leaders, the wisest counsel. That we have not done these things is as obvious as it is regrettable. The disorder and violence

150 which troubles us as we meet here today, is part of the price we pay for our neglect. There is in existence today a community which has decided that the price is too high. It is a case study in the successful application of enforced order to the problem of community relations. I have had the good fortune of taking an active part in the experiment. I have watched it mature during twenty-eight years of ser vice as a professional police officer. I refer your attention to Los Angeles. That city is, today, characterized by a quality of inter-group cooperation which renders it almost unique among our great cities. It is not a model city. It has intolerant citizens; it has incidents of conflict. But those factors have not been permitted to accumulate into mass disorder. Los Angeles has not experienced an instance of organized group-violence in the past twelve years. If organized violence occurred anywhere, it should, by all socio-economic standards, have been in Los Angeles. In the last decade, the city has nearly doubled in size; it suffered the intense dislocation of adjustment to an industrial economy; it has been and still is the focus of one of the greatest migrations in this nation's history. Its two million, two hundred thousand people, the hub of a five-million person metropolitan area, is a melting pot of races, colors, creeds, and ideas. Let me cite some examples. Los Angeles is the home of nearly one-quarter million Negroes, an increase of 168% since World War II. It has the largest Mexican-descent population outside of Mexico City. It has the largest Japanese group in the nation; the third largest Chinese group. The number of persons of the Jewish faith at least equals the urban average. The city is a cross section of the races, colors, and creeds which make up our nation. And, for reasons no one has ever explained to my satisfaction, we are somehow a Mecca for not only strange religious cults, but also for every brand of zealot, bigot, and fanatic that our society breeds. This is Log Angeles – not the city colorfully depicted on travel posters – but the one which interests us here today. It has, like other great metropolitan centers, nearly every element which creates community tensions. But its peoples of different background are learning to live together.

151 The story of that city's freedom from strife is largely the story of the professionalization of its police department. In this respect, I do not discount the efforts of other agencies, particularly those working for community and group betterment. Their progress in the fields of human understanding, education, and welfare, has been remarkable. It holds great promise for the future. But they made one additional contribution. They recognized that there was one thing which would make social tranquility immediately possible. They gave dynamic and unflagging support to police improvement. I want to approach the subject of police improvement in a bluntly realistic manner. There has been a great deal of discussion about it at this Institute, and I am anxious that one serious error be avoided. As I left Los Angeles yesterday, I was introduced to a feature writer from another city's metropolitan newspaper. He is a capable man. His task was to analyze the Los Angeles Police Department, study its techniques and procedures, and take the story back home. This is good journalism – the type which justifies our faith in the Fourth Estate. I hope he won't make the error I'm concerned about. If he doesn't, it will be a rare instance. Since Los Angeles has achieved its eminence in law enforcement, dozens of citizen groups, city officials, and journalists have studied our methods. The usual result is a storm of bitter criticism of their department, and a demand that their police adopt Los Angeles' professionalism. How simple that sounds. And how dangerous it is to assume that a city's socalled police problem stems from the police themselves. These people who demand that their police be more efficient, more honest, more impartial – I invite them to join me in an exercise in realism. Who actually runs a police department? The mayor, the police commission, the chief? The people do! They set its policies, establish its standards, furnish its man-power, and supply its budget. The police department is not a private endeavor; it has no funds of its own. It is not a legal entity; it has no rights, no vested interests. It is merely a group of citizens employed to exercise certain functions. It is created by the public, shaped by the public, and operated by the public. And if it

152 operates badly, the responsibility cannot be disowned by the public. I have often heard the complaint that the police organization is all right, but the officers just are not producing. And if an employee isn't producing – whose fault is it? The public selected that man – did they select the wrong man? The public furnished the training – was it bad training – or did they neglect to provide funds for training of any sort? What about the supervisors and commanders? Were they selected by competitive examination on a merit basis – or were they promoted on a political basis? If so, whose politics? If there is a machine in town – a few police votes don't keep it running. But the public vote does! A recent news report tells of widespread police graft in a southern city. Officers are "squeezing" merchandise from businessmen, parking fees from truckers, gratuities from other citizens. The good citizens there, horrified at the expose, might do well to accept some personal responsibility. The basic salary of their police officer is $220.00 per month. On the six-day week, that runs about a dollar per hour. Carpenter's helpers in the same town earn nearly double that scale. What kind of policemen do they expect to get for a dollar an hour? Their police department costs less than a million dollars per year. Of course, the crime bill, the disorder, the under-the-table pay-offs run fifteen million dollars per year. A shrewd bargain these good citizens have driven. Of course, they are going to solve their problem. They're replacing the chief, the seventh in six years. If a journalist or a citizens' group from that city calls upon Los Angeles for assistance, what should we tell them? They'll want to study our organization, inspect our Planning and Research and Intelligence Divisions, our strong disciplinary program, observe our cadet school, our continuous in-service training. There are no secrets about these things. They are merely adaptions of sound administrative technique. They are available and understandable to qualified police officials everywhere. But they cannot be put into effect until competent personnel are attracted by decent job benefits, until an adequate operating budget is furnished; until public cooperation replaces disinterest, shallow-interest, and special-interest. Professional police work will come into being only when the public takes a long hard look at their police, and instead of

153 disowning what they themselves have created, accept full responsibility for the errors of generations. Returning, then, to the Los Angeles experiment – the thing which made police progress and social order there a reality was a public acceptance of these very basic facts. At first, it was understood by only a small group – community leaders such as those represented at this conference. The job of selling this concept was a difficult one. Not that it was a particularly new concept – but at some community levels it is an ugly one. Los Angeles members of the groups represented at this Institute were key factors in that sales job. Assuming a community is ready to support the professionalism of its police agency, there are certain techniques which the Los Angeles experiment has proved necessary. The first step is the attraction of proper recruits. Los Angeles policemen draw $440.00 monthly at the end of three years' service. This is probably a minimum figure. Below that, the possibility of attracting sufficiently educated and capable persons is almost nil. I am of the opinion that the base salary for an experienced line officer should be in the neighborhood of $600.00 monthly, at present living costs. The first city to adopt such a scale will attract high quality personnel who now select other professions. At the present time, I am trying to convince Los Angeles that we would save money by paying more. I had the pleasure of meeting our former staff researcher here today – a former Los Angeles policeman, now Professor Albert Germann of Michigan State University. There must be minimum recruiting standards – and these minimums must be held even though the department operates below strength. Far better to have to increase unit output than to corrupt your police future with substandard men. In Los Angeles, less than 4 per cent of all applicants meet our rigid police standards. We have been considerably under authorized strength for five years, at one time ten per cent under an allowed figure which was itself nearly forty percent under the recommended population, square mile ratio. We have managed to do the job only because personnel quality allowed us to steadily improve efficiency. We were told by administrative experts we might improve 2

154 percent per year with much planning and labor. We upped work output fifteen percent last year and we are going to do better in 1955. Recruit selection must be made solely on a merit basis, preferably by an independent civil service department. If a ward boss, an alderman, or a councilman can influence selection in any manner, tear up your plans and start over. As a matter of fact, if we can interfere in any way other than through official channels, the police improvement plan is doomed. Categorically, professional police work and politics do not mix – and there are no shades of gray to that philosophy. A psychiatric test must be included in the recruit selection program. This bears directly on the problem of community relations. The finest training, direction, and discipline cannot correct or control serious emotional defects. Our Cadet Training School runs thirteen weeks at present. Again, this should be considered a minimum and then only if the recruit has an educational equivalent of two college years. I am personally in favor of a six-month training period, plus a six-month additional field probation under strict supervision. This should be followed up with in-service and advanced officers' schools, specialist and command schools such as are provided in Los Angeles. This is, of course, only a sketch of recruiting and training considerations. With it in mind, I would like to consider in more detail some of the training which bears directly on the subject of community relations. Once the police cadet has received basic technical information, the direction of training pivots to the consideration of human relations. The cadet must be taught to translate his technical background into solutions of field situations – problems which involve people. In these courses, sociology is stressed more than ethnology. Applied human relations is stressed more than theoretical psychology. The purpose of the training is to provide, immediately, useable knowledge. Training schedules do not allow time for building the broad base of theoretical knowledge necessary in university training. The police administrators should not attempt that impossible task under present training time minimums. The advantages

155 of a college education requirement for police applicants is readily apparent here. Lacking this, colleges do provide upper-level courses, and officers should be encouraged to take advantage of these facilities. In a recent survey, we found that forty percent of our officers were engaged in such training. The cadet learns that people differ – by race, religion, politics, economic status, occupation, and in a thousand other ways. He learns they have a right to be different. He learns that we are all minority group members – that each of us belongs to many groups, any one of which can be and often has been discriminated against. In other classes, statistical diagrams of the composition of the city are studied. The various peoples are discussed, the movements of groups are traced, the tensions resulting from these movements are pin-pointed and analyzed in de tail. The racial composition of police districts are an important lesson here because it must be made clear that there are no "Jim Crow" areas, no "Ghettos." Every police division has everything found in all other divisions, differing only in proportion. The aim here is to correct stereotyped impressions that the city is divided into clearly defined groups and areas, and that law enforcement differs accordingly. The police department's policy of one class of citizenship, one standard of police technique, then becomes readily understandable. Another class expands this policy. The officer now understands the composition of the community, he has learned how people differ. He is now taught that these variations cannot influence him in the discharge of his duties. His department handles the people involved in incidents only according to the degree of their involvement. There is no other measurement. Existing laws are enforced and nothing else. We do not enforce beliefs or prejudices – including the officer's. During his hours of duty, he is a composite of the entire community. Typical course titles are Police Sociological Problems, Human Relations, Ethics, Professionalism, Civil Disturbances, and Public Relations. Course titles do not reveal the full scope of the 520-hour program. For example, although Human Relations class lasts two hours, that subject is a principal concern in courses such

156 as Interrogation, Patrol Tactics, and Investigation. The firearms' class gives more time to "when not to shoot" than it does to "how to shoot." The entire training staff is constantly alert in the classroom, on the exercise field, and in the locker room, to discover signs of disabling prejudice which might make the cadet a poor risk. Conditions of tensions are artificially created so that the man's reaction can be studied – and he may never know that the situation was contrived to test him. At this point, let us consider the subject of racial and religious prejudice. The cadets, of course, reflect a broad cross section of society and bring to us the intolerant attitudes to which they have previously been exposed. The question – what to do about these beliefs? Recently, a chief of police from a mid-western city made an inspection tour of our department. He was particularly interested in the extremely low percentage of citizen complaints received alleging prejudicial treatment of minority group members. He was also interested in case studies where so-called minority group organizations defended the police department against accusations of such misconduct. One of these instances involved a metropolitan Los Angeles daily newspaper which began a series of articles with the caption: "Cops Lay Heavy Hands on Minorities." You have all seen such articles and, in many cases, they represent good journalism – accurate coverage. In this instance, the facts were patently incorrect. The writer, a new resident, was securing information from old newspaper clippings and from certain special-interest groups. He was committing the cardinal reportorial sin of not checking current facts. The article shook police morale and public confidence. Assuming the facts had been true, it offered no solutions other than a vague recommendation that the police ought to do something about this mess! Fortunately, certain community organizations recognized where the "mess" really was. A coordinating group representing sixty social service agencies contacted the publisher of that paper. He was told, and in no uncertain terms, that the story was untrue, that it was inciting lunatic fringe-elements into disorderly conduct, and was playing directly into the hands of subversive groups. The result – that particular series was discontinued and, to the credit of that publisher, a new

157 series of articles underscoring police-public cooperation was instituted in its place. The visiting chief of police was understandably impressed. In most jurisdictions the police fight lonely battles. He assumed that such overwhelming public support meant we had somehow erased prejudicial and intolerant beliefs held by police officers. He was wrong. Those of you who work in the field of education recognize we do not and can not accomplish this miracle. Of course, we will not accept an applicant whose intolerance is so high it is a disabling factor. Where it is not too deep-seated, we can erase it, or at least diminish it. In the majority of cases, we must learn to operate equitably despite it. We do that by controlling the results of these beliefs. With policemen, as with society in general, our immediate concern is not in what the man thinks but what he does. Los Angeles police policy recognizes only one class of citizenship – first class citizenship. Any incident of police action which deviates from this policy is met with swift and certain discipline. A police department's community relations program begins with a training, a firm human relations policy, and strong disciplinary machinery to enforce it. It is a departmental application of my second premise – that the immediate issue is conduct and the immediate solution is enforced order. For those who question whether that degree of discipline is possible, I have an example. I am thinking of a certain Los Angeles police officer who walks a foot beat in the old section of the city. The street is a racial melting pot. I know the officer personally; he is one of the "old school," recruited long before psychiatric examinations were instituted. If there is a maximum number of racial and religious prejudices that one mind can hold, I am certain he represents it. This officer has been exposed to the complete range of police human relations in training. He has memorized every maxim, every scientific fact, every theory relating to human equality. He knows all the accepted answers. Of course, he doesn't believe a word of it. This may surprise you – the officer's eight-hour duty tour is characterized by tolerance, applied human relations, and equitable treatment of all persons. Both his division commander and myself

158 have watched his work closely, a little wary that his deep-seated convictions might win out over discipline in moments of stress. This has not happened during the five years he has patrolled this highly critical district. We are very near an opinion that his intolerance has become a victim of enforced order – habit has won out over belief. Discipline, enforced compliance with police policy, is a key which is available to every police administrator. If it works in Los Angeles, it will work elsewhere. The entire community relations program is at stake on every officer in the field. It is here that the police department proves itself, or is found wanting. The second-line community relations effort is handled by specialized police units. One of the most successful of these is our Community Relations Detail working out of the Public Information office. Its mission is to establish and maintain communication between police and the so-called minority segments of the community serving them, and key individuals in the human relations field. These officers are members of sixty organizations representing a cross section of specialized community interests. Few police details pierce so deeply into the stratifications of our complex society or maintain so many privileged sources of information. Their first task was at the community press level. Certain of these newspapers were parlaying instances of law enforcement against minority group members into sensational accounts of police prejudice and brutality. Many of these articles were written solely from the unsubstantiated accounts given by the arrestee. The accumulated result was the fomenting of an hysterical "cop-hating" attitude which h rendered suspect every police action involving non-Caucasian persons. The Community Relations officers went to these publishers and laid their cards on the table. Sensationalism was selling newspapers, but it was hurting the community. They pointed out that sensationalism was actually manufacturing new incidents – feeding upon itself. They offered, with the full backing of the office of the chief, to provide the publisher with exact and complete facts on every inquiry, whether the police action was right or wrong; whether the facts helped us or hurt us.

159 The confidence I have in the men who publish the nation's newspapers was justified. Community interest won out over self interest. The Community Relations Detail is, first, a public information activity, acquainting community groups with police policies, procedures, and tactics. Where necessary, it interprets specific police actions, explaining why they were necessary and how they were taken. Secondly, the detail transmits information in the other direction, keeping the police staff informed about minority and inter-group problems and activities. We have found the police are sometimes overly suspicious of a group's militant efforts, seeing in it a threat to order which does not actually exist. The two-way communication furnished by the det ail brings the facts to both sides. Thirdly, the detail reports any police activities which are discriminatory, or may appear to the community to be discriminatory. The police staff does not operate under the assumption that it is infallible. Critical comment from this specialized unit often prevents more dangerous and expensive criticism from the public at large. Lastly, the detail operates as an advance listening post, alert for rumors which might prelude violent conflict. In a recent instance, these officers were informed that racial violence was brewing at a school. A quick investigation indicated the situation was critical. The detail flashed the word to citizen groups organized to combat just such emergencies. Affected police field units were placed on a stand-by basis. The result – this detail, working with citizen groups, contained the situation. It is profitable to assign to these specialized units officers belonging to minority groups. They are often more sensitive to the problem, have previously established contacts in those communities, and encounter fewer barriers. However, it must be emphasized that the officer's competency, and not his ancestry, is the overriding consideration in making the assignment. Community relations details are not "window-dressing" – they are not publicity gags designed to display nonCaucasians in key positions. A similar detail works out of the Juvenile Division. In this case, the principal concern is with actual offenders. One of this unit's primary values is its detailed knowledge of gang members, leaders, and methods. They know their homes, their meeting places, their

160 territories. They deal with what the law recognizes as children, but do not be mistaken – this is intelligence activity of the highest order. The disheartening message of our crime statistics is all too clear – today's delinquent is often a dangerous criminal – an immediate threat to community order. He is sometimes the innocent tool of intolerant adults, but he can also be a moving force behind community violence. We are sympathetic with the ideals of juvenile correction – of rehabilitation over punishment. Here, as with other community problems, we invite welfare agencies to work to eliminate causes. Meanwhile, we ask them to remember that the police is not a social agency. We are bound to read the message in police records and employ protective tactics accordingly. In Los Angeles, as in other cities, we have a juvenile problem. We do not have a problem in mass juvenile disorder, because we face facts, and on the basis of these facts, employ units such as the ones I have described. Three factors compose the Los Angeles Police Department's community relations program: Training of officers – including training through discipline, public information activity, and efficient line police work. Unless they are all in existence and interworking, a community relations program does not exist. Training provides a base, but public information and line officers must forward to training that information which keys it to current needs. Public information is a useless activity unless it is backed up with competent line officers who are enforcing the laws equitably. And the most dedicated line commanders can accomplish little unless training provides well-schooled personnel and public information creates a co-operative public. I would rather have brought to this Institute a simple and revolutionary device – some easy way to an effective program. I know of no such device. I can promise that, to a mutually co-operating public and police department, no problem in the community order is beyond solution. The methods are known, they are proving themselves in the Los Angeles experiment – all that is needed is dedicated citizens who will put them into effect. To this point, this has been a progress report. The Los Angeles experiment seems to justify the philosophy of enforced order as the first step toward improved community relations. Progress of this

161 type can be reported objectively, without seeming to seek praise because law enforcement is absolutely dependent upon the public for any successes it may have. The credit for Los Angeles progress must go primarily to Los Angeles citizens. I would not want to close, however, leaving the impression that the experiment is concluded. It does not represent the ultimate in community equity and tranquility. Certain factors now at work could bring all the progress crashing down into rubble and violence. I have pledged forthrightness and honesty in this report, and it requires some critical comments, perhaps touching upon activities and attitudes or organizations represented here. The first comment concerns minority discrimination against the public as a whole. Reaction to police deployment furnishes a good example of this danger. Every department worth its salt deploys field forces on the basis of crime experience. Deployment is often heaviest in so-called minority sections of the city. The reason is statistical – it is a fact that certain racial groups, at the present time, commit a disproportionate share of the total crime. Let me make one point clear in that regard – a competent police administrator is fully aware of the multiple conditions which create this problem. There is no inherent physical or mental weakness in any racial stock which tends towards crime. But – and this is a "but" which must be borne constantly in mind – police field deployment is not social agency activity. In deploying to suppress crime, we are not interested in why a certain group tends toward crime, we are interested in maintaining order. The fact that the group would not be a crime problem under different socio-economic conditions and might not be a crime problem tomorrow, does not alter today's tactical necessities. Police deployment is concerned with effect, not cause. When I am told that intense police activity in a given area is psychologically disturbing to residents, I am forced to agree. And I agree that it can add weight to discriminatory beliefs held by some who witness it, and that it can create a sense of persecution among those who receive it. Is the police administrator, then, to discard crime occurrence statistics and deploy his men on the basis of social inoffensiveness? This would be discrimination indeed!

162 Every citizen has the right to police protection on the basis of need. The police have the duty of providing that protection, and of employing whatever legal devices are necessary to accomplish it. At the present time, race, color, and creed are useful statistical and tactical devices. So are age groupings, sex, and employment. If persons of one occupation, for some reason commit more theft than average, then increased police attention is given to persons of that occupation. Discrimination is not a factor there. If persons of Mexican, Negro, or Anglo-Saxon ancestry, for some reason, contribute heavily to other forms of crime, police deployment must take that into account. From an ethnological point-of-view, Negro, Mexican, and Anglo-Saxon are unscientific break-downs; they are a fiction. From the police point-of-view, they are a useful fiction and should be used as long as they remain useful. The demand that the police cease to consider race, color, and creed is an unrealistic demand. Identification is a police tool, not a police attitude. If traffic violations run heavily in favor of lavender colored automobiles, you may be certain, whatever the sociological reasons for that condition, we would give lavender automobiles more than average attention. And if those vehicles were predominantly found in one area of the city, we would give that area more than average attention. You may be certain that any pressure brought to bear by the lavender manufacturer's association would not alter our professional stand – it would only react to their disadvantage by making the police job more difficult. Such demands are a form of discrimination against the public as a whole. For a moment, let us consider this entire problem of group identification. It is one thing for the police to employ it for statistical and descriptive purposes; it is quite another if it is employed to set a group apart from the rest of society. The question must be brought out into the open and discussed because it represents a conflict of opinion within the physically-identifiable minority groups. Some of these citizens object strenuously to being identified with their background. Others publicly announce it by joining organizations bearing that stamp of identity. Either attitude can be supported by argument. But I humbly submit that the man, or the group which changes identification at different times and

163 under different conditions, confuses and impedes the social assimilation process. There is no place for dual status in our society, and it is incongruous that the groups with the keenest interest in eliminating dual status should create conditions which perpetuate it. Organizations which publicly identify themselves with a certain racial group are keeping alive the phantasy that the group is different. By setting it apart from the whole, they help keep it apart. We need such organizations; they fill a vital role in our changing system; I heartily endorse their good works. I suggest that if a single class of citizenship is the key to social assimilation, then practices and titles which contradict it, must be examined and resolved. Another problem which plagues the police administrator is organized group pressure to promote officers and make command assignments on the basis of race, color, or creed. Before a recent Los Angeles election, I encountered tremendous pressure to replace an Anglo-Saxon commander of a detective division with another commander belonging to a certain minority group. I refused to engage in racial discrimination against the Anglo-Saxon commander. He was the most qualified man for the job and, as such, he retained the job. Neither do I consider ancestry a factor in making promotional appointments. The Los Angeles policy is to take the top man from the list. Racial background should not hinder advancement; neither should it help it. Shortly before I left Los Angeles, I had the pleasure of pinning a Lieutenant's badge on a young officer born in Mexico. He got that badge because he was the top man, not because accidents of conquest created a national border between our places of birth. No one is more critical of the American police service than myself. For twenty-eight years I have outspokenly expressed that criticism and have sat in meetings and applauded others who have criticized constructively. Certainly, few other organizations in history have been so unanimously castigated. I have no complaints to make – it is part of the painful process of growth and improvement. There is one danger inherent in this process – a point of group-masochism is reached where all other groups become wise and faultless and self-reproach becomes the total answer. I caution the police against this danger.

164 I have made the point that discrimination is a two-way street. Those who are most active in combatting it are sometimes guilty of advocating that the police practice it. There is nothing shocking in this critical observation – no group is characterized by omniscience. The fact that minorities have received intolerant and discriminatory treatment does not automatically lend justice to all of their demands. They are as prone to error as majority groups, and the wiser and calmer citizens within those groups recognize this fact. Thoughtful citizens expect the police to stand their ground when they believe they are right. They expect the police to criticize as well as be criticized. I have tried to steer a course between these extremes tonight. I have assessed the situation as forthrightly as I know how. There is always a temptation when speaking on a subject so emotion-laden as this, to skirt issues, to woo friends, rather than court truth. In my experience with the National Conference of Christians and Jews, I have never felt it necessary to compromise my honest convictions, and I did not intend to dishonor this Institute by doing so tonight. I would like to close by expressing my philosophy of citizenship, a philosophy which I humbly believe embodies the convictions of all persons and groups represented at this gathering. Good citizenship is expressed in many ways. It consists not only of bearing arms for one's country, but also of bearing truth for it. It consists not only of facing physical enemies, but also of facing spiritual enemies: Intolerance, Bigotry, and Hate. It consists not only of holding high the regimental banners, but also of holding high the banners of Duty, Faith, and Love. Although not all citizens can prove themselves on a battlefield, all can do it by the quiet and devoted living of the spirit of our country. It is sometimes more difficult to live ideals than to shed blood for them.

Chapter Eight

PARKER ON TRAFFIC Traffic Inflation: An address delivered to the Los Angeles Rotary Club, January, 1953.

Freedom on the Freeways: An address delivered at the Los Angeles Breakfast Club, July, 1953.

Public Relations and the Traffic Officer: An article published in the Municipal Motorcycle Officers of California Year Book, 1952.

Transit Inflation

It is an honor to appear here today to speak to you about the Traffic Problem, a subject which is of vital concern to all of us. In my remarks I do not intend to be critical of any group or any industry, but I am compelled to bring to your attention certain observations because it is my serious belief that the future welfare of our community is involved. The twenty-fifth floor of our City Hall is designed as an observation tower. It is a large open quadrangle which commands an impressive view of our city. On these clear January days you can see from there a tremendous sweep of land stretching from the sea to the mountains – the vast coastal plan which is Los Angeles. You can feel the electric tension of life, of the production and transportation which is transforming our community into a giant among cities. Standing there you can feel the kind of pride the ancients must have had for their Alexandria, Rome, and Athens. I wish it were possible for us to meet there at the end of the day. You would be privileged to view a scene unparalleled in all the world. You would see one-half million automobiles, a stream of steel and rubber massed on the roadways as far as your eyes can travel. Over most of the scene you would see them packed one against the other so closely that movement can hardly be discerned. You would see great six-lane freeways like swollen rivers, as sluggish as the smaller streams. And it appeared to you that Los Angeles lay inundated by some catastrophic flood, you would be near the truth. This scene is representative of what has been termed the Traffic Problem. I wish to objectively discuss that problem here today. I speak not as a partisan for any control plan, but as a policeman – a servant of the public, who during a quarter of a century of service has stood in the intersection, in the traffic analytical room, 167

168 and at the traffic staff t able. The traffic problem can be divided into two areas of conflict: 1. Collision. 2. Congestion. Automobile-collision death, injury, and property damage represents a $300,000,000 loss to Los Angeles in the last ten y ears. We have been alert to this problem since 1940, when the police department reorganized its traffic division to utilize scientific methods of accident prevention. I can say quite truthfully that from that day to this, your police department has intensively applied all of the best known techniques in the field of traffic control. The program resulted in a decrease in fatal accidents which brought Los Angeles national awards as the safest major city in the nation. In 1940 there were 33.4 street traffic deaths for 100,000 inhabitants. By 1952 that ratio had decreased to 13.5. However, it is likely that the use of fatality statistics alone has developed a false sense of traffic safety accomplishment. It has long been by belief that the traffic picture is not nearly so bright as a lowered traffic fatality rate might seem to indicate. I have consistently maintained that the rate of personal-injury accidents is superior to the fatality rate as a true index of traffic safety. I contend that any review which arbitrarily requires that an individual be dead before the city's safety rating is affected, statistically and logically evades the issue. Injury, although not as appealing to sentiment as death, often causes the greater economic loss. Viewed objectively, all injury accidents are potential fatal accident. And the fact that a combination of circumstances either spared the driver or killed him, should not influence the city's traffic safety rating. Although fatal accidents have decreased over the past ten years, the rate of injury accidents has steadily increased. In 1942, Los Angeles recorded 543 traffic accidents for each 100,000 inhabitants. By 1950 that number had increased to 803. In 1952, the year we have just closed, the rate climbed to 841 personal-injury street traffic accidents for each 100,000 inhabitants, an increase of fifty-five per cent over 1942. We are forced to conclude that the individual in this city today is more likely to become involved in a personal-injury accident than was the case ten years ago. And we have reason to suspect that this situation is not peculiar to Los Angeles but exists throughout the United States because we are

169 told that the insurance companies in the United States lost one hundred million dollars in traffic-accident insurance last year. The police have performed their task in traffic well. However, this merely substantiates the fact that the solution does not lie entirely in measures available to the police. In 1952 your police department issued citations or made arrests in 386,471 cases involving moving traffic violations. If this negative discipline imposed upon the motorist has resulted in material improvement, it is not obvious in injury-accident statistics. There is another very serious consideration in connection with this set of figures. We know that the United States is experimenting in a form of free government. This experiment has not yet been concluded – all the results are not yet in. Students of government have attempted to impress upon us, with little avail, that a nation can retain self-government only so long as the bulk of its citizens voluntarily and willingly comply with the regulations promulgated to guide their behavior. When the majority of the citizens of a nation fail or refuse to comply with established standards of behavior, when they fail to invoke self discipline, then selfgovernment is doomed to failure. History teaches us that when self-government collapses, it is followed by some form of totalitarian control. If the application of negative discipline to almost 400,000 of the people who are operating motor vehicles in this city is not sufficient to bring about safe and lawful operation of motor vehicles, then it is my contention that to go beyond this level of enforcement merely sparks the trend toward the dissolution of our freedoms. In line with the other enlightened approaches to the traffic problem, and you are familiar with the three E's – enforcement, education and engineering – let us dwell for a moment on the educational phase. The educators are to be commended for the efforts they have made to bring safety education and driver training into the schools. Although this program has not been expanded to the proportions which it should assume, some of it should have had an effect upon the students. But has this been the case? Let us look at the group that has recently graduated from our high schools to become young adults of our society and see the effect of traffic safety education. The answer lies in one

170 simple fact. If you have in your family anyone under the age of twenty-five years who operates your automobile, you pay an additional premium for your insurance. Let us now view the second area of traffic conflict – congestion. The economic loss due to traffic congestion is greater than the cost of traffic accidents and probably represents a greater menace to our pattern of existence. A discussion of congestion requires attention to some unique features of the city of Los Angeles: It is a city only in a political sense. It is actually an accumulation of forty-five separate jurisdictions over which people travel with little attention to artificial boundaries. It is a decentralized community, lightly populated according to big-city standards and attracting new residents at a fantastic rate. The total population of Los Angeles has increased fifty-nine per cent since 1930. Experts expect the city, presently at the two million mark, to increase to three and one third million by 1970 – only 17 years away. It exists on an automobile economy. Its communities are linked by roadways rather than by mass transit and its citizens travel almost exclusively by private vehicle at the rate of approximately one and a half persons per automobile.

Registered vehicles per mile of city street have increased sixty per cent in the last nine years. The future will bring increases in vehicle registration which will threaten and may destroy the value of the private automobile as a mode of commuter transportation. The 5,400,000 passenger vehicles registered in California last year was twelve per cent greater than previous estimates for hat year. And the experts now tell us that by 1970 there will be registered in this state, 9,250,000 vehicles. We may expect a thirty per cent increase in the next seven years, and an eighty per cent increase in the next seventeen years. Statistics indicate that five and one-half million passenger vehicles will be built in the United States in 1953. 1954 will see the highest rate of production in the history of the industry, toping the peak year of 1950. The vehicular registration rate will increase faster than population. The present rate of one car for every two and one-half persons will, by 1970, increase to one car for every two inhabitants. Furthermore, we can expect not only more cars, but greater use

171 of them. Vehicle wheel miles drive are increasing faster than registration. In Los Angeles during the past ten years, miles driven have increased seventy-nine per cent as against a sixty-two per cent increase for the number of vehicles and a thirtytwo per cent increase for population. Although these figures are given to show the paralyzing congestion the future may bring, it is also interesting to speculate on what effect the increase will have on our rising injury-accident rate. The impact of past increases in registration and wheel miles on the geometrically-rigid street networks of our business centers has resulted in congestion. We have not been able to materially increase business-district street capacity because these centers are constructed as permanent installations; they can accommodate only a given number of vehicles. On the other hand, they are the heart of the city and require a free flow of people and goods. Further congestion will result in astronomical property and business losses as owners, workers, and buyers seek markets elsewhere. In the past, police and traffic engineers have been able to partially compensate for vehicular increases through (1) stringent parking regulations, (2) off-set lanes, (3) synchronization of signals, (4) manual intersection control. In the last case, this means placing as many as four police officers at a single intersection. Today, we are approaching the limit of stop-gap devices. No amount of police efficiency can put two vehicles in the space required for one – although drivers sometimes try to do it. Traffic congestions involves the four fundamentals of traffic flow. They are time and distance, space and volume. If the time required to traverse a certain distance is unreasonably great, the system is inefficient. If the volume of traffic to be moved cannot be readily absorbed into the available space, the system is inefficient. As I read about the various measures that are being proposed to alleviate this situation, I am totally puzzled as to the effect that these measures will have upon our economy. I admit very frankly that I cannot qualify as an expert in the field of economics, but I am concerned about it and it frightens me. When an individual, in order to move from his home to his place of employment must travel as many as fifty miles a day in

172 a privately owned automobile at a cost of perhaps three dollars for transportation alone, and then finds himself faced with the problem of paying for the storage of that vehicle while he is at work, I wonder if that is the kind of economy under which we can survive. The time element alone involves frightening losses of wealth. The San Fernando Valley is an excellent example because, unfortunately, it has only one real through highway east and west, which is Ventura Boulevard. When congestion occurs on the approaches to the Cahuenga freeway, or on the freeway itself, traffic backs up nine miles. It will continue to do so until something is done to alleviate it. Have you considered the cost of the time wasted on that one street alone? A rough approximation indicates several millions of hours lost annually along that freeway approach. Multiply this by the many similar instances in the city and you will have some approximation of the impact of congestion on our economy. In recent years, Los Angeles has often boasted the highest cost-of-living index in the United States. Why? It certainly is not because we are faced with the weather problems of the East where huge sums must be expended for heating and light. The answer, in my humble and inexpert opinion, is transportation. Everything we wear and everything we buy contains within the purchase price a large portion for moving that commodity from the manufacturer to the retailer. A very good example of that was brought to my attention at this table when I spoke to the Western Growers Association. Their president, Mr. Park, told me that he ships leafy produce from his ranch at Buellton, which is just north of Santa Barbara, to New York City by truck. He stated, "Believe it or not, it costs just as much to move that produce from the truck terminals in New York City to the retailer as it costs to move it from my ranch in Buellton to New York City." This is just another example of the costs of congestion. We are presently attempting to solve our traffic problem by constructing a giant freeway system in Los Angeles and vicinity. I should like to make it clear that I am not opposed to freeways. However, I am opposed to the promotion of them as a total and final solution to the traffic problem. I should like to point out a few facts about them, not to discredit the excellent planning and

173 design which has gone into them, but to seek to learn by errors we may have made. I will not give figures to show the cost of construction. It may well be that several million dollars per mile is not an exorbitant cost when measured against their effective life. However, they do involve a secondary cost not popularly realized. Every foot of land that is taken for a freeway goes off the tax roll. The giant intersection where our present system comes together near Sunset and Figueroa, occupies eighty acres of land which formerly produced taxes for the support of government. In other words, as land is taken, in addition to the acquisition costs, no longer does it help support government but becomes an expense to government. This expense includes maintenance of the roadways as well as the beautification of the borders. An equally serious error has been the failure to include, along the center strip of constructed freeways, sufficient space for the eventual construction of rapid transportation. I realize that it was an apparently insolvable situation, but it was a serious error for which we shall pay dearly for many years to come. I would someday like to see our outstanding economists become interested in this problem. I would like to know, as you would like to know, whether or not it will be economically possible to build freeways and the adjacent roadway networks, as rapidly as we are increasing the demand for their use. It appears certain to me that if we have congestion in this state today with 5,400,000 vehicles, then it will become infinitely worse as we nearly double that number of vehicles in the next seventeen years. If we are to keep congestion just at the level which exists today, we are going to have to almost double the complete road network of the state of California by 1970. And I ask you, can we afford it? I cannot answer that question. I hope some economist will. Even if it is possible for freeways to keep pace with automobile use, they will paralyze central business districts by the quantities of vehicles which are funneled there. It is well and good to get onto a freeway, and I enjoy moving rapidly from one part of the city to the other as much as you do, but we must realize that vehicles have to leave the freeway at some point. The argument that freeways are interconnecting and will by-pass central traffic districts is not valid in Los Angeles. Peak-hour traffic is commuter

174 traffic, with the business district as its terminal. Neither is the argument that freeways work in New York City and similar areas valid here. New York is a city on iron rails, not rubber tires. The by-pass traffic theory works there due to sufficient rapid mass transit facilities for commuters. Freeways must be balanced with mass transit facilities. It is folly to perpetuate and encourage the extension of automobile transportation if its ultimate inadequacy will result in economic ruin. The private automobile is a mechanically inefficient mode of transportation. It is a physically dangerous mode of transportation. Automobiles require up to three hundred square feet for parking. Seven hundred acres, more than one square mile, are required to park every 100,000 vehicles. This in areas where land often sells by the foot. Further, each car requires nearly 1,000 feet of space for free movement. Compare this with the few square feet required by the individual commuting on rapid transit, and the complete lack of parking space requirements. During the past week two experienced civic leaders have directed public attention to the inherent limitations of the freeway system. First, Mr. Harry Morrison, General Manager of the Downtown Businessmen's Association, called for more freeways, plus adequate mass transit. Colonel William M. Spencer, Chairman of the Chicago Planning Commission, after an inspection of our freeways stated, "Freeways are not the ultimate answer to the traffic problem. The ultimate answer is in mass transportation." Again I ask the question, have we reached the point of diminishing returns in our current transportation system? Yes, we must have freeways, but they must be regarded as a part of the plan rather than as a panacea in themselves. Los Angeles must have the courage, the vision, and the faith in its future, to meet the traffic problem before the city motors itself beyond the point of no return.

Freedom on the Freeways Contrary to the experience and practice of the other large metropolitan centers of the world, the inhabitants of the Los Angeles metropolitan area have elected, by choice or necessity, to utilize the privately-owned passenger automobile as a basic means of transportation. Many years ago it became obvious to the most casual observer that the roadway network of this area could not continue to accommodate the ever-increasing number of automobiles. Volume began to exceed space, and the interminable delays due to cross current friction at intersections created a disproportion between time and distance. It was at this point that we should have planned and constructed an adequate network of mass-transportation facilities regardless of the immediate cost and the amount of subsidy involved. Due to technical difficulties this did not appear feasible to many, and we turned to roadways that would permit uninterrupted travel over substantial distances through congested areas. Thus the freeway was adapted to use in metropolitan areas. The perpetuation of a system whereby the majority of individuals move about in a densely populated metropolis at the rate of one and one-half persons per automobile challenges the laws of economics. The Los Angeles County Chamber of Commerce recently published an attractive brochure beamed at the visitor, the homeseeker, and the investor. In the section devoted to the cost of living in this area, it states in part, "Most families find expenses for heating and clothing less, but these savings are often offset by higher outlays for transportation or other items resulting from changes in the pattern of living." Freeways are expensive to build. The Estimated total cost of the Hollywood Freeway is $52,000,000 or almost $7,000,000 per mile. Since 1947 a total of $180,000,000 has been spent on Los Angeles Metropolitan area freeways, and another $600,000,000 is needed to 175

176 complete the system. Freeways produce no revenue. On the contrary, the land acquired for freeway construction is eliminated from the tax rolls. There are continuing costs for roadway maintenance and border beautification. In the beginning, freeway travel proved a delight to the inhibited motorist. Crowded rural highways on weekends proved vexing and frustrating to the motorist who desired the experience of thrill through motion. But here was a new opportunity. While traveling to and from his place of employment the commuter could interpret the true significance of the speedometer that was built to register up to 120 miles per hour. Here was an opportunity to give full display to the vastly increased horsepower built into the engine of his car. This new birth of freedom was short-lived. Congestion began to appear. Volume counts indicate 120,000 automotive units traversing the Cahuenga and the Hollywood freeways during a twenty-four hour period. A passenger train has but one engineer who is highly trained, deftly skilled, and subject to regulations that he thoroughly understands and that are rigidly enforced. The conveyance he operates is restricted to steel rails from which he cannot depart. In freeway traffic, each automobile driver is his own engineer. He may set his speed to suit his own fancy. He may roam from lane to lane as he attempts to compensate for the varied speeds adopted by h is fellow engineers on the freeway. All too frequently he will come into contact with the self-appointed enforcer who has decided his rate of speed is adequate for all, and his presence in the lane of his choosing will require all of those to his rear to conform. Our freeway engineer is limited in his area of movement to the side walls of the freeway which prove an insurmountable barrier when stagnation occurs ahead. He is also subject to the barrier of physical laws which he does not generally understand, and he is amazed when he becomes involved in a multiple-car collision of accordion proportions because a sudden cessation of movement ahead does not give him time to react and machanically bring his vehicle to a safe halt. As the bulk of freeway users are in reality commuters and not cross-country travelers, it is necessary they enter and leave the freeways at points of congestion. While entering the freeway from

177 an access road many of our commuting engineers fail to realize that they must enter a traffic lane already occupied by a steady stream of fast-moving traffic, and that two bodies cannot occupy the same space at the same time. The modern Casey Jones is also puzzled at the inevitable congestion ahead of him on the outlet he must use to leave the freeway. He is simply back into the world of frictional cross currents, and, while he has previously been afforded uninterrupted use of the roadway, this privilege has been reduced to half-of-the-time use of the intersection ahead. As the tempo of freeway movement increases, the more conservative soul finds himself compelled to adopt the pace and thus undergoes a terrifying and nerve-wracking experience on each occasion. A sound technician currently employed in Hollywood recently told me that he is selling his home in the Valley because he can no longer suffer the nervous tension resulting from driving the Cahuenga Freeway. There is one other barrier to complete freedom of action on the freeways, and that is the police officer. Voluntary compliance with motor vehicle regulations would make his work easier and all of our lives more pleasant. This lack of voluntary compliance is evidenced by the fact that the Los Angeles Police Department has issued 262,651 traffic citations for moving violations during the period from January 1 to July 20, 1953. The freeways present difficult problems to the enforcement officer. The speed and volume of the traffic present an unusual hazard to the officer, and many times it is impossible to separate the violator from the other traffic with safety until he has actually left the freeway. To attempt to shepherd the slow drier in the wrong lane to a place of safety without causing a collision with the parallel traffic, presents complications. Perhaps the greatest hurdle to adequate enforcement of speed regulations is the proper determination of what is an unlawful speed. We continue to be governed by archaic regulations known as the prima facie speed law. It is the sense of this law that speeds in excess of the posted speed limit are not necessarily unlawful unless it is established that the speed endangers the safety of persons or property. While it is lawful for a police officer to issue a traffic citation to anyone who drives at a speed greater than the

178 prima facie speed limit, in theory the defendant may establish by competent evidence that the alleged excessive speed was not in fact a violation of the basic speed law. In reality, it is incumbent upon the citing officer to establish the unsafe character of the speed as well as the excess over and above the prima facie speed limit. The situation is well exemplified on those streets where the posted signs indicate a speed limit of twenty-five miles per hour and additional signs state "signals set for thirty-two miles per hour." Many times it becomes a conflict of judgment between the driver and the police officer. On one hand, the alleged violator can conscientiously believe that his speed, although in excess of the prima facie limit, was not actually a violation of the basic speed law. On the other hand, it is the considered judgment of the police officer that the rate of speed was unsafe for the conditions prevailing at the time. In the light of this type of complicated statute, it may be alleged in good faith that speeds in excess of fifty-five miles per hour under certain conditions upon our freeways are not in violation of the basic speed law, and therefore are not illegal speeds. It is my serious contention that the time has come when the traffic pattern in the State of California demands a repeal of the prima facie speed law and the institution of maximum fixed speed limits. In regard to the current enforcement operation on the freeways, a judge of the traffic court and responsible authorities in the police department have concluded that any speed greater than fifty-five miles per hour on the freeways are in fact excessive and are a violation of the basic speed law. At a time when there were fewer automobiles traversing the roadways of California, one could more readily understand a basis for flexibility in the application of speed limits to defined areas; but today our highways and roadways reflect a picture of almost constant congestion. Recently, Dr. Amos E. Neyhard, Administrative Director of the Institute of Public Safety at Pennsylvania State College, called attention to the fact that there are 53,300,000 vehicles registered in the United States and attempting to operate on a network of roads adequate for only 30,000,000 vehicles. As of June 1, 1953, there were about five and one-half million vehicles registered in the State of California alone.

179 In my humble opinion, we have reached the point where it is imperative that maximum fixed speed limits be established throughout the State of California and that no deviation be permitted therefrom. A friend of mine has stated to me that he considers the privilege of operating a motor vehicle one of his greatest privileges as an American. Emphasis here is upon the word "privilege." Our courts have long since established that the operation of a motor vehicle is a privilege and not a matter of right. Freedom to move in traffic is relative and not absolute. We must temper our conduct in order that society as a whole may be protected. Much of the trouble we have experienced on our freeways is due to an exaggerated sense of freedom on the part of the users thereof. We must be restricted individually in order that there may be freedom for all. If the latitude of the prima facie speed law is eliminated, and our drivers learn to respect, in the absolute, maximum fixed speed laws and conform to that pattern of behavior, some of the problems in traffic that beset us today will be eliminated.

Public Relations and the Traffic Officer "The greatest stumbling block to good public relations!" A number of leaders in the police field have placed this label on traffic enforcement. They have said that the task of traffic officer is inalterably negative in nature. They have said that the "speed cop" fear complex is inalterably ingrained in the American motorist. And they have concluded that, so long as the motorist violates traffic laws and the police enforce them, little can be done about the problem. Without any doubt, these are compelling views. American individualism promotes strong feelings about personal liberty, and the traffic citation runs counter to most of those feelings. The average driver believes that the traffic statutes have no moral basis; therefore he does nothing really "wrong" if he occasionally violates them. If apprehended he feels, and with some justification, that he has been singled out and that there are probably drivers more careless and dangerous who should occupy the officer's attention. The motorist's attitude is one of an honest citizen discovered in a minor error of judgment. He concludes, and again with some justification, "no one can drive without occasionally breaking a traffic law." Faced with this problem, many police departments have seen only one answer – hold traffic law enforcement to a bare minimum and counter its effects with an aggressive public relations program. In other words, they have accepted the view that traffic law enforcement and public relations represent the opposite extremes of getting along with the public. Is this necessarily true? Must the traffic officer's duties invariably result in poor public relations? During the past few years, a number of police departments have challenged the traditional belief. These new voices have maintained that it is possible to do a good job of traffic law enforcement – and make the public like it. 180

181 The new school of thought began to gather strength in the early forties. Alert police administrators noticed that certain traffic officers achieved consistent success in avoiding the antagonism which plagued other officers. In many cases, these officers averaged written commendations against complaints on a ratio as high as twenty to one – and at the same time issued more citations than the norm for the squad. Close examination revealed these successful officers to be consciously or subconsciously using accepted techniques of "salesmanship." Their methods were similar to those practiced in private industry. In other words, they were adapting principles of human relations to their police task. Further scrutiny revealed these successful traffic officers to have high "boiling points." Their anger could not be easily provoked. Most of them rated high on emotional maturity tests. They approached their work in a philosophical manner. Regardless of the violation or the personality of the motorist, they avoided personal issues. Strangely enough those officers with high or even strict ethical standards got along better with drivers than those officers whose attitudes fluctuated. In general, they "called them as they saw them" regardless of political, social, or other considerations. Their success was not based upon hand-shaking, a soft attitude, or failure to do the job. It became apparent that the traffic officers with good public relations techniques had many things in common. In other words, they could be recognized as a "type." Noting this, a few administrators began to believe that most of the irritation and antagonism traditionally associated with the traffic citation might be avoided. It was possible that the problem could be attributed as much to clumsy police methods as to the system itself. If some officers could cite violators and maintain an atmosphere of mutual respect, why couldn't other officers be selected or trained to accomplish as much? It was a good question. But it could not be answered on a theoretical level. No one could deny that traffic enforcement was hard work, physically and emotionally. It was possible that the desired type of officer was extremely rare, and sufficient numbers could not be recruited from other police tasks. It was possible that

182 the successful officers were "born diplomats," and that those necessary qualities could not be taught and learned. Yet, the potentialities made it worth a fair trial. If the traffic officer could be made a potent public relations tool, public interest in police problems would quicken and more rapid professional progress would be possible. During the early forties, Los Angeles became the test center for this new school of thought. It was not because that city had any monopoly on creative police thinking. Rather, it was because the Los Angeles traffic problem was seriously taxing the efforts of the police and the patience of the public. Congestion, delay, and danger in traffic were rubbing driver-nerves raw. The added friction of oldfashioned enforcement was threatening the delicate balance of public support upon which all police work depends. Something had to be done. Reduced traffic enforcement was unthinkable. Death and injury rates were the highest of any comparable city. At the same time, the police department would face an alarmingly hostile public if every citation continued to build up the level of public resentment. The Los Angeles program was based upon military, government, and industrial experience. Basically, it was a process of selection, training, and control. The first task was to determine the intelligence level, emotional make-up, physical and other requirements most ideal for the traffic officer. Police records were studied and minimum qualifications were drawn up. Although it was recognized that available human-measurement tests were subject to much error, at least a s tarting point could be established. Next, a well-rounded training program was devised. It was not just a motorcycle riding school. Although safe-riding techniques remained a paramount concern, equal attention was devoted to the psychology of the driver, the theory and aims of scientific control, "salesmanship," and the elements of traffic law. The course was designed to be physically and mentally difficult. As high as thirty per cent of the class were expected to "flunk out," a screening which supplemented the selective aspects of the written examinations. Finally, to guarantee continuing proper attitudes and methods after graduation, an in-service training program was adopted.

183 Supervisors were selected as carefully as the officers. Efforts were made to keep squad espirit de corps high. It would be pleasant to report that conditions changed immediately – that accidents dropped sharply and the motorcycle squad became the most popular group of young men in the city. Of course, things did not happen quite that way. Mistakes in selection and training were made, some of them serious. Ingrained attitudes were slow to change. Some old-timers regarded the changes with suspicion. Oddly enough, some motorists seemed to resent the new police attitude. One driver complained he expected a "bawling out" and the policeman who failed to give it was neglecting his duty. One newspaper editorialized that if the police became "popular," it was strong evidence that a poor job was being done. Opponents of the plan criticized the time and money "lost" in selection and training. It is to the credit of police leaders in Los Angeles and other test cities that a lack of immediate and overwhelming success did not discourage them. As quickly as errors in selection were discovered, they were corrected. Examinations and testing devices were improved. Weaknesses in the training program were remedied as they became evident. All of the returns are not yet in. Further improvements will be made by a new generation of administrators. If police progress continues, an increasingly higher standard of recruit will be attracted to this public service. Improved testing devices will be found. Traffic statutes, long in need of careful revision, may be corrected to ease the job of the traffic officer. Driver training and public education may create an improved public attitude, taking some of the burden off the enforcement officer. However, the test period is over. The role of the traffic officer as a positive public-relations factor is no longer an experiment – it has become policy. Although results from individual officers still vary considerably, the net result has been drastic changes in both public and police attitudes. Late years have seen mass reaction to traffic control swing from smarting resentment to an appreciation of its necessity. Not only has this simplified the task of traffic control, but it has markedly eased the performance of other police tasks. The police and the public, once separated by a sea of

184 hostility, have seen the waters slowly recede until they stand on nearly the same ground. While complete credit for this welcome change can be granted to no single group, the traffic officer has overcome tremendous obstacles to lead the way. If this advance is continued, and if his associates in other divisions of law enforcement will follow, the professional goals of the American police service will come within reach during our generation.

Chapter Nine

PARKER ON POLICE ADMINISTRATION The Police Challenge in Our Great Cities: An article published in The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Philadelphia, January, 1954

The Police Challenge in Our Great Cities

It would be difficult to devise a combination of factors more conducive to crime and disorder than is found in the typical great city of the United States. Rarely does history record so many people of varied beliefs and modes of conduct grouped together in so competitive and complex a social structure. The confusing variety of religious and political creeds, national origins, and diverse cultures is matched only by the extremes of ideals, emotions, and conduct found in the individual. Although proud of their independence, these people live so interdependently that food, shelter, and even their very movement on the streets require delicately balanced cooperation. Although sharing a tradition of individual liberty, their activities are regulated by the greatest and most complicated concentration of laws to be found anywhere. Charged with maintaining this precarious order by enforcing this confusion of laws is the city police department. Although this would prove a difficult task under ideal conditions, it is aggravated by unusual factors. The police function is rarely considered by the members of the electorate to be a vital element of their life together. Further, its past operation is one of alternating inefficiency, corruption, and brutality. As a result, the individual police officer operates with a remarkable lack of public support, cooperation, or trust. Although this past is a legacy from corrupt political machines erected and supported by the people themselves, the policeman has become a public symbol upon which the wrath for such conditions is vented. It must also be conceded that the police themselves have failed. Instead of analyzing the causes for lack of support and working toward their eventual removal, police have all too often withdrawn into a shell of "minorityism." There has been a near-fatal inability to recognize police dependence on public opinion, and 187

188 the result has been great tuggings at bootstraps without appreciable elevation.

Increased Interest Manifest This is the "police problem" that has characterized every major American city in the past and complicates the administration of most police departments today. Yet there are indications that at least some factors are changing. The last few years have seen a great upsurge of attention to this aspect of government and, even more heartening, a growing appreciation of the vital part it plays in the affairs of men. If this rising tide of interest can be sustained, the professional police services our country so critically needs may, within our lifetime, be planned and their foundations laid. It is inevitable that the police of our great cities will be thrust into leadership in this reformation. The reason is not that size alone attracts superior personnel or confers any monopoly on creative thinking. Rather, it is because the weaknesses of our system are more apparent there. Urban life concentrates and multiplies law enforcement problems. Police inefficiencies which may go nearly unnoticed in the relatively stable pattern of rural life are cast into prominence and grave import by the fast-paced social and economic turmoil of the larger cities. Million-dollar budgets, strangling traffic congestion, and lucrative markets for organized crime make for spectacular police failures. It is here that the public outcry is heard first and loudest, and it is here that sheer necessity puts law enforcement to its crucial test.

The Basis for Improvement Despite the most aggressive and enlightened leadership, law enforcement cannot rise above the level set by the electorate. A condition precedent to the establishment of efficient, professional law enforcement in a community is a desire and a demand on the part of the residents for that type of service. In this respect, law enforcement does not differ greatly from private industry. The one factor which predetermines the success of any business is the market. Unless the ultimate recipient of a product or service is convinced that he requires it, the most skillful organization and techniques are wasted.

189 A second lesson the police administrator can draw from industry is that markets are created. They seldom spring full-blown from the unshaped desires of the people. The vital elements of civilized life, including our most sacred institutions, at one time or another have been laboriously sold to the people. In this respect, it is heartening that unreceptiveness is not one of the faults of Americans. They respond quickly to new ideas, and peculiarly relish being proved wrong. Despite opinion to the contrary, they respond to large ideas as well as to the small and trivial. They buy comic books, but they also make best sellers of works on art, philosophy, and religion. This is of tremendous importance to the police administrator, because the ideas and ideals he must sell are not trivial ones. The police administrator's first step toward professionalism must be to introduce to the public a fact which is elemental to every society. This fact is, the police function is a basic component of man's government by man which has determined the character and permanence of every social structure since human beings first sought collective security. In the face of the extremes of conduct possible in human affairs, we manage to exist only because we set up and enforce certain limits of conduct. These rules or laws are promulgated, not because men agree on attitudes or conduct, but because they do not agree. Thus law, an artificial standard, is necessary to mark the limits of activity beyond which society is injured. Law, standing alone, is a fiction. It achieves reality only when it is observed. The character of every society lies in its method of establishing observance, and its permanence lies in its success in securing it.

Creating Demand for Professional Law Enforcement This is not a call for the police administrator to garb himself in the robes of Socrates. It is not unlikely that if he did, he would suffer the same end. This concept, although it has a philosophical basis, is an immensely practical matter, and it can be sold to practical community leaders. Most of them are well aware of the exorbitant cost of ineffectual law enforcement. They are not entirely unfamiliar with the experience of other communities or of other nations. The creation of a market for professional law

190 enforcement is not so much the sale of a startling new concept as it is the calling to memory of some well-known facts. Immediate tangibles which will be recognized are more effective security of goods, a higher rate of recovery of stolen property, lower insurance premiums, and improved traffic conditions. A few leaders will see the broader implications of the idea, and through them the elemental thinking will be transplanted into other minds. It should be emphasized and re-emphasized that the administrator is not selling "theory." The raw facts and figures are available. The manner in which they should be presented and the relative speed with which they will be accepted depends upon his ability and the political climate of the community. Some of the methods which have ben used are narrative type annual reports, radio and television forums, pamphlets, motion picture and television films, well-trained police speakers, and written contributions to local magazines, industrial house organs, and other publications. Of even more importance is the relationship of the chief administrator with the business and professional groups of the city. Included is the press, since it is primarily a business enterprise with a stake in community welfare. It should be noted that the administrator's concern is not with the news-gathering level of the press. He is not seeking "good publicity." He is not a press agent. He is a community leader seeking the solution to one of the community's most pressing problems. His business is not with reporters, but with publishers, stockholders, and directors. As he meets with other business groups he will talk with advertisers, radio and television station owners, motion picture producers, and members of chambers of commerce and transit, banking, insurance, veterans, and other associations. Similar powerful influences of community thinking are school, religious, and inter-racial groups. This effort should not be confused with "public relations." At this point the administrator is not concerned with shaping the police organization to meet public demands. Cries for "efficiency," "honesty," and "reduction of crime" cannot be answered effectively until he creates a climate that will support the internal changes essential to those goals.

191 Unwarranted Community Services Although the principles and practices of sound organization found in many texts would seem to fit police departments large and small, their application becomes progressively more difficult with size. As the growing complexity of the great cities creates more and more varied problems, the police organization tends to subdivide and take on new tasks in an effort to cope with them. Almost invariably, the lines of demarcation between primary, support, service, and nonpolice elements of the organization become narrower and less distinguishable. Surgery is needed. At this point the wisdom of first laying a foundation of public support becomes apparent to the administrator. Every police activity, however ineffectual and costly, has public supporters who, because of selfishness or misunderstanding, will oppose its reduction or elimination. Unless the administrator has enlisted broad support, his attempts to reform the police structure will be defeated by small but vocal pressure groups. Over the years the large city departments have gathered along their flanks a peculiar assortment of public services. Although many of these are not properly police responsibilities, they tend to assume greater bulk and they drain increasing money, manpower, and energies from the basic task.

Jail operation The greatest offender in some cities is jail operation. This task consumes as much as 20 per cent of the police budget and 7 per cent of the personnel strength. It takes the time and energies of officers selected, trained, and paid to accomplish vastly more complex tasks. It encumbers police training with studies of institutional problems not remotely connected with law enforcement. It necessitates assignments in conflict with aptitudes, which often give the jail a "Siberia" connotation by which general morale is lowered and other police tasks suffer. It adds a completely unnecessary and unjustifiable element to the chief administrator's nearly impossible span of attention. Worse, the detention of sentenced prisoners by the police is a dangerous violation of the democratic theory of law enforcement. The identification of police

192 with the processes of punishment works to destroy the ideal of a nonjudging, nonpenalizing police The answer to the jail problem is not impossibly difficult. The facilities already exist. In many cities a change of management requires only administrative action. Jail personnel with suitable aptitudes should be recruited, given specialized training, and compensated at a level in keeping with the task.

Juvenile welfare Another public service attached to most large police departments is some form of juvenile welfare activity. Not to be confused with the investigation of juvenile delinquency, it is actually an attempt to treat the multiple causes of adolescent maladjustment. It takes many forms, ranging from a boys' club to complicated advisory, treatment, and referral centers for potential or actual delinquents. Often included are summer camps, gymnasiums, and clubhouses. In some instances the total cost is financed from police budgets, and in others the activity merely utilizes the services of on-duty officers. While no experienced police officer would dispute the great need for such a community program, some doubt as to its being a proper police function is justified. Many of the criticisms directed at police operation of the city jail are valid here. As long as the police are experiencing difficulty in accomplishing their primary tasks, the siphoning of men, money, and energy into social services not properly chargeable to law enforcement is difficult to rationalize. Ultimately the police must recognize that they are neither authorized nor equipped to deal with economic and social problems inherent in the prevention of crime. If they continue invading this most difficult field, they will ultimately saddle themselves with burdens so great that a single step forward will be impossible.

Various activities Other efforts which are draining police vitality are probation and parole activities, assignments of investigators to other city departments, and traffic engineering. The administrator will also find officers who have been selected and trained to enforce the

193 laws of the community performing routine duties as clerks, typists, librarians, laboratory technicians, fingerprint classifiers, and others – positions which could be filled at less expense and with greater efficiency by qualified civilians. It is safe to say that the manpower problem of the average large department is to a great extent an organizational problem, created over the years by the police themselves. Although many of these extraneous activities are the result of commendable efforts to provide needed community services, from an organizational standpoint they must be classified as deadwood. The plea that they supply good public relations is rebuttable. Failure to meet successfully the harsh requirements of fundamental police tasks cannot so easily be disguised.

Maintenance of Control Another problem to be met by administrators of large police organizations is that of maintaining full control, while at the same time reducing the span of executive attention to a workable minimum. Theoretically, it is sufficient to divide into a total of five to seven primary support and line units, headed by deputies serving also as a general staff or council. However, this plan often results in the formation of practically independent organizations which block the vertical flow of communication so vital to control. Consequently, instead of aggressively leading, the chief administrator finds himself cast in an increasingly impotent role in department affairs. The answer to this problem is not the abandoning of the principles of organization, but rather the retention of control of key activities. These are internal discipline, intelligence, public relations, vice control, and planning. The most efficient method of handling these control functions appears to consist in giving to the field forces the line responsibility to accomplish the tasks, checking and balancing their efforts through administrative divisions with both staff authority and line responsibility. Thus, for example, vice control is directly accomplished by patrol and detective forces, with an administrative vice division co-ordinating their efforts, spot checking their effectiveness and integrity, and reporting to the chief the volume and direction of vice activities throughout the city. These staff services

194 can be combined into a primary departmental unit, commanded by an administrative deputy.

Large Cities Produce Special Administrative Situations There can be little doubt that the well-established principles of administration should guide the chief of police in all but the most unusual cases. Yet certain problems peculiar to large city police organizations do not respond readily to broad generalizations. The first of these is that the department head is likely to meet is the question of an assistant chief. This position is usually created in the hope of reducing the administrative work burden. It is reasoned that an assistant chief can handle routine matters, act as a "buffer," and digest and condense information directed upwards. There is no greater fallacy in police administration. The true assistants of the chief are his council of deputies. If these commanders are not functioning, little is gained b y creating an intermediate position which obscures this fact. At best, an assistant chief accomplishes task that are properly the duties of an executive officer or adjutant; at worst, he isolates the chief from the department, takes over policy decisions without which the department head cannot be chief-in-fact, and becomes a sort of "grand vizier" to which all ranks must bow in order to have their requests granted. The chief cannot share his ultimate responsibilities. If his work burden exceeds human limits, the answer will be found in his own organizational and administrative failures.

Specialization As a police organization grows, it is inevitable that the question of specialization versus generalization will be raised. At first glance it will appear that the question has been answered by the experts who caution against "overspecialization." However, closer scrutiny will reveal no sure definition of that term. Theoretically, the size of a department should have little effect on the broad competencies of the individual police officer. He should be able to perform effectively every task he may reasonably be expected to encounter, whether he patrols the entire area of

195 Prairie Junction or a similar area and population in Chicago. This ideal has been reversed, not by the growth of cities, but by expanding police technology, which has increased at such a phenomenal rate that the ideal of complete competency has become a myth. No single officer can effectively perform in the diverse and highly technical fields which police science has created. A parallel can be found in the profession of medicine. The growth of medical science – not of cities – created its specialists. The fact that Prairie Junction will not support a group of medical specialists does not make this situation an ideal to be followed in Chicago. Carrying the parallel further, the medical profession has found that the public is best served by creating a balance of field forces (general practitioners) and specialists. This is also the answer to the police administrator's problem. His is not a task of limiting specialization, but of balancing generalists and specialists so that crime and disorder will receive treatment best fitted to reduce it. This is not an organizational problem whereby ratios are abstracted and rigidly followed. Rather, it is a question of administration devoting attention to the soundest control and work-measurement devices available.

Transfers The diverse organization of the large department also creates rotation problems. How often should personnel be transferred into new assignments? Is the public interest best served by long-term familiarity with one task or district, or by a work perspective born of varied police experience? The problem is best solved by avoiding extremes either way. An excellent key is frequent transfers of young officers, letting them perceive the breadth and intricacies of law enforcement. As they move about and test their abilities against various assignments, there is a natural tendency for them to fit into place. A word of caution – transfers easily become a crutch which supports and disguises poor leadership. The fact that individuals vegetate and fail to produce after long assignment to one job is not a sign of the efficacy of frequent transfers. Rather, it should be a sign of command and supervisory failures which should be corrected. Although some assignments will always be favored, a

196 police department should have no "corner pockets" or "Siberias." If they exist, the administrator cannot excuse his own failures by cursing the nature of mankind and using the "shake-up" as a cure. It logically follows that transfers should never be used as a disciplinary tool. There is no place in the police organization for a penal colony. There are a few exceptions to the rule that transfers should not be an arbitrarily regular procedure. Certain police tasks are highly exhausting, conducive to the production of moral callousness, or are purely educational in nature. Vice control assignments are one example. No officer should be exposed too long to this emotionally and morally fatiguing task. Another example: the rotation of first-level supervisors through the planning division and the internal discipline division is an excellent training device calling for frequent short-term assignments.

Selection of supervisors The intricate nature of the big city police department also creates problems in the selection of supervisors. Of the many systems which have been tried, strict and impartial promotion by civil service methods seems to work best. Although its inequities are obvious, they are not so conducive to corruption and destruction of morale as the practice of letting the chief administrator make his own selections. The advantages of having a leader pick supervisors with "loyal" or "compatible" attitudes may be of some importance in a political organization, but are totally out of place in professional endeavor. The only loyalty professional men owe is to the ideals of their service; loyalty to a person is warranted only in so far as that person reflects those ideals. A few administrators have great faith in their ability to choose subordinate leaders. In some cases that faith may be warranted. But such rare personal abilities must be balanced against the fact that the tenure of the chief is historically short. When he goes, his selectees and all possibility of long-term progress go with him. Few organizations can afford the frequent and conflicting changes in policy inherent in this system. At worst, the raw material presented to the chief administrator by civil service will seldom be less capable than the selections which personal error and prejudice will produce.

197 Aids to Successful Police Administration A discussion of police techniques peculiar to the larger cities should be prefaced with a word of caution: there are few greater pitfalls in police work today than the practice of adopting technique for its own sake. Due to lack of accurate work-measurement devices, such as commerce has in its profit system, administrators and other officers often go through the motions of new procedure and scientific techniques with little attention to whether or not results are forthcoming. The police administrator's attention must be keyed to results, and a great part of his energy must necessarily be devoted to the creation of improved methods of measuring them.

Planning The planning activity, intelligently executed, serves as a source both of improved techniques and of work measurement. It is one of the vital administrative controls. It should be entrusted to a staff unit under the supervision of the chief. In this unit can be included related activities which are scattered and ineffectual in many departments. These include statistical studies, crime analysis, writing of manuals and orders, forms control, and procedure surveys. The division should be manned with experienced officers and supervisors carefully selected with attention to necessary aptitudes. These men should be given considerable freedom to inspect, criticize, improvise, and recommend procedures. In this manner the organization is guaranteed a source of creative thinking without which any enterprise will stagnate. The division should be constantly aware, however, that, like all other activities, the life of the division will be determined by results produced. Moderately frequent transfers will serve to diminish "ivory tower" connotations, revitalize field thinking, and keep attention directed at current line problems. A typical activity of this division is the planning of traffic crowd control at large public gatherings. Although the majority of such events have little place in the crowded life of great cities, they are, unfortunately, common occurrences. They disrupt traffic, draw a significant amount of police strength from necessary duties, and inconvenience tens of thousands of citizens. Through studies

198 of the planning division, it is possible for the chief to present the true cost of these spectacles to the city administration and obtain regulation of the most commercial and selfish of these events. The size of the event must be closely approximated, the flow capacity of surrounding streets measured, and the points of traffic conflict established. Street and private parking facilities must be approximated and controls set up accordingly. Bypass traffic arteries must be established and protected, and transit companies alerted in time to plan use of these paths. In the congested area, first-aid routes and stations must be planned. The volume of crowds at all points must be balanced with patrol forces adequate for control. If the assembly is of such a nature that disorder may be expected, reserve forces must be placed at key points, communications planned, and field booking photography, and temporary detention facilities arranged. Occasional events will require field kitchens and rest facilities for officers, and a completely equipped command post. The final task of the planning unit is to inspect the event, measuring the accuracy of the estimates and the effectiveness of techniques used. These studios should form the basis for standby plans which can be put into effect to control the various types of emergencies that can occur in the city.

Intelligence Like planning, an intelligence division is a police activity necessary in great cities. Organized crime and subversive activity are controllable only if the department head has constant and current information of the activities of such groups. In gaining this information and maintaining necessary surveillance, the "arms length" technique will ultimately prove more effective than the establishment of "personal" relations between officers and suspects. The latter arrangement will invariably fester into a spot of corruption or prove a source of embarrassment even when capably and honestly conducted. Adequate intelligence of underworld activities is the administrator's most potent weapon against organized crime. These criminal operations are too cleverly conducted to respond to suppression by any unplanned combination of patrol and investigation.

199 Law enforcement's shockingly low arrest and conviction rate of known syndicate members bears the best evidence that traditional police techniques are not the answer to this problem. Organized crime can be reduced and stamped out by the police only when knowledge of its methods, personalities, and plans produced conviction hazards so great that operation becomes unprofitable.

Appraisal of Results It is inevitable that in a paper directed by one police officer to others, "shop talk" concerning the technology of law enforcement will consume a major share of the space. For that reason it is necessary to assess the results of hard-won improvements before closing. For a half-century police administrators in the United States have responded to the cry for better law enforcement by working to improve police techniques. In the past the telephone, the automobile, and the radio have been successively looked to as the answer to the problem of crime and disorder. During the years immediately past, sound principles of organization, supervision, selection, and training have been sought and adopted. Today's police administrators, even more advanced, are resolutely shouldering the enormous task of measuring the effect of social and economic factors on police problems. They are adapting advanced concepts of systems and procedures to law enforcement. Even the most critical observers agree that remarkable technical progress is apparent in this search for the still elusive answer. The police service has benefited greatly from this improved technology. It is probably that today, without these advances, the expanding police departments of our larger cities, faced with increasing work loads and lengthening lines of supply and communication, would be completely ineffective. Every step has been accomplished painfully and laboriously, and in the face of great difficulty. But the answer has not yet been found. Despite the technology that has been acquired through no small effort and expense, the police service today fulfills its task with no greater success than it did a quarter- or half-century ago. This is a damaging accusation, but it is susceptible of proof. As inaccurate as our statistics are, they leave little doubt that the

200 crime rate has been on the increase for the past several decades – the identical years in which the American police have shown their greatest technical progress. It is highly doubtful that our present crime rate is any lower than that which accompanied the brawling, lusty period of the nation's formation – years in which organized police protection scarcely existed. It is true that the criminal today often wears a silk glove, but the hand beneath that sleek fabric exacts no less a toll than when it was exposed and easily recognized. Our years of greatest progress, instead of limiting the volume and scope of crime, have seen it shift from a predominantly individual enterprise against society to a system of huge and powerful cartels that control not only cities, but entire sates of this Union. Indeed, our most accurate crime statistics indicate that crime rates rise and fall on the tides of economic, social, and political cycles with embarrassingly little attention to the most determined efforts of our police.

Where the Answer Lies The purpose of this exposition is not to condemn the systemization and perfection of procedures, but to question whether the answer lies in that direction. It is not suggested that continuous effort toward refinement of techniques should cease, but it is suggested that since methodology has not yet produced significant results, the problem may have its deepest roots in causes other than police performance. Those causes have been suggested here. To blame police failures on the police themselves is to confuse cause with effect. Law enforcement is totally dependent upon the public for its life, its strength, and its effectiveness. It can no more divorce itself from the electorate and seek growth alone than a plant can divorce itself from the soil that bears and feeds it. However critical the need may be for professional law enforcement, it will not come into being until the public itself recognizes that need. If this belief be true, it holds an answer to the police problem.

Chapter Ten

PARKER TO THE CITIZENS Progress Report: August 9, 1050 to January 1, 1953, submitted to the Board of Police Commissioners, Los Angeles, January, 1953.

Juvenile Crime and the Police: Response to questions of the Los Angeles City Council concerning a juvenile gang attack on a citizen in downtown Los Angeles which resulted in his death. December, 1953.

The Rehabilitation Center: Excerpts from an address entitled "The March of Crime" delivered at the Ebell Club Assembly Dinner, March, 1956.

Progress Report – August 9, 1950 to January 1, 1953

On August 9, 1950, I assumed the duties and responsibilities of Chief of Police of our city. In addition to swearing a solemn oath of office, I promised the citizens of Los Angeles that we would strive to build and maintain the most efficient police department in the city's history. Today, twenty-nine months later, I should like to give an accounting of the stewardship of that trust and to speak of things which lie ahead. By way of preface, it should surprise no one that police work at all levels is difficult work. Unlike private industry, the police do not work with tangible products which can be cleverly fashioned and neatly boxed. They toil in the field of human behavior, a cosmic riddle which mortal man has never solved. Neither the police nor any other human agency can completely understand or fully control the processes by which honest men become thieves, by which intelligent men turn to prejudice and hate, or by which crime periodically sweeps over every community like an evil tide. Neither the police nor any other human agency can fully understand or prevent the petty failures which turn wet with blood our traffic ways as normally prudent citizens plunge their automobiles into headlong defiance of the laws of physics and of man. The police not only deal with the riddle of human behavior; they are themselves sometimes victims of it. If, by virtue of their uniform, the police were always just, forever incorruptible, and completely efficient, then this report would be a simple one. Unfortunately, they are merely human beings in uniform, as prone to fallibility as the citizenry from which they were carefully selected by Civil Service. I have conceived it my task to organize, train, and supervise your police department to constrain that human fallibility so that it would have a minimum effect upon our assigned tasks. 203

204 To do this, changes have been necessary in police organization, in police techniques, and in the underlying philosophy which directs police endeavor. Twenty-nine months is a short time when measured against the eighty-three years' existence of your police department. All that some day may be done could not be accomplished in that brief period. However, there are many changes to report. I am confident they will indicate that the promise has been kept and that Los Angeles has passed over the threshold of a brave experiment in professional law enforcement.

National Attention Police progress here has not occurred without considerable attention. The Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce publicly commended the department for "exceptional efficiency" in a citation presented August 9, 1951. The Honorable Estes Kefauver, during his national investigation of crime and corruption, noted that this menace did not extend across the boundaries of the City of Los Angeles. O.W. Wilson, an outstanding authority in the field of police administration who has actually visited here to study the department, has consistently proclaimed it "the best large department in the country." The Federal Government has repeatedly used Los Angeles as a training ground in democratic police procedures for law enforcement officers from occupied Germany and Japan.

Political Control By far the most important factor in police progress is the fact that the department has remained consistently free from partisan political control. The City Administration has been alert to the terrible danger a captive police department would represent to the people of our city. Almost alone among the great cities of this nation, the Los Angeles police officer has been free to do his job with full impartiality, owing responsibility only to the people, the courts, and duly constituted police authority. There are no "hidden bosses," there is no "privileged class," there are no "fixes." From the lowly traffic citation to the felony indictment, each citizen must face enforcement of the law of our land on an equal basis.

205 Manpower Police manpower has been an acute problem during the period of this report. In August 1950, this office had 4,427 officers available to deploy over the city. As of this date, the number has dropped to 4,152. This loss of 275 policemen has taken place during a period in which the city has increased by approximately 128,000 residents. By area, Los Angeles police strength presently measures nine policemen per square mile as compared with fifty-one for New York, thirty-four for Chicago, thirty-two for Philadelphia and thirty for Detroit. The causes of decreasing manpower are well known. Nearly three-fourths of your policemen are veterans of military service, most of them eligible for reserve duty. As a result, a total of 221 officers have been called to active service in Korea. In addition, a combination of draft call and higher salaries available in private industry has greatly reduced the number of potential condidates. Finally, harsh working conditions, physical danger, and the tendency of some to group all policemen into a single category and condemn them all for the errors of a few, greatly reduce the attractiveness of the job to young men.

Office Staff Replacement Despite fewer policemen, Los Angeles today receives better police protection than at any other time in its history. One way of accomplishing this was the replacement of officers employed in clerical tasks with civilian employees. During 1951 and 1952 approximately 109 officers in this manner were released to field duty.

One-Man Patrol Cars In 1951, experiments indicated one-man patrol cars could supplant traditional two-man units in certain areas of the city. This system greatly extends available manpower. Careful retraining of officers has minimized risks involved and allowed us to put these units on the street in several police divisions. One-man patrol experience over the past year is presently being evaluated, and it appears likely that it can be expanded with still greater savings in manpower and consequent improved patrol coverage.

206 Visual Patrol A comparison of the efficiency of marked and unmarked patrol vehicles was conducted during the period of this report. The results indicated that clearly marked black and white police vehicles give the public greater opportunity to make use of law enforcement services and have a marked repressive effect on traffic violators and petty criminals. As a result, your police department has adopted the policy that uniformed officers will patrol in black and white automobiles. Non-uniform officers will continue to use unmarked vehicles necessary to investigation and surveillance. To minimize repainting costs, change-over is being conducted on a normal vehiclereplacement basis.

Paperwork It is obvious that every hour spent by the officer at the report desk is an hour lost to field police work. Further, every error caused by poorly designed and inefficient report forms multiplies this loss of man-hours. Your police department must not be submerged in the mass of paperwork, nearly one million reports annually, necessary to law enforcement here. In September, 1950, the department was burdened with over 700 report forms, many of them cumbersome and inefficient. Since that time, sixty-three outdated forms have been cancelled and 155 old forms have been completely redesigned to reduce reporting, typing, and filing time by approximately thirty-five per cent. In addition, portable voice writers have been introduced at report desks. This transcribing device allows officers to quickly record several reports on one disc and return to field duty. These recordings are later transmitted to paper by civilian typists.

Police Planning In 1951 there was established a Planning and Research Division with the primary task of evaluating successes and failures in all aspects of police work. After analysis, this division recommends improved methods. By means of this selfcriticism, we have accomplished the following: 1. Reduced entry processing time of prisoners into the City

207 Jail, resulting in annual savings equal to the entire cost of the Planning and Research Division. 2. Redesigned police patrol districts to follow boundaries of government census tracts. This change will allow us to make future studies of crime conditions in specific communities with exact knowledge of population, economic, and social conditions. A long-range effort, this project will provide us with greatly needed facts to guide our juvenile delinquency and other crime prevention programs. 3. Instituted radically improved methods of crime analysis which give field officers speedy and exact knowledge of criminal personalities, methods, and conditions in their assigned districts. 4. Developed a completely new system of police manuals, bringing to each officer the latest technical information necessary to the efficient performance of his duties. 5. Instituted continuous study of the distribution of crime over the city's area, a program which enables supervisors to assign field officers in the proper area at the proper time to secure maximum results against specific crimes.

Recruitment and Training High standards of recruitment and training have been maintained despite the pressure induced by manpower shortages. Cadet training has been maintained at a thirteen-week level as compared with a six-week course common before 1950. Psychological testing of officers has been an important phase of the training program. During the period of this report, all new officers have received emotional maturity tests prior to academy graduation. Because such tests do not represent an exact science, we have been engaged since 1950 in a program of evaluating their accuracy in predicting future behavior. Recently, the professional services of a psychiatrist have been made available to us, a factor which will improve the accuracy of these examinations.

Integrity Little known is the fact that an entire administrative division of the police department devotes its time exclusively to investigating complaints against policemen. During the 29 months in question,

208 they have averaged 905 investigations per year, 28 per cent of which were sustained and resulted in disciplinary action. The citizen evaluating these figures must recognize that the life of the policeman is severely regulated compared to that of the private citizen. The bulk of these penalties represent breaches of department regulations rather than actual violations of law. Total offenses involving dishonesty, abuse of civil rights, or excessive force, averaged only .004 per cent of department strength during 1951 and 1952. It should be borne in mind that the amount of publicity springing from police error is no sure indication of its prevelancy. Cases of individual culpability have been found during the months in question as indeed will always be the case in any group of over four thousand humans. However, it is a fact that not even the severest critics of your police department have found any evidence of organized dishonesty or tolerated abuse of regulatory powers. An overwhelming majority of Los Angeles policemen are deeply devoted to the high ethical and moral principles upon which rest our concepts of democratic police service. With the cooperation of an informed citizenry, we will keep those majority convictions as near unanimity as is possible in a human agency.

Crime Organized crime finds it increasingly difficult to operate here. The syndicate member, whether prostitute, bookmaker, or

209 professional murderer, cannot purchase immunity in Los Angeles. The criminal operating here does so at immediate and constant peril to his freedom. Crime rates here, although fluctuating in response to social and economic factors over which the police have relatively little control, have remained consistently below the national average for cities of comparable size.

Traffic The twenty-nine months in question have seen Los Angeles increase by 128,000 population and 60,000 registered vehicles without proportionate increase in streets and mass transit. Spiraling congestion and traffic death rates have been prevented only by extreme traffic-control measures. Although not conducive to police popularity, these measures have purchased time in which the city's critical transportation problem may be solved. Further, despite the severity of the problem, traffic death here has been kept at less than one-half of the rate prevailing ten years ago.

Narcotics The growing narcotic menace was attacked in May, 1951, by the use of specially trained Juvenile Narcotics Officers whose work supplements that of the twenty-nine man Narcotics Division, rated by the Commissioner of the United States Bureau of Narcotics as the nation's finest. In January, 1952, a comprehensive study of the menace was prepared in booklet form and widely distributed to the adult segment of our community. This study was later adopted by the Board of Education as a basis for an accelerated program of preventive education.

Rehabilitation and Corrections During 1952, your department conducted studies of city jail efficiency which enabled it to increase housing and feeding potential there by twenty-five per cent. At the same time, police manpower required at the city jail was reduced twenty-two per cent. This resulted in seventy officers being transferred to field duty at an annual saving of approximately $325,000. Construction of a 588-acre Rehabilitation Center designed for

210 the physical and mental treatment of alcoholics was begun in 1952. Necessitated by a near doubling of average daily jail population during the past five years, this progressive move will reduce per capita confinement costs and provide a solution to the city's growing alcoholic problem (six out of every ten misdemeanor arrests). In addition, work therapy in the nature of farming activities will provide a substantial portion of all city jail diets with resultant savings of tax dollars.

Community Affairs In the past twenty-nine months many community problems involving crime or traffic have become matters of public debate. In our democracy, such debate is the raw material wherefrom opinion is molded and our laws conceived. I have believed it the duty of the Chief of Police to draw upon the experience of the police department in order to speak out openly where questions of order and public safety were concerned. During the period of this report, I have spoken out against legalizing gambling in its many fraudulent guises. I have opposed measures which might promote the infiltration of organized crime into our community. Although I have acted decisively against breaches of police discipline, I have as quickly spoken out against measures which would make the policeman a "whipping boy" for the ills of society. I have outlined the dangers of traffic paralysis represented by our controlled automobile economy, and have objectively pointed out the limitations of our already outmoded freeway system.

1953 City Election The result of these aggressive stands on questions affecting public safety is a belief in some quarters that I aspire to elective office this spring. It is not possible to give twenty-six years of service to a community without feeling genuinely honored by such mention. At the same time, it is distressing to note that words and actions given unselfishly and without partisan design should be construed by some to be tools of political ambition. It is my belief that in matters affecting his profession, a man is duty bound to enter the

211 arena of democratic debate. I cannot believe that cynicism has so permeated our thinking that the open discussion of public questions must be left to those who seek personal or partisan advantage. I am not a candidate for elective office in 1953. If I have ambition to contribute further service to our city, it is best offered in the field to which I have devoted the major portion of my life. It is the duty of the police to protect the lives and property of the citizens of Los Angeles. I cannot conceive of honest men either directing or influencing the directing of this task for selfish purpose. This courageous and worthwhile experiment in professional law enforcement is too precious to be destroyed for transient advantage. It is my earnest hope that this coming election will be conducted on a plane sufficiently high to allow this difficult but immensely rewarding progress to continue.

Juvenile Crime and the Police You have asked me a number of questions. I hope I can satisfactorily answer them. The first question you asked concerns the depletion of the police force. Numerically speaking, there are fewer policemen in the City of Los Angeles today than there were when I was appointed Chief of Police in August, 1950. This has occurred despite the fact that civil service examinations have been given repeatedly and we have exhausted every resulting eligible list. In an attempt to remedy this situation, we have established extensive recruiting programs. We have prepared brochures which are handed out at the Separation Centers of the Armed Forces. We have directed information at the students in our colleges. We have prepared recruiting films. In the last instance, we have even used Jack Webb as the commentator, hoping to give some glamour to the police service. We have also made changes in certain job requirements. For example, we no longer require a high school diploma if the applicant can pass an educational background test. The Civil Service Department conducts police examinations in any part of the United States where there are sufficient applicants. We are now allowing nineteen year old boys to take the examination, securing their interest while they are still searching for a place in the economic field. At the age of twentyone, if they are still able to meet our requirements, we will accept them for police service. Of course, we will not be able to obtain this manpower for a couple of years. One the medical side, we are accepting applicants with corrective physical defects. A question has been asked about I.Q. requirements. The I.Q. level of the Police Department is about 110, roughly the college entrance average. A policeman's job has become so complex that if we ever drop below that level we will be in serious trouble. 212

213 Persons who do not possess that degree of intelligence cannot cope with the complex tasks which are thrust upon policemen today. The decline of police man power is not solely a Los Angeles problem. I was in New York City recently, talking with the Commissioner of Police and his chief officers. They have an almost identical problem. New York City has a thousand vacancies in its police department. There are many factors involved in this country-wide problem of insufficient police man power. As far as the question of pay is involved, there is little doubt that the more money you offer people the better your chances of obtaining their services. But in my responsibility as General Manager of the police department I have taken the position that the matter of salaries rests with the City Council and the Mayor. During my twenty-seven years service I have come to the firm belief that the treatment which has been afforded the police in America is at least partially responsible for the current problem. This conviction is shared by growing numbers of police administrators. Too often it is the vogue to attack the police upon the slightest provocation, blaming them for the ills of society. The result has been to make the police service so unpopular that, in many cases, the person who is intelligent enough to be a police officer is too intelligent to take the job. Society, for its own preservation, is going to have to begin treating its police quite differently. I read on the front page of a newspaper yesterday a very emotional editorial, asking us to prevent crime by using "clubs and mailed fists." I couldn't help but remember the thirty-two men disciplined just two years ago for an incident known as "Bloody Christmas." I thought perhaps the author of that editorial should go up to the penitentiary and talk to those policemen that are in there now because they became emotional and did things that this editorial urged be done. If that writer will look at the facts he will discover that the police department is not today an emotional organization. We are a group that is limited by the very laws that we enforce. It is a strange commentary that during the same week in which we are celebrating the Bill of Rights, some people are

214 advocating lawlessness on the part of the police in disregard of constitutional rights. Now let us discuss the case which precipitated this inquiry. We have identified several young men who were involved. Frankly, it seems amazing to me that we were so quickly able to determine who they were, and yet no one seems to have given any thought to that! According to the press reports, hundreds of people were at the scene at the time, but where are the witnesses? Of the good citizens who are lamenting the fact that the police didn't happen to be there at the time, none came forward and offered to assist us by identifying the participants. And yet, without any cooperation from the citizens present, we have the suspects in custody. It is also worth mentioning that our nine-man Juvenile Gang Squad has not once failed to identify participants in these serious crime incidents. It might interest you to know that this Juvenile Gang Squad interrogated some of those same suspects on the previous Saturday night. At that time they had not committed any unlawful act and there was no justification for their arrest. And if you think that police can arrest without justification, I suggest that you ask the City Attorney about the eagerness with which some people sue the police. The present total of law suits against the Chief of Police and his officers is close to fifteen million dollars! Another question that has been raised is why we have only nine men on our Juvenile Gang Squad. I thought that was a large squad! Please understand we are not talking about the Juvenile Division! The Juvenile Division has 186 other officers. The Juvenile Gang Squad merely supplements their work. Men on the Juvenile Gang Squad are assigned primarily to the problems involving people of Latin origin. Nearly every officer on the Squad is of Latin origin himself. There have been some questions about curbing juvenile delinquency. Let it be clear that we are talking about a problem that is not too far removed from adult delinquency. I do not choose to regard the juvenile problem as totally independent of the whole crime problem. Juvenile delinquency is part and parcel of the present course of American behavior. Everyone seems to be wondering why the police let incidents

215 occur such as happened at Seventh and Broadway. It seems it is always the poor policeman who is blamed! But let's talk about facts. Only two or three months ago the demand was upon us to place more and more policemen on freeways. Well, they can't be on the freeways and at Seventh and Broadway at the same time. Let's talk about the parade situation in Los Angeles. From a police deployment and manpower perspective, it is a disturbing subject. In a recent parade in the San Fernando Valley, we were asked to deploy some 135 officers. That is 135 police man-days that were taken away from the fundamental job of protecting this city. That is 135 days where places like Seventh and Broadway will not be patrolled because someone had a parade. We have a small department here in Los Angeles. It can only accomplish so many tasks! I invite you to visit our stations and watch our men work forty and fifty hours on cases without sleep; without any pay for overtime; and with little chance of ever getting the time back. Then show me any other line of endeavor where that is done! I hope the day never comes – but I'm not sure it won't – when a policeman pursuing a criminal hears the whistle blow, stops his car, picks up his lunch bucket, and goes home. Perhaps the source of our police manpower problem lies in the fact that you expect more of a policeman than you do of anybody ese! Perhaps the answer to the problem lies in giving some attention to the police officer's problems. Society has established three standards of behavior. First the police – they are expected to adhere to a standard higher than that of any other person! Next is the public official – when he does things which are done without any particular concern by the general population, he is excoriated. Then thirdly, there is the behavior standard of the general public. Now this latter is an interesting subject – the mores of contemporary society. Crime today is increasing at a more rapid rate than the population! This is a frightening thing! The Census Bureau tells us that from 1940 to 1060 we will experience an increase of forty million people in the United States. And if crime continues to increase more rapidly than the population, what is the end? Even today your state prison authorities say there is no more room in the penitentiary. And I'm not so sure that they don't have

216 to open the back door and let men out prematurely in order to make room for men coming in the front door! You can blame the situation on your police if you wish. You can lay it in their laps, if you want to. Blame them even for social problems over which they have little control. (And, incidentally, this is the reason why people who want to be popular don't become policemen). But let's be practical and realistic. The police do not create crime problems! But they are expending more effort toward their solution than any other single group. Have you given any thought to the fact that the Los Angeles Police Department sponsors twenty-three Boy Scout troops, the larges number of Scout units sponsored by any police department in the United States. Do you know that a great deal of this work is done by police officers on their off-duty time, without compensation? This is just one instance that answers the question "What are we doing?" It appears we are doing more than our regularly assigned duties. We are also operating an official Deputy Auxiliary Police organization. Including salaries, it costs the taxpayers about $268,000 a year. This youth organization has around five thousand members. Just last week it was my pleasure to present to one of these Deputy Auxiliary Police a savings bond of $500 sent down by the Chief of Police of San Francisco. The young Auxiliary Policeman to whom this bond was presented was a fine Negro boy who assisted our officers in the apprehension of a man who fled here after he shot and killed an inspector of the San Francisco Police Department. And, I will gamble, there was no such furor raised over this police officer's death as there has been over the incident we are talking about today. We are not even certain this local death is a homicide. We may end up with nothing more than a battery. Certainly, I lament the present affair, and my sympathies are with the deceased's family. But let's talk about facts. We are confronted by a crime problem that is inherent in contemporary society. Hysteria won't solve it. Nothing is solved by hysteria! Yet police work all too often bears the brunt of one type of hysteria or another. Speeches won't solve it! Emotional comments without facts won't solve it! You can get a new Police Chief every

217 day and that won't solve it! Some day the American people will have to wake up to the facts. They had better realize that the criminal army they have in their midst numbers some six million people – a number which is far greater than social elements which have overthrown established governments before! The underground criminal element here is growing every day – and growing out of proportion to the population. Unless you get in back of your police and give them support and add some dignity and social status to the job, then with this crime wave will go your democracy!

The Rehabilitation Center Under our form of government, it is imperative that there be a close, sympathetic, harmonious and cooperative working relationship between the people of a community and their police if the police task is to be properly performed; the efficiency of any police service depends largely upon the confidence of the people whom it serves. It is as tragic as it is true that public confidence in the police has been frequently lacking in communities throughout America and police efficiency has been a topic of conversation rather than a reality. Many factors have contributed to this untenable situation such as: poor working conditions and inadequate salaries resulting in inept police personnel; manipulation of the police as a tool of patronage by venal political office holders; the distinctly American custom of making the police service the major issue in local elections; a tendency on the part of some of the courts to place the people and the police in two alien camps; and, a remarkable inarticulacy on the part of the police. When under attack the police have generally remained silent due to bewilderment or vulnerability. Thus, an essential ingredient of mutual understanding has been lacking, i.e., unobstructed channels of communication between the police and the public. The City of Los Angeles is unique in many respects. No political machine has long controlled its destinies for the city grew too fast to permit entrenchment. It has been many years since any special privilege group has been able to influence the police service in this city. It is my premise that the majority of the residents of Los Angeles desire and demand an efficient, honest, effective, impartial, and professional police service; a premise that I predict will be sorely tested in the not too distant future. Imbued with this philosophy, and conscious of the freedom of the local police service from the wrong type of political control, I assumed the position of 218

219 Chief of Police more than five and one half years ago. This report to you tonight might well be termed a "white paper" on the local police situation. Although bonds had been voted by the people in 1947to provide for a police administration building and a rehabilitation center for alcoholics, nothing had been accomplished on the rehabilitation center. The police building site had been acquired and plans completed, but the design was for a monumental type building, the cost of which far exceeded the funds available. Although the plans cost about $480,000 to prepare, it was finally determined that it would be better to set them aside and start all over. We turned to a completely functional design and, on August 1, 1955, we began occupancy of the completed building which is a model of efficiency and one that cost approximately five million dollars less than the estimated cost of the original design. This police building has ninety percent usable floor space as compared with fifty-seven per cent in the City Hall. The structure with its 400,000 square feet of floor space will do the job required of it in the foreseeable future. To go into all of the important details would consume the remainder of the evening. It is the opinion of many that the police building has become a model for the entire country. The Rehabilitation Center is located north of the town of Saugus and was dedicated on March 25, 1954. It consists of 588 acres of land on three distinct levels of elevation. At present almost 600 alcoholics who have become police problems are serving sentences at the Center and learning to readjust their lives. In reality, the rehabilitation of alcoholics is not a police responsibility, but the failure of others to assume the task has resulted in the police undertaking the job. Experts have praised the operation as the most progressive in the country. Some of the highlights of its operation will be of interest. Upon arrival at the Center, and after the initial processing, the inmate is afforded a private consultation with a police officer skilled in practical psychology. An effort is made to determine the underlying causes of his abnormal behavior in order that corrective measures may be applied. Aptitudes are explored and work therapy is applied. The food served at the Center is prepared

220 under the direction of a professional chef and is based on the recommendations of a dietician. The inmate may eat all of the food he wishes as long as nothing is left on the tray. Each inmate is required to bathe and shave daily and is issued a complete set of clean clothing each day. He is privileged to attend classes in various trades. Alcoholics Anonymous conducts two meetings a week and religious services are also held at the Center. Motion pictures are shown and a library is available. Much of the work at the center consists of farming and the various crops reduce food costs to the taxpayer. When the inmate is ready for release he visits the barber shop and, if his clothes are inadequate, he is supplied with free clothing from a stockpile of used garments donated primarily by police officers. While post release observation has not been engaged in, we believe that progress is being made. Among the large number of Christmas cards received by the Center Staff were many from former inmates who stated they were still "on the wagon" although more than a year had passed since their release. In addition to the completion of these two big projects, the capitalimprovement requirements of the police department for the next ten years have been established. The site has been acquired and building plans are being prepared for one of the four new police stations needed in the San Fernando Valley. Sometimes it is hard to believe that we are policing the Valley, with an area of 212 square miles and more than 600,000 inhabitants, from one police station. The resultant inefficiencies are revealed in a recent study which discloses that eighty per cent of the time of the field forces in that area is consumed in answering calls, leaving only twenty per cent of the total time for all other activities. Time will not permit a detailed discussion of all of the things that have been done to improve the police service in this city. Much has been accomplished through reorganization and the improvement of procedures. We have studied and adopted modern business techniques where such measures would apply. The utilization of one-man cars has increased the effectiveness of the field force. Additional training and experience have been important factors in bringing about increased efficiency. The substitution of clerical or technical personnel for police officers on non-field

221 assignments wherever feasible has increased the level of service. As of June 3, 1953, approval by a competent psychiatrist is a condition precedent to employment as a police officer. Discipline has been maintained at a high level and unethical conduct has been swiftly dealt with. Many authorities in the field of law enforcement have praised the Los Angeles Police Department as the best in the nation. As it is human nature to take accomplishment for granted, I believe it is time to review some of the problems of the present and immediate past. Since August 1, 1950, the population of Los Angeles has increased by more than one quarter of a million persons and this figure may be even greater when the current census is complete. A quarter of a million additional automobiles have been registered in this city since that date. Eighteen and a half miles of freeway have been added to the ten and one-half in existence at that time. In interpreting these data in terms of police problems, it must be remembered that the remainder of the area has been growing at an even more rapid rate and that many of the inhabitants around us move in, out of, and through the city proper. In the face of this growth in the problem, it is imperative that you realize that there are twenty fewer policemen in Los Angeles than there were on June 15, 1950. While it is true that 313 clerical and technical personnel have been added since that time to replace police officers on inside duty and to somewhat compensate for the increased work load, other factors have occurred that more than offset this gain in manpower. When the Rehabilitation Center was opened in March, 1954, it was necessary to transfer sixty-two police officers from field operations to the Center. Effective July 10, 1955, police officers were given parity with other city employees in the matter of days off and vacations. While this action was most appropriate it will require 326 additional police officers to make up for the loss in the size of the effective force on duty; this will result in an annual deficit of 57,664 man-days of service so far as the present police complement is concerned. Another important factor is reflected in a report compiled by Griffenhagen and Associates entitled "A Method of Determining Annual Adjustments in Fire and Police Salaries" dated February

222 15, 1956. The report contains the results of a survey recommended by the Mayor and ordered by the City Council. After taking into consideration all of the perquisites including time off and pensions, the report concludes that Los Angeles policemen have been underpaid since 1946. Meanwhile, America has been losing the war against crime. According to FBI statistics, during the period from 1950 through 1954, crime increased at four times the rate of the population increase. In spite of all of these adverse conditions, the record of your Los Angeles Police is one of accomplishment. Individual production increased by about 15 per cent during 1954 over 1953, even though authorities in the field of business administration stated a two per cent increase was the limit to be expected. An increase was also experienced during 1955 reflecting the highest individual accomplishment in the department's history. The local crime rate began to descend when a trend was established about May of 1953. As this trend continued into 1955, a fifteen per cent decrease in major felony offenses was experienced during the first quarter of that year compared with the same period of 1954. Crime was going down, arrests were up, and the criminal army was gradually being contained. Then somebody changed the rules! The State Supreme Court, on April 27, 1955, for the first time in California's history, invoked the exclusionary rule upon the courts of this state. Crime then started an upward climb.

Chapter Eleven

PARKER TO HIS FORCE Miscellaneous Chief's Messages from the 1952 Annual Report and The Beat

Chief's Messages Annual Report – 1952

When a city department has made excellent progress it is sometimes difficult to report objectively without appearing to seek laudation. Fortunately, this does not necessarily apply when a report concerns a police department. Law enforcement is so dependent upon the cooperation of the individual citizen, that credit for police progress must go primarily to the citizen. Acting through his elected representatives, the citizen patterns the organization, sets its standards, passes on its effectiveness, and pays its cost. Largely by his political ethics, the citizen determines the ethics of the police. By his recognition of the principles of administration and management, he sets working conditions which attract the quality of personnel desired. Safety and order in the community is a partnership of a type which can exist only in a working democracy. Our city is no exception to this rule. Los Angeles has, and will always have, the quality of police service it collectively desires. It can be no better than that, and it can be no worse. The greatest single factor in police progress here is the fact that the department has remained consistently free from partisan political control. The City Administration has been alert to the terrible danger a "captive" police department would represent to the people of our city. The Los Angeles police officer has been free to do his job with full impartiality, owing responsibility only to the people, the courts, and duly constituted police authority. The facts in this report will make it obvious that most Los Angeles citizens have accepted their responsibilities toward law enforcement. Conditions favorable to police progress have bene created, and the result is depicted on the following pages. It would be difficult to read this account without the thought 225

226 occurring that a new and honorable profession may be in the process of birth. Whether it emerges still-born, dies in infancy, or matures to fill a vital social need, will depend upon the environment it continues to find.

The Beat, February, 1952 I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have. I must stand with anybody who stands right; stand with him while he stands right, and part company with him when he goes wrong –

Abraham

Lincoln

As we celebrate Lincoln's birthday on February 12, we cannot but be impressed by the speeches and writings of the Great Emancipator. Though written many years ago, they are as modern as tomorrow, and could well be heeded today. Particularly pertinent to members of our procession is the quotation above. The philosophy expressed herein, honored by its strict observance, carried Lincoln through trials which few men in history have been called upon to face. Lincoln's words expressed a true concept of loyalty. They do not imply a blind, unreasoning devotion to an individual; rather a rational adherence to basic ideological principles. On occasion, each officer meets situations which rapidly develop into challenging tests of character and moral sense. Some consolation may be gained through the realization that others have met the same test successfully through strict adherence to Lincoln's policy, as expressed in these forceful words.

The Beat, July-August, 1952 It is a fact that, of the modest satisfactions derived from police work, comradeship ranks near the top. Every policeman has felt the strength of the invisible ties of fraternalism which have their inception in common trust. Practiced within the bounds of honor and duty, it is a respected attribute. Unfortunately, fraternalism is not regarded as a two-way

227 obligation by all persons. There have always been policemen who are ready to risk the security of their fellows for their own selfish ends. Always the first to demand loyalty in others, they fail to exercise it in either thought or deed. They do not understand that this virtue imposes obligations upon themselves as well as upon others. Instead, they look upon it as a cloak to be held by brother officers so as to hide their own selfish acts. They seek constantly to exaggerate the meaning of fraternalism until it becomes an all-powerful force, overriding all considerations of truth, honor, and duty. There are also officers whose desire to "belong" binds them to the motives of those who use, rather than practice, fraternalism. They allow themselves to be swept into a distorted sense of loyalty until they find themselves being disloyal to all in order to protect one. There are fine officers in the Los Angeles Police Department, bearing exemplary records as policemen, who do not recognize the fallacy of exaggerated fraternalism. It is tragic, indeed, when they let a mistaken sense of loyalty to a few individuals blind them to the greater loyalty they owe to themselves, to the police department, and to society. In the final analysis, there is no loyalty to individuals; there can only be loyalty to the principles that individuals represent.

The Beat, April, 1953 A major problem of the Chief of a large police department is the impossibility of frequent personal contacts with all officers. It becomes particularly distressing when he knows that they are consistently performing highly satisfactory police work. Like every other police officer, a Chief is subject to the human limitations of time, mental fatigue, and physical endurance. The multitude of managerial tasks just does not allow an individual hands-clasp and spoken commendation to hundreds of officers every month. Your splendid efforts during the first quarter of 1953 should be recognized – not only by this office but by the public. Although national crime rates are steadily rising, we have

228 forestalled comparable increases here. Those categories which react to sound law enforcement are being forced downward. Arrests and convictions are up. We are winning the fight against the narcotic menace. Integrity and devotion to duty have reached a level which, I am certain, has never been approached by another large department. This monthly column is only a poor substitute for the personal message I would prefer to give. Therefore, I ask you to read into it an individual "well-done."

The Beat, May, 1953 Valor is not restricted to field campaigns and fleet battle lines. The giving of decorations for bravery has never been the exclusive prerogative of the military services. Awards have long been granted for service against enemies both within and without a nation. The fact that an individual acts in defense of a small unit of society does not detract from the honor that courage earns. It sometimes requires more fortitude to engage the enemy on a dark and lonely city street than when spurred by the mass courage of the battlefield. An award representing the gratitude of one city is as significant of honor and valor as weightier decorations from the governments of whole nations. These are some of the principles prompting the reissuance of the Los Angeles Police Department Medal of Valor. Its integrity and true worth will be protected. The recommendation of two departmental boards, the endorsement of the Chief of Police, and the approval of the Board of Police Commissioners are required for its award. Since the inception of the Medal of Valor in October, 1951, twenty officers have won the right to wear this symbol on their uniform. It is my earnest wish that they will exercise that privilege. Too often we believe the severe requirements of police duty are not recognized by others. However, the presentation of the awards during our Annual Police Show evoked a spontaneous display of gratitude by citizens present. The display of this award will continue to serve as a reminder to them and an inspiration to all of us.

229 The Beat, June, 1953 You may recall that on January 9 of this year, a report of Police Department progress was sent to the Police Commission, and subsequently widely distributed to community leaders. It contained an earnest hope that the election, now past, would be conducted on a high plane – and that our experiment in professional law enforcement would not be destroyed for transient political advantage. In other words, we hoped no candidate would sabotage the community's first line of defense merely for the sake of a few emotionally directed votes. It was a plea that often has been made here as in other cities, but seldom heeded. However, as the campaign progressed, it became apparent that the integrity of the city's police officers would be respected and their reputation protected. Although the candidates differed in political beliefs, they shared the opinion that politics and law enforcement should not mix. As a result, the campaign stands as a unique experience in our city's political history. Every home will be safer, every citizen more secure, and every child better protected this year, because the city's police were saved the humiliating and degrading experience of service as the political "whipping boy." These facts bode well for our professional future. It is axiomatic that to render maximum service to the community there must exist a culture which will permit the police to operate aside and apart from the political arena. The events of the past few weeks indicate that such a culture does exist – and it is incumbent upon all of us to preserve it.

The Beat, December, 1953 There are two ways to look at a painting. One is to stand off and see the canvas as a whole, grasping the over-all meaning of the work. The other way is to move in and inspect the detail, admiring the careful brush work which spells hours of painstaking labor. Police work can also be viewed from these two perspectives. Too often we look at our job only from the long perspective, forgetting that it is the result of countless small missions which have been quietly and ably performed. In the last Beat message

230 of the year let us look at the "brush work" which has created a highly satisfactory police picture in 1953. A few weeks ago an unfortunate and unhappy man prepared to throw himself from the roof of a downtown office building. A PIC officer summoned by citizens took quick stock of the situation and, at no small risk to himself, took the action necessary to the saving of a life. During the same month two officers in Hollywood courageously risked their reputations by refusing to gun-fight armed felons in a crowded building. By allowing themselves to be forced outside at gunpoint, the capture was made by an alert detective team. Only a short time before this, a skilfully coordinated search of the metropolitan area resulted in the capture of an armed gunman who had murdered a San Francisco police officer. Again, in this instance, the capture was made in such a way as to avoid injury to innocent persons. These are only three examples. The entire space of this magazine would be necessary to sketch every case of skilled, courageous, and devoted police service. This close look at our job is necessary now and then to remind us of a fact: a man can be proud to wear the uniform of a Los Angeles police officer. Pride which has been earned is a healthy thing. We will continue to deserve it in 1954.

The Beat, February, 1954 Should policemen have "social status"? Just how important is it that they be respected, perhaps occasionally honored, as vital to community peace and security? I suspect that a change in society's attitude toward its police would solve many current problems. For example, take recruitment. We are having a difficult time enlisting qualified candidates into our ranks. Thousands of acceptable young men with no better prospects in sight, steadfastly refuse to consider a career of police work. They are not afraid of hard discipline; they are not physical cowards; they would like an opportunity to serve society. What's the problem? Simply that they consider a police oath would automatically deprive them of the respect and status they want in life. Public attitudes toward the police may also play a part in the frightening rise in crime rates. Disrespect for law enforcers breeds

231 disrespect for law. A child who is raised to laugh at "cops" is not likely to grow up with any great respect for the laws which the police enforce. Decades of misrepresentation and abuse in the media of public entertainment and education have left their mark. Crime rates are rising steadily, increasing at a greater rate than the population. Society is finding that it cannot ridicule the enforcers of law on the one hand and build respect for law on the other. You cannot separate the two any more than you can separate education from teachers, justice from judges, and religion from the ministry. It is very possible we will soon observe a very definite switch in the public attitude toward the police. In Los Angeles a new awareness of the elemental importance of law enforcement can already be felt. Whether this change of attitude matures into genuine dignity and prestige for our profession will depend largely upon whether we continue to deserve public respect.

The Beat, March, 1954 In past months the Los Angeles Police Department has been the subject of considerable public interest. The local press has carried an unusual amount of commendatory news. Various aspects of our job have been featured in national magazines. Motion pictures and television studios, attracted by the popularity of authentic police portrayals, are adopting a documentary approach to police stories. This has gone beyond the point of mere publicity. It reflects a genuine change in public attitude. Los Angeles is being looked to as the focal point of a new approach to law enforcement – an approach emphasizing ethics, science, and service. Who is responsible for this change, and who must be charged with maintaining the ground won? The answer is obvious – the field police officer. His conduct provides citizens with firsthand impressions, direct and lasting. If he does a sloppy job, no amount of secondary public relations activity can hide the fact. If he does a good job, and the basis of present favorable news is the fact that he has done a good job, then public cooperation follows. Prompt, efficient, and courteous police work in the field is the secret of any success we have had. Abiding public cooperation is

232 earned the hard way – mile by mile of alert patrol, hour by hour of tedious investigation; both backed up by a sincere devotion to our profession of public service.

The Beat, August-September, 1954 We have just passed the fifth anniversary of an institution within this department which has become, in that short period, a foundation stone to effective police service in this community. To be effective, a law enforcement agency must achieve public confidence, and to this end, the Internal Affairs Division has been a potent force. The citizens of this community know that their justifiable complaints against the police department will receive action. They are aware that police officers of this jurisdiction do not, and cannot, act with indifference to lawful process. They know that their department claims no immunity – particularly when it is brought to their attention that the department has the integrity to obtain its own complaints against errant members. Also, to be effective, a law enforcement agency must preserve internal morale against the malicious attacks of a small segment of the public. To this end, the Internal Affairs Division has earned the gratitude of many officers whose names and reputations have been the subject of unwarranted vilification. The movement toward professionalization of law enforcement is bringing pressures in the areas of standards and ethics; the Internal Affairs Division of this department is contributing much toward this progress and deserves the support and respect of citizen and officer alike – it either deteriorates or improves itself. An effective Internal Affairs Division is a step forward in the direction of improvement.

This Book

PARKER ON POLICE

Edited by O.W. Wilson

was set, printed and bound by the George Banta Company, Inc., of Menasha, Wisconsin. The engravings were made by the Northwestern Engraving Company of Menasha, Wisconsin. The page trim size is 6 X 9 inches. The type page is 26 X 43 picas. The type face is Linotype Caledonia, set 11 point on 13 point. The text paper is 70# white Winnebago Eggshell. The cover is Holliston Sturdite 18 78239KWM

With THOMAS BOOKS careful attention is given to all details of manufacturing and design. It is the Publisher's desire to present books that are satisfactory as to their physical qualities and artistic possibilities and appropriate for their particular use. THOMAS BOOKS will be true to those laws of quality that assure a good name and good will.