Los Angeles Police Department officials announced Tuesday that they
investigated more than 300 complaints of racial profiling against
officers last year and found that none had merit -- a conclusion that
left members of the department's oversight commission incredulous. It
is at least the sixth consecutive year that all allegations of racial
profiling against LAPD officers have been dismissed, according to
department documents reviewed by The Times. In 2007, the LAPD's
Internal Affairs Group closed 320 investigations into allegations that
officers stopped, questioned or otherwise confronted someone solely
because of the person's race. Nearly 80% of the time -- 252 of the
cases -- the claims were dismissed outright as "unfounded," according
to an annual complaint report presented Tuesday to the civilian Police
Commission. In the remaining cases, there was either insufficient
evidence to reach a conclusion or no misconduct was uncovered. "A
big, fat zero," said a visibly flummoxed Commissioner John Mack, who is
African American and the former president of the Los Angeles Urban
League. "In my mind, there is no such thing as a perfect institution .
. . I find it baffling that we have these zeros." His disbelief,
echoed by other commissioners, drew a quick response from Police Chief
William J. Bratton. Unsolicited, he told the commission he would have
his staff conduct a survey of other large, urban police departments, as
well as the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, to back up his
belief that the findings in the LAPD are similar elsewhere. SOURCE:LATIMES
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