NEW LAW CAN HELP LAPD, SHOPPERS CATCH RATS PUSHING RACISM.

Byline: Dennis McCarthy

"This person is sick. It's not like you're going to look at your wife at night and say, 'Gee, Honey, let's have some Pocahontas ice cream.' This was meant for little kids to see."

- Marcie Silverstein.

The kids in question are Marcie's 7-year-old daughter and her 9-year-old friend - a couple of kids, having an after-school snack, who opened a package of ice-cream cups and found graphic hate literature inside.

Pictured are a black man and a white woman walking down the street together. Derogatory comments are aimed at each of them.

This same kind of racist material has been showing up in local high school lockers, mail boxes, beneath windshield wipers, and in packaged foods in our area for a couple of years. Now it's found its way inside a carton of kid's ice cream cups bought at a West Hills supermarket.

The rats who come out from under their rocks to distribute this trash are now trying to expose young kids to their world of hate and prejudice.

"If that would have happened to a child of mine, I'd be furious," said Mike Manning, a North Hills man who spearheaded a drive to get the Los Angeles Police Department and City Hall more involved in fighting back against this kind of hate literature.

Last October, Manning went to his local North Hills supermarket to buy groceries, including a box of cheese crackers.

"When I got home and opened the box, a piece of paper fell out," he said. "I thought it was a coupon. When I saw what it was, it floored me.

"I thought, 'What kind of sick mind writes this stuff and then sticks it inside a box of crackers for people to read?' "

When he called the LAPD to report it, Manning was in for another shock. Whoever put the racist material inside the box was breaking no law on the books.

State and federal law prohibits product tampering, but only if a seal is broken. In Manning's case, as in Marcie Silverstein's, the boxes were not sealed. There was room to slip something under the flap.

The California Grocers Association reports more than 800 similar hate messages have been found in supermarket products in Los Angeles, Ventura and Orange counties since 1992.

"I got mad and called Councilman (Joel) Wachs' office because I live in his district and thought he should do something about this," Manning said.

Last October, Wachs did - introducing a motion that would make it against the law to insert written material into any product package.

Last month, Mayor Richard Riordan signed the new city ordinance. As of this Monday, it will be a misdemeanor - punishable by up to one year in jail and a $1,000 fine - for anyone to put material of any kind into a consumer product without the manufacturer's consent or the store owner's permission.

Similar legislation is being discussed in Sacramento for the entire state.

Now that the city has the legal tools to fight back, all it needs are the eyes of the public in monitoring against this kind of activity, said the commanding officer of the LAPD's criminal intelligence group, David Kalish.

"The people doing this kind of thing are not the only ones in the store," Kalish said. "When people are pushing their cart down the aisle, there should be a heightened awareness of anyone tampering with a product.

"If you see it, notify the store manager, get a description of the person or a license plate number, and call us. This is definitely a high-priority item for us."

It should be for everyone, Marcie Silverstein says.

The Santa Clarita Marrow Donor Drive for Garrett LaRue, 3, and his brother, Blayke, 7, will be held from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday at the Santa Clarita City Hall council chambers, 23920 W. Valencia Blvd.

"While it is in honor of the LaRue boys, it is also for the many other individuals who are desperately searching for a perfect miracle match and a chance at life," says Lisa Hardy, a cousin of firefighter-paramedic Scott LaRue, father of the boys and a former Santa Clarita resident.

For more information, call the National Marrow Donor Program at [phone] (800-MARROW2).