SUPERVISORS FAILED TO ACT.

Byline: Beth Barrett and Greg Gittrich Staff Writers

Rogue anti-gang officers in the LAPD's Rampart Division embraced and exploited the department's overall culture of mediocrity to commit crimes and corrupt policies with shocking disregard and met little resistance from their supervisors, an internal investigation found.

The Los Angeles Police Department's Board of Inquiry report found that Rampart supervisors seldom challenged officers' police reports and cooked-up stories. With more oversight, the pattern of abuse and thuggery within the unit would have been exposed.

Instead, the worst corruption scandal in the city's history remained hidden until dirty cop Rafael Perez agreed to testify last year in exchange for a lighter sentence for stealing cocaine from an evidence locker.

``There can be no doubt that things were amiss in Rampart,'' concluded the board report, which will be presented to the Police Commission today.

``Pursuits, injuries resulting from uses of force, officer-involved shooting and personnel complaints had a clearly identifiable pattern . . . Yet no one seems to have noticed and, more importantly, dealt with the patterns.''

The report identified deep systemic problems at Rampart, with safeguards practically nonexistent after Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums (CRASH) officers moved to a separate building - nicknamed ``Fort Apache.''

At ``Fort Apache,'' officers were free, if not encouraged, to adopt the ``Rampart Way'' of bending or breaking rules to make more arrests.

``Clearly, Rampart CRASH saw itself as an entity separate and apart from the rest of the command,'' the report noted, describing how many officers adopted ``The Deadman's Hand'' patch.

The unauthorized adornment displayed the hand of playing cards - a pair of aces and a pair of eights - that legendary outlaw Wild Bill Hickock supposedly held when he was shot to death.

Chief Bernard C. Parks, who has vowed to root out all corruption within the department, said the LAPD, as an organization, must share in the criticism for providing the opportunity for Rampart to happen in the first place.

``We had officers working their own sources without reporting to supervisors,'' Parks said in an interview. ``We had officers writing reports and their own booking instructions with no supervision. We were just accepting what was being written.''

Bunkered in the separate quarters under the leadership of a weak captain, sergeants ran the show and CRASH officers routinely forged supervisors' names on arrest reports and booking recommendations.

``This is a serious breach of a major corruption check and balance designed to ensure independent review of every arrest,'' the report said. ``Bypassing the system was blatant and readily apparent to anyone who looked.''

If officers' reports had been reviewed and challenged, a suspicious pattern of suspects dropping narcotics in plain view, readily confessing to crimes and making selncriminating statements might have emerged.

It is not unheard of for gang members to drop drugs and guns in front of police officers, but it becomes suspicious when the police reports aren't reviewed and approved up the chain of command.

Repeated citizen complaints against a handful of officers assigned to the Rampart CRASH unit also went untracked. Such a tracking system was a key reform recommended by the Christopher Commission after the videotaped 1991 beating of African-American motorist Rodney King by LAPD officers. The board's report faulted the department's computer system, saying it did not reliably track an officer's disciplinary record.

In fact, LAPD supervisors took citizen complaints so lightly that two CRASH officers were allowed to work together as partners even after the department sustained a series of complaints against each of them.

Supervisors should have questioned why so many of the complaints were later withdrawn, the report said. Plaintiffs in civil lawsuits allege that officers threatened to harm them if they did not take back their statements.

``For example, a complainant would allege to have been beaten and the photos and medical treatment records support that. Then the person would recant, saying he only fell, but the injuries were inconsistent with a simple fall,'' the report noted.

The LAPD's chain of command should have noticed the high number of use-of-force incidents at Rampart and problems with CRASH shootings, including the shooting of Javier Ovando, who officers then framed by planting a gun on him.

```Clearly, there was a noticeable OIS (officer-involved shooting) pattern occurring in Rampart over this five-year period (1994-1999),'' the report said. ``Large numbers of officers at locations, multiple `shooters' and either no supervision or ineffective supervision were apparent.

The internal report said interviews with Rampart supervisors suggest there existed a ``tremendous leadership vacuum.'' Rarely, investigators said, has so much influence been exerted, not by captains or lieutenants, but by a core of supervisors led by a sergeant.

The group was so dominant that it would convene informal, ``secondary roll calls'' at undisclosed locations to discuss how things would be done at Rampart. Veteran officers often required probationary officers to arrive early to wash cars, check out equipment and load shotguns - with the knowledge of supervisors.

The Board of Inquiry concluded that the department must be revamped in terms of staffing, computer equipment, training and command.

``The alternative . . . is to risk a repeat of the Rampart corruption scandal, which is clearly an unacceptable alternative for the department, the city and the people we serve.''

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Photo: Former Officer Rafael Perez, sentenced last week to five years in prison for stealing cocaine from a police evidence room, and other officers did as they pleased in Rampart Division, supervised by a weak captain who allowed it, said an LAPD Board of Inquiry report to be released today.

Daily News File Photo