TRIVIAL PURSUIT OF COPS COMPLAINT POLICY FOCUSES ON SERIOUS, NOT-SO-SERIOUS.

Byline: Dominic Berbeo Staff Writer

That's no way to treat the ``laser lady,'' the woman complained to LAPD officials.

As she had for 20 years, she had called police for help because laser beams were piercing her brain and, on this occasion, the officer fobbed her off by saying he would have the beams turned off as soon as she hung up.

He got rid of her but the beams kept coming, so she filed a formal complaint and now the officer faces a disciplinary investigation - a procedure that can take up to a year, during which the officer is ineligible for promotion.

Police union officials say the episode shows how a policy implemented by Chief Bernard C. Parks - requiring every complaint to be investigated - is making an already tough job tougher, lowering morale and chasing good cops off the force.

On average, 17 misconduct complaints are now filed daily in the LAPD compared with three a day in 1996, when the department allowed commanding officers to use discretion in recommending whether a complaint warranted an investigation.

``There are a lot of complaints that are just absurd,'' said Bob Baker, a vice president of the Police Protective League. ``We understand if we make major mistakes, we should be punished, but the majority are unfounded and take up hundreds of hours of investigation and lower morale.''

Department brass say most complaints are legitimate, and the policy is necessary to establish public confidence that complaints are taken seriously - and also to keep track of potential misconduct patterns by individual officers as well as LAPD bureaus.

``We have to have a high level of trust in the community,'' said Lt. Horace Frank, LAPD spokesman. ``But we also owe it to our officers that we do a thorough investigation to prove or disprove the allegation, that leaves no doubt.''

The new policy is commonly referred to as the 1.28 system, which is the number of the complaint form used.

More investigations

In 1996, before Parks became chief, there were 1,207 complaints investigated under the old system, compared with 5,339 under the new system in 1998, 5,280 in 1999, and 6,252 in 2000, LAPD records show.

Whether the federal consent decree agreed to buy city officials' attempts to reform the department or makes matters worse remains to be seen. Conditions imposed by the U.S. Justice Department recommend that the expanded Internal Affairs Group have discretion to determine when a complaint warrants investigation.

Currently, Frank said, complaints determined by the IAG to be without basis are recorded and investigated, but do not spark ``full-blown'' investigations.

These incidents have to be tracked, he said, because what may at first appear to be a minor or frivolous complaint might not be, especially if a pattern persists that wouldn't have been noticed otherwise.

``If you have 10 unresolved complaints, then there's a pattern, and for risk-management purposes, you look at that,'' Frank said. ``In these cases where there are patterns, then commanding officers can determine there is a pattern of conduct and recommend discipline.''

A study headed by Wellford Wilms, a professor in the UCLA School of Public Policy, scheduled to be submitted to the Justice Department says many officers regard the 1.28 complaint system as an ``instrument of fear'' and ``detrimental'' to the workplace.

``This, coupled with officers' increasing job dissatisfaction, reports of being 'burned out,' and a rapidly rising proportion who would leave the LAPD if they had the chance, point to an increasingly unhealthy climate,'' the study concludes.

Based on surveys with some 80 percent of officers, the report also found that in the 12 months leading up to the survey, 48 percent of all officers reported receiving at least one complaint, and complaints on average take from nine to 12 months to resolve. Once a complaint is filed, an officer cannot transfer or be promoted until the complaint is resolved.

The 1.28 system is ``abhorred'' by an overwhelming majority of the rank and file, the survey found.

Only 5 percent agreed that it makes them more effective as police officers, and 79 percent said they are afraid of being punished for making an honest mistake.

Jack Riley, who heads the criminal justice program at Rand, said it is important to make the public feel that complaints are tracked and taken seriously. But he also said many complaints are probably filed out of spite.

``Many officers say that hard-core offenders know how to manipulate the complaint system,'' he said. ``But if it can be shown that frivolous complaints do not adversely affect officers, then maybe they would taper off.''

Other staffing issues

Possible improvements, he said, would be to put further limitations on access to complaint records and tentatively promote officers pending the outcome of investigations.

While discipline issues certainly add to the current LAPD staffing crisis, he said, there are other factors.

``Police departments in major metropolitan cities nationwide are experiencing similar attrition problems due to a combination of quality-of-life issues,'' he said. ``I'm not sure you can tie it down to just one specific management issue.''

Over the past five years, the number of LAPD officers has gone down by about 1,000, city records show. While the number of retiring officers has grown, those leaving for other cities or departments have also gone up.

Last year, one of every nine officers who left the LAPD went to another police department, compared with one in 14 in 1996.

Jeffrey Eglash, Police Commission inspector general since July 1999, monitors the department's disciplinary system and tracks every complaint filed against officers. He says there should be a way both to take complaints seriously and protect officers from being unfairly attacked by the public.

``A sizable majority of complaints are unfounded or not sustained,'' he said. ``The department has a legitimate reason for tracking all complaints, but officers also have a legitimate concern that those unfounded complaints not be misused.''

If complaints are not tracked, he said, there could be patterns of misconduct that would go unnoticed otherwise.

In the UCLA study, Parks defended the complaint system while hinting that it could stand fine-tuning.

``We're looking for ways to refine it,'' he said, ``but not at the expense of diluting the process. We need well-documented and retrievable investigations. It's not enough to do it on a log; you give a supervisor too much discretion to make judgments without documentation. Now, for the first time in history, we'll know what the community complains about.''

In March, Parks announced a change in disciplinary procedure that would allow for continued raises and transfers if complaints are determined to be minor in nature and easily resolved.

Disciplinary action has gone up over the last four years since Parks became chief.

Officer suspensions went up from 187 in 1997 to 372 in 1998 and 402 in 1999.

Firings for misconduct went up from 12 in 1997 to 66 in 1998 and 45 in 1999, including new officers still on probation.

Poor morale

Mitzi Grasso, president of the union for some 9,000 LAPD officers, said morale in the department has hit rock bottom, mostly because officers feel they are being used by the chief as scapegoats to improve his public image.

``Many times they are making a mountain out of a molehill,'' she said. ``There are many ways to document complaints without putting an officer's life on hold for some minor or invalid complaint.''

She said watch commanders, who directly supervise officers, should document complaints and have discretion over which complaints merit investigation. Negotiations between the union and the chief are ongoing.

Some other examples of complaints over the past 18 months that the police union says do not warrant investigations include:

--An officer being investigated for neglect of duty after a resident filed a complaint because a weather balloon landed in his back yard and he didn't like the fact that the officer - correctly - referred him to the Fire Department.

--A mentally disturbed individual who did not appear to be a threat intruded on a private residence. Occupants of the house called the police, but told officers when they arrived that they did not want an arrest made. Later, the homeowner returned to the residence and complained that the officers failed in their duty to make an arrest, opening an investigation.

--A woman complained that officers who interviewed her looked at her ``like she was stupid,'' sparking an investigation and a discourtesy complaint to go on the officers' records.

--Officers responded to an activated burglar alarm at a residence. During the investigation, a poodle at the residence got out and officers were not able to get it back. The resident later filed a complaint, sparking an investigation.

Some protections do exist for officers against false complaints tainting their personnel records.

Recording evidence

First, under state law, officers are allowed to sue someone who knowingly files a false complaint. They are also encouraged to carry tape recorders while on patrol to use as evidence, and many do.

Also, the police computer database separates personnel files and sustained complaints from files that store complaints that resulted in no disciplinary action.

Complaints that were deemed to be unfounded, unresolved, false, or for actions that were simply against LAPD policy or procedure are classified and are strictly off-limits to commanding officers checking individual records when considering an officer for promotion or transfer.

And while there is no sure-fire system for knowing whether a ranking officer takes a peek at the information for the wrong reasons, they would be subject to disciplinary action themselves if it was determined they did so, Frank said.