2nd LAPD Shooting Targeted as Corruption Probe Widens
Rampart Division: Possible cover-up during a fatal 1996 incident is being investigated. FBI launches a civil rights inquiry as victim in first case is freed from prison.

As the FBI on Thursday joined an expanding probe into the largest LAPD corruption scandal in 60 years, sources said police detectives are investigating the possible cover-up by Rampart Division officers of a second unjustified shooting that left one man dead and another wounded.
     Also on Thursday, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge ordered the release from state prison of a 22-year-old man who allegedly was handcuffed, shot point-blank in the head by an officer and then framed by police to make it appear that he had attacked them.
    The two shootings are part of a wide-ranging corruption investigation fueled largely by information from ex-LAPD Officer Rafael A. Perez, who is cooperating with authorities in exchange for a lighter sentence on cocaine theft convictions.
    Already a dozen officers who either work or have worked at the Rampart station have been relieved of duty or fired, and more officers may be involved, investigators said. The probe, which is examining allegations ranging from illegal shootings and drug dealing to excessive force and so-called code of silence violations, is the most extensive inquiry into LAPD misconduct since the notoriously corrupt administration of Mayor Frank Shaw in the late 1930s, investigators said.
    Many of the allegations focus on officers in Rampart's anti-gang CRASH unit, who are charged with policing some of the city's toughest streets.
    "This is devastating," said one high-ranking official at the LAPD, an organization renowned for being largely corruption-free since the days of Chief William Parker.
    Even public defenders, who often question the testimony of police, were shocked by the revelations that led to the release of Javier Francisco Ovando, the man shot and apparently framed by police.
    "Any suspicion I ever had of these officers embellishing or enhancing, never went as far as them putting a gun in my client's hand," said Tamar R. Toister, who represented the now wheelchair-bound Ovando at his trial.
    Despite her client's release, Toister remained deeply troubled by the case. "I feel more victimized than vindicated."
    For the district attorney, the case marked the first time that county prosecutors had gone before a judge seeking to free a convicted man from prison and the judge who ordered him released described the facts of his case as those of "an attempted murder."
    LAPD detectives continued to investigate what may be a far more disturbing police shooting.
    Investigators would not disclose details about the July 20, 1996, shootout, but sources said Perez has described it as "dirty."
     According to an internal LAPD review of that shooting, nine officers from the Rampart Division descended on an apartment building in the 600 block of South Shatto Place in response to a report that two gang members were preparing to mount a retaliatory attack for a drive-by shooting the day before in which two fellow gang members were killed.
     It was about 9:40 p.m. when the officers arrived and found several gang members gathered in front of the building, one of them armed. Under the direction of their supervising sergeant, the officers came up with a plan to arrest two armed gang members who were allegedly hiding inside the building, the report says.
    The plan called for the officers to be dispatched in pairs to various floors of the building in hopes of finding and arresting the gun-toting gang members. Other officers would monitor the situation by radio from nearby.
     What ensued was a chaotic episode in which one suspect was killed, another was shot in the chest but survived, and a witness was shot in the arm.
    According to the shooting report, four officers fired a total of 10 rounds as they tried to apprehend the suspects. Three of those officers have been relieved of duty in the wake of the ongoing corruption investigation and another was fired earlier this year in connection with an alleged beating of a handcuffed informant at the Rampart police station.
    The internal report on the 1996 shooting makes no reference to any of the gang members, each of whom was allegedly armed, ever firing a shot. An LAPD review board and then Chief Willie L. Williams found the shootings to be within department policy.
    One of the suspects, shot multiple times, died at Los Angeles County/USC Medical Center. Another, Jose Perez, then 19, suffered a shotgun blast to the chest. He was charged with assault with a deadly weapon on a police officer. Another suspect, who surrendered peacefully, was charged with assault with a deadly weapon on a police officer.
    Officer Perez, 32, who was at the shooting but did not fire his weapon, told investigators that the incident did not transpire as the officers said at the time.
    Sources confirm that they are looking into the possibility that officers planted weapons on the suspects. Investigators are still planning to get more details from Perez on the shooting at follow-up interviews.
     An attorney for Jose Perez, one of the wounded men, said his client contends that he never pointed a gun at officers and was shot as he was fleeing.
    Of the nine officers present the night the fatal shooting occurred, at least five, and probably more, were relieved of duty this week, and another has been fired. The sergeant at the scene of the 1996 shooting is one of the officers relieved of duty.
     A few acquaintances of the officers allegedly involved in the brewing scandal said they believe that Perez is lying and making up stories about other officers to shave time off his prison sentence.
    Meanwhile in court Thursday, there were chilling new details about the October 1996 shooting that left Ovando in a wheelchair. In a jailhouse interview, he told an LAPD investigator that he was handcuffed before being shot in the chest by Perez and his partner, Nino Durden, court papers show. Ovando said Perez then grabbed him by the front of the shirt, held him upright and shot him point-blank in the head.
    After the shooting, Perez now alleges that Durden planted an assault-type rifle with a banana clip on Ovando, a reputed 18th Street gang member with no criminal convictions. The gun was seized during a gang sweep a few days before and Durden filed off the weapon's serial number, Perez said.
    Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard A. Rosenthal said the shooting was "so egregious" that he felt compelled to personally seek Ovando's immediate release from prison, an unprecedented move in the recent history of the Los Angeles County district attorney's office.
    Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler also appeared moved by the new evidence.
    "The statement from Mr. Ovando indicates there was an attempted murder," the judge said.
    Rosenthal said an investigation into the shooting was continuing and criminal charges would be filed if warranted.
    Durden was relieved of duty last month pending a hearing on charges unrelated to the Ovando shooting, including planting evidence and making a false arrest, police documents show. He has not responded to numerous requests by The Times for an interview.
    Perez's cooperation with police, in which he is expected to detail crimes and misconduct by himself and other officers, was the result of a plea deal in which he will receive five years in prison for stealing eight pounds of cocaine.
    The deal, struck hours before his trial was to begin, almost never came to pass.
    Initially, the D.A.'s office would only agree to give Perez immunity for crimes that did not involve great bodily injury. Though the shooting of Ovando did, when Perez told authorities an innocent man was in jail as a result, they offered him the deal.
    The public disclosure of possible abuses at the LAPD sparked a civil rights investigation by federal authorities Thursday.
    "We are working with Chief [Bernard C.] Parks in an effort to learn of all the facts and address them appropriately," said U.S. Atty. Alejandro N. Mayorkas. His office has instructed the FBI to launch a probe.
    Police Commission President Gerald L. Chaleff said he was disturbed by officers who allegedly misused the authority of their badges but added: "I'm glad the department is pursuing it aggressively."
    On Thursday afternoon, a large banner bearing the likeness of a blue ribbon and the slogan "The Community Loves The Men & Women of Rampart Station" hung outside the station.
    But the support of some community members did not lift spirits much.
    "The mood is grim here," said one Rampart officer. "It's like a morgue."

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