Daryl Gates
Encyclopedia
Daryl Gates was the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department
(LAPD) from 1978 to 1992.
mother and a Catholic
father; he was raised in his mother's faith. He grew up in Glendale
and Highland Park
, in the northeastern part of Los Angeles
. The Great Depression
had an impact on his early life: his father was an alcoholic
, and frequently ended up in the custody of the Glendale police. (Later in life, Gates often remarked on the taunts and harassment he received from schoolmates because of his father's behavior.) Gates later wrote that he had a low opinion of the police due to their rough treatment of his father, and at age 16 Gates himself was arrested after punching an officer who gave him a parking ticket (Gates apologized and the charges were dropped).
Gates graduated from Franklin High School in Highland Park, and joined the Navy
in time to see action in the Pacific Theater
during World War II
. After leaving the Navy, he attended Pasadena City College
and married his first wife, Wanda Hawkins. He went on to take pre-law classes at the University of Southern California
. After his wife became pregnant, a friend suggested that he join the LAPD, which was conducting a recruitment drive among former servicemen; Gates initially declined, then decided it was a good opportunity. (Gates later finished his degree at USC.)
Gates worked hard to prepare for his promotional exams, scoring first in the sergeant's exam and in every promotional exam thereafter. On his promotion to lieutenant
, he rejoined Chief Parker as Parker's executive officer. He was promoted to captain
, responsible for intelligence. By the time of the Watts riots
in 1965 he was an inspector
(overseeing the investigations of, among other crimes, the Manson Family murders and the Hillside Strangler
case). On March 28, 1978, Gates became the 49th Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department.
(Special Weapons And Tactics), established the specialized unit in order to deal with hostage rescue and extreme situations involving armed and dangerous suspects. Ordinary street officers, with light armament, limited weapons training and little instruction on group fighting techniques, had shown to be ineffective in dealing with snipers, bank robberies carried out by heavily armed persons, and other high-intensity situations. In 1965, Officer John Nelson came up with the idea to form a specially trained and equipped unit to respond to and manage critical situations while minimizing police casualties.
As an inspector, Gates approved this idea. He formed a small select group of volunteer officers. The first SWAT team, which Gates had originally wanted to name "Special Weapons Attack Team," was born LAPD SWAT, D-Platoon of the Metro Division. This first SWAT unit was initially constituted as 15 teams of four men each, for a total staff of 60. These officers were given special status and benefits, but in return they had to attend monthly trainings and serve as security for police facilities during episodes of civil unrest. SWAT was copied almost immediately by most US police departments, and is now used by law enforcement agencies throughout the world.
In Gates' autobiography, Chief: My Life in the LAPD (Bantam Books
, 1992), he explained that he developed neither SWAT tactics nor its distinctive equipment. He wrote that he supported the concept, tried to empower his people to develop the concept, and lent them moral support.
(CAPA) as one of two dozen or so plaintiffs, later sued the LAPD on First Amendment
grounds that exposed the unlawful harassment, surveillance, and infiltration of the progressive movement in Los Angeles by LAPD agents. The lawsuit against Gates and the LAPD proved successful. The PDID was ordered to disband, and did so in January 1983. In February 1984, an out-of-court settlement awarded $1.8 million dollars to the named plaintiffs, individuals, and organizations who had sued the City of Los Angeles
. A drug-related issue that had also come to the forefront at the time was gang
violence, which paralyzed many of the neighborhoods (primarily impoverished and black or Hispanic) in which gangs held sway. In response, the LAPD set up specialist gang units which gathered intelligence on and ran operations against gangs. These units were called Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums
, aka CRASH, immortalized in the 1988 film Colors
. Gates' aggressive approach to the gang problem was effective in suppressing gang violence but allegations of false arrest and a general LAPD disdain for young black
and Latino
men were made. By this time, however, the department had a significant percentage of minority officers.
Gates himself became a byword among some for excessive use of force by anti-gang units, and became a favorite lyrical target for gang-connected urban black rappers notably, Ice Cube. Nevertheless, CRASH's approach appeared successful and remained in widespread use until the Rampart Division
scandal of 1999 drew attention to abuses of the law that threatened to undo hundreds of criminal convictions.
, during a time of tremendous change in California politics. While the LAPD traditionally had been a "lean and mean" department compared with other American police forces (a point of pride for Parker), traffic congestion and continually decreasing officer-to-resident ratios (approximately 7,000 police officers for 3,000,000 residents in 1978) diminished the effectiveness of LAPD's prized mobility. Gates was eager to take more recruits, particularly for CRASH units, when the city made funds available.
Gates later claimed that many officers recruited in the 1980s — a period in which the LAPD was subject to a consent decree
which set minimum quotas for hiring of women and minorities — were substandard, remarking:
beating, Gates was at a community policing conference. This tendency, a logical extension of the policies implemented by Parker that discouraged LAPD officers from becoming too enmeshed in the communities in which they served, did not serve him well politically: allegations of arrogance and racism plagued the department throughout his tenure, surfacing most strongly in the Christopher Commission
report.
. After eight people were gunned down at a birthday party in a drive by shooting in 1987, Gates responded with an extremely aggressive sweep of South Los Angeles that involved 1000 officers at any given time.
The operation lasted several years, with multiple sweeps, and resulted in over 25,000 arrests. (This was not unprecedented: during the run-up to the 1984 Summer Olympics, Mayor Tom Bradley
allegedly ordered Gates to take all of the city's gang members—known and suspected—into custody, where they remained until shortly after the Games' conclusion.)
As a vast majority of those arrested were never charged, Operation Hammer was roundly criticized as a harassment operation whose chief goal was to intimidate young black and Hispanic men. In a PBS interview, when asked whether the local people in the minority areas expressed thanks to the police for their actions, he responded:
was arrested and beaten by LAPD officers after a car chase. A bystander, George Holliday, recorded the beating on videotape. Gates and his department faced strong criticism in the aftermath of the beating; the Christopher Commission
report, issued July 10, 1991, identified a police culture of excessive force and poor supervision, and recommended numerous reforms, as well as Gates's removal. Mayor Tom Bradley
also called for Gates to resign, but he refused, leading to an extended stand-off between Gates and the mayor.
The 1992 Los Angeles riots
, which began when a jury acquitted four white
Los Angeles Police Department officers accused in the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney King following a high-speed pursuit, brought an end to Gates's police career.
On the first evening of the riots, Gates told reporters that the situation would soon be under control, and attended a previously scheduled fundraising dinner. These actions led to charges that Gates was out of touch. General command-and-control failings in the entire LAPD hierarchy during the riots led to criticisms that he was incapable of managing his force. In the aftermath of the riots, local and national media printed and aired dozens of reports deeply critical of the LAPD under Gates, painting it as an army of racist beat cops accountable only to an arrogant leadership. While evidence of systematic racism among the rank-and-file and by Gates himself was not clear-cut, the paramilitary approach that Gates represented came in for criticism, and calls for the LAPD to shift to a community policing strategy.
Gates finally resigned on June 28, 1992, and was replaced by Willie L. Williams
. A second commission, the Webster Commission, headed by former FBI and CIA Director William H. Webster, was formed in the wake of the riots. Its report, released on October 21, 1992, was generally considered to be scathingly critical of the department (as well as other government agencies) and was especially critical of Gates' management of it.
, an adventure game set in Los Angeles where gamers play the role of a Robbery/Homicide detective trying to solve a series of brutal murders. He appears in the game as Chief of Police, and can be found on one of the top floors of Parker Center
. In addition, Gates has been the principal consultant for Sierra's SWAT
series, appearing in them as well. In 1993, Gates was a talk show host on KFI
, replacing Tom Leykis
. His tenure was short lived but he remained a frequent guest on talk radio, especially in regards to policing issues.
, written with the assistance of Diane K. Shah (Bantam Books). The book has much detail about Gates's career and high-profile cases, although the book went to press before the L.A. riots.
that he intended to apply for his old job as LAPD chief. This led Los Angeles media to ridicule Gates' announcement as a publicity stunt
. Hahn ultimately appointed William J. Bratton
, a former police commissioner of Boston
and New York City
, to head the department.
On April 16, 2010, Gates died at his home in Dana Point, California
at the age of 83 after a battle with bladder cancer.
Los Angeles Police Department
The Los Angeles Police Department is the police department of the city of Los Angeles, California. With just under 10,000 officers and more than 3,000 civilian staff, covering an area of with a population of more than 4.1 million people, it is the third largest local law enforcement agency in...
(LAPD) from 1978 to 1992.
Early life
Gates was born to a MormonMormon
The term Mormon most commonly denotes an adherent, practitioner, follower, or constituent of Mormonism, which is the largest branch of the Latter Day Saint movement in restorationist Christianity...
mother and a Catholic
Catholic
The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...
father; he was raised in his mother's faith. He grew up in Glendale
Glendale, California
Glendale is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2010 Census, the city population is 191,719, down from 194,973 at the 2000 census. making it the third largest city in Los Angeles County and the 22nd largest city in the state of California...
and Highland Park
Highland Park, Los Angeles, California
Highland Park is a neighborhood in Northeast Los Angeles.-Geography:Highland Park is located along the Arroyo Seco. It is situated within what was once Rancho San Rafael of the Spanish / Mexican era...
, in the northeastern part of Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
. The Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
had an impact on his early life: his father was an alcoholic
Alcoholism
Alcoholism is a broad term for problems with alcohol, and is generally used to mean compulsive and uncontrolled consumption of alcoholic beverages, usually to the detriment of the drinker's health, personal relationships, and social standing...
, and frequently ended up in the custody of the Glendale police. (Later in life, Gates often remarked on the taunts and harassment he received from schoolmates because of his father's behavior.) Gates later wrote that he had a low opinion of the police due to their rough treatment of his father, and at age 16 Gates himself was arrested after punching an officer who gave him a parking ticket (Gates apologized and the charges were dropped).
Gates graduated from Franklin High School in Highland Park, and joined the Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
in time to see action in the Pacific Theater
Pacific Ocean theater of World War II
The Pacific Ocean theatre was one of four major naval theatres of war of World War II, which pitted the forces of Japan against those of the United States, the British Commonwealth, the Netherlands and France....
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. After leaving the Navy, he attended Pasadena City College
Pasadena City College
Pasadena City College is a community college in Pasadena, California, USA, located on Colorado Boulevard. PCC is the third largest community college campus in the United States. PCC was founded in 1924 as Pasadena Junior College. In 1954, Pasadena Junior College merged with another junior...
and married his first wife, Wanda Hawkins. He went on to take pre-law classes at the University of Southern California
University of Southern California
The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...
. After his wife became pregnant, a friend suggested that he join the LAPD, which was conducting a recruitment drive among former servicemen; Gates initially declined, then decided it was a good opportunity. (Gates later finished his degree at USC.)
LAPD career
He joined the LAPD in 1949. Among his roles as an officer, Gates was picked to be the chauffeur for Chief William H. Parker. Gates often remarked that he gained many administrative and professional insights from Parker during the hours they spent together each day.Gates worked hard to prepare for his promotional exams, scoring first in the sergeant's exam and in every promotional exam thereafter. On his promotion to lieutenant
Lieutenant
A lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer in many nations' armed forces. Typically, the rank of lieutenant in naval usage, while still a junior officer rank, is senior to the army rank...
, he rejoined Chief Parker as Parker's executive officer. He was promoted to captain
Police captain
- France :France uses the rank of capitaine for management duties in both uniformed and plain-clothed policing. The rank comes senior to lieutenant and junior to commandant....
, responsible for intelligence. By the time of the Watts riots
Watts Riots
The Watts Riots or the Watts Rebellion was a civil disturbance in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles, California from August 11 to August 15, 1965. The 5-day riot resulted in 34 deaths, 1,032 injuries, and 3,438 arrests...
in 1965 he was an inspector
Inspector
Inspector is both a police rank and an administrative position, both used in a number of contexts. However, it is not an equivalent rank in each police force.- Australia :...
(overseeing the investigations of, among other crimes, the Manson Family murders and the Hillside Strangler
Hillside Strangler
The Hillside Strangler is the media epithet for two men, cousins Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono, who were convicted of kidnapping, raping, torturing, and killing girls and women ranging in age from 12 to 28 years old during a four-month period from late 1977 to early 1978...
case). On March 28, 1978, Gates became the 49th Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department.
SWAT
Gates, considered the father of SWATSWAT
A SWAT team is an elite tactical unit in various national law enforcement departments. They are trained to perform high-risk operations that fall outside of the abilities of regular officers...
(Special Weapons And Tactics), established the specialized unit in order to deal with hostage rescue and extreme situations involving armed and dangerous suspects. Ordinary street officers, with light armament, limited weapons training and little instruction on group fighting techniques, had shown to be ineffective in dealing with snipers, bank robberies carried out by heavily armed persons, and other high-intensity situations. In 1965, Officer John Nelson came up with the idea to form a specially trained and equipped unit to respond to and manage critical situations while minimizing police casualties.
As an inspector, Gates approved this idea. He formed a small select group of volunteer officers. The first SWAT team, which Gates had originally wanted to name "Special Weapons Attack Team," was born LAPD SWAT, D-Platoon of the Metro Division. This first SWAT unit was initially constituted as 15 teams of four men each, for a total staff of 60. These officers were given special status and benefits, but in return they had to attend monthly trainings and serve as security for police facilities during episodes of civil unrest. SWAT was copied almost immediately by most US police departments, and is now used by law enforcement agencies throughout the world.
In Gates' autobiography, Chief: My Life in the LAPD (Bantam Books
Bantam Books
Bantam Books is an American publishing house owned entirely by Random House, the German media corporation subsidiary of Bertelsmann; it is an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group. It was formed in 1945 by Walter B. Pitkin, Jr., Sidney B. Kramer, and Ian and Betty Ballantine...
, 1992), he explained that he developed neither SWAT tactics nor its distinctive equipment. He wrote that he supported the concept, tried to empower his people to develop the concept, and lent them moral support.
PDID
Gates made substantial use of the LAPD's Public Disorder and Intelligence Division (PDID) squad, even developing an international spying operation. The lawsuit CAPA v. Gates, with the Coalition Against Police AbuseCoalition Against Police Abuse
The Coalition Against Police Abuse is a currently active community organization in Los Angeles with the stated aim of organizing marginalized groups such as the poor, homosexuals, blacks, and Latinos to prevent, expose, and resist abuse by police and seek legal redress for such abuse.-History and...
(CAPA) as one of two dozen or so plaintiffs, later sued the LAPD on First Amendment
First Amendment to the United States Constitution
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights. The amendment prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering...
grounds that exposed the unlawful harassment, surveillance, and infiltration of the progressive movement in Los Angeles by LAPD agents. The lawsuit against Gates and the LAPD proved successful. The PDID was ordered to disband, and did so in January 1983. In February 1984, an out-of-court settlement awarded $1.8 million dollars to the named plaintiffs, individuals, and organizations who had sued the City of Los Angeles
DARE
In joint collaboration with the Rotary Club of Los Angeles, Gates founded DARE, the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program designed to educate children about the dangers of drug abuse. DARE is currently used in schools worldwide, although scientific research has found it to be ineffective in reducing alcohol or drug use and there is evidence that it may increase drug use among some groups.CRASH
Gates's appointment as chief roughly coincided with the intensification of the War on DrugsWar on Drugs
The War on Drugs is a campaign of prohibition and foreign military aid and military intervention being undertaken by the United States government, with the assistance of participating countries, intended to both define and reduce the illegal drug trade...
. A drug-related issue that had also come to the forefront at the time was gang
Gang
A gang is a group of people who, through the organization, formation, and establishment of an assemblage, share a common identity. In current usage it typically denotes a criminal organization or else a criminal affiliation. In early usage, the word gang referred to a group of workmen...
violence, which paralyzed many of the neighborhoods (primarily impoverished and black or Hispanic) in which gangs held sway. In response, the LAPD set up specialist gang units which gathered intelligence on and ran operations against gangs. These units were called Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums
Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums
Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums, usually known by the acronym C.R.A.S.H., was an elite, but controversial special operations unit of the Los Angeles Police Department. It was established by then-chief Daryl Gates to combat the rising problem of gangs in Los Angeles, California...
, aka CRASH, immortalized in the 1988 film Colors
Colors (film)
Colors is a 1988 police procedural crime film starring Sean Penn and Robert Duvall and directed by Dennis Hopper. The story takes place in South Central Los Angeles, and is about Bob Hodges , an experienced LAPD Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums Police Officer III, and his rookie partner,...
. Gates' aggressive approach to the gang problem was effective in suppressing gang violence but allegations of false arrest and a general LAPD disdain for young black
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
and Latino
Latino
The demonyms Latino and Latina , are defined in English language dictionaries as:* "a person of Latin-American descent."* "A Latin American."* "A person of Hispanic, especially Latin-American, descent, often one living in the United States."...
men were made. By this time, however, the department had a significant percentage of minority officers.
Gates himself became a byword among some for excessive use of force by anti-gang units, and became a favorite lyrical target for gang-connected urban black rappers notably, Ice Cube. Nevertheless, CRASH's approach appeared successful and remained in widespread use until the Rampart Division
Rampart Scandal
The Rampart scandal refers to widespread corruption in the Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums anti-gang unit of the Los Angeles Police Department Rampart Division in the late 1990s. More than 70 police officers in the CRASH unit were implicated in misconduct, making it one of the most...
scandal of 1999 drew attention to abuses of the law that threatened to undo hundreds of criminal convictions.
Force enlargement
Gates became LAPD chief of police a little over two months before the enactment of California's Proposition 13California Proposition 13
There are two different ballot proposition in California called Proposition 13:* California Proposition 13 , about property taxation.* California Proposition 13 , about state officer salary increases....
, during a time of tremendous change in California politics. While the LAPD traditionally had been a "lean and mean" department compared with other American police forces (a point of pride for Parker), traffic congestion and continually decreasing officer-to-resident ratios (approximately 7,000 police officers for 3,000,000 residents in 1978) diminished the effectiveness of LAPD's prized mobility. Gates was eager to take more recruits, particularly for CRASH units, when the city made funds available.
Gates later claimed that many officers recruited in the 1980s — a period in which the LAPD was subject to a consent decree
Consent decree
A consent decree is a final, binding judicial decree or judgment memorializing a voluntary agreement between parties to a suit in return for withdrawal of a criminal charge or an end to a civil litigation...
which set minimum quotas for hiring of women and minorities — were substandard, remarking:
- " ... [I]f you don't have all of those quotas, you can't hire all the people you need. So you've got to make all of those quotas. And when that happens, you get somebody who is on the borderline, you'd say "Yes, he's black, or he's Hispanic, or it's a female, but we want to bring in these additional people when we have the opportunity. So we'll err on the side of, 'We'll take them and hope it works out.'" And we made some mistakes. No question about it, we have made some mistakes."
Special Order 40
In 1979 Gates helped craft and implement Special Order 40, a mandate that prohibits police officers from stopping people for the sole purpose of obtaining immigration status. The mandate was created in an effort to encourage residents to report crimes without the fear of intimidation or deportation.Administrative style and personality
Like his mentor Parker, Gates publicly questioned the effectiveness of community policing, usually electing not to work with community activists and prominent persons in communities in which the LAPD was conducting major anti-gang operations. At the time of the Rodney KingRodney King
Rodney Glen King is an American best known for his involvement in a police brutality case involving the Los Angeles Police Department on March 3, 1991...
beating, Gates was at a community policing conference. This tendency, a logical extension of the policies implemented by Parker that discouraged LAPD officers from becoming too enmeshed in the communities in which they served, did not serve him well politically: allegations of arrogance and racism plagued the department throughout his tenure, surfacing most strongly in the Christopher Commission
Christopher Commission
The Independent Commission on the Los Angeles Police Department, informally known as the Christopher Commission, was formed in July 1991, in the wake of the Rodney King beating, by then-mayor of Los Angeles Tom Bradley. It was chaired by attorney Warren Christopher...
report.
Operation Hammer
Many commentators criticized Gates for Operation Hammer, a policing operation conducted by the LAPD in South Los AngelesSouth Los Angeles
South Los Angeles, often abbreviated as South L.A. and formerly South Central Los Angeles, is the official name for a large geographic and cultural portion lying to the southwest and southeast of downtown Los Angeles, California. The area was formerly called South Central, and is still widely known...
. After eight people were gunned down at a birthday party in a drive by shooting in 1987, Gates responded with an extremely aggressive sweep of South Los Angeles that involved 1000 officers at any given time.
The operation lasted several years, with multiple sweeps, and resulted in over 25,000 arrests. (This was not unprecedented: during the run-up to the 1984 Summer Olympics, Mayor Tom Bradley
Tom Bradley (politician)
Thomas J. "Tom" Bradley was the 38th Mayor of Los Angeles, California, serving in that office from 1973 to 1993. He was the first and to date only African American mayor of Los Angeles...
allegedly ordered Gates to take all of the city's gang members—known and suspected—into custody, where they remained until shortly after the Games' conclusion.)
As a vast majority of those arrested were never charged, Operation Hammer was roundly criticized as a harassment operation whose chief goal was to intimidate young black and Hispanic men. In a PBS interview, when asked whether the local people in the minority areas expressed thanks to the police for their actions, he responded:
Rodney King and the Los Angeles riots
On March 3, 1991, Rodney KingRodney King
Rodney Glen King is an American best known for his involvement in a police brutality case involving the Los Angeles Police Department on March 3, 1991...
was arrested and beaten by LAPD officers after a car chase. A bystander, George Holliday, recorded the beating on videotape. Gates and his department faced strong criticism in the aftermath of the beating; the Christopher Commission
Christopher Commission
The Independent Commission on the Los Angeles Police Department, informally known as the Christopher Commission, was formed in July 1991, in the wake of the Rodney King beating, by then-mayor of Los Angeles Tom Bradley. It was chaired by attorney Warren Christopher...
report, issued July 10, 1991, identified a police culture of excessive force and poor supervision, and recommended numerous reforms, as well as Gates's removal. Mayor Tom Bradley
Tom Bradley (politician)
Thomas J. "Tom" Bradley was the 38th Mayor of Los Angeles, California, serving in that office from 1973 to 1993. He was the first and to date only African American mayor of Los Angeles...
also called for Gates to resign, but he refused, leading to an extended stand-off between Gates and the mayor.
The 1992 Los Angeles riots
1992 Los Angeles riots
The 1992 Los Angeles Riots or South Central Riots, also known as the 1992 Los Angeles Civil Unrest were sparked on April 29, 1992, when a jury acquitted three white and one hispanic Los Angeles Police Department officers accused in the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney King following a...
, which began when a jury acquitted four white
White people
White people is a term which usually refers to human beings characterized, at least in part, by the light pigmentation of their skin...
Los Angeles Police Department officers accused in the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney King following a high-speed pursuit, brought an end to Gates's police career.
On the first evening of the riots, Gates told reporters that the situation would soon be under control, and attended a previously scheduled fundraising dinner. These actions led to charges that Gates was out of touch. General command-and-control failings in the entire LAPD hierarchy during the riots led to criticisms that he was incapable of managing his force. In the aftermath of the riots, local and national media printed and aired dozens of reports deeply critical of the LAPD under Gates, painting it as an army of racist beat cops accountable only to an arrogant leadership. While evidence of systematic racism among the rank-and-file and by Gates himself was not clear-cut, the paramilitary approach that Gates represented came in for criticism, and calls for the LAPD to shift to a community policing strategy.
Gates finally resigned on June 28, 1992, and was replaced by Willie L. Williams
Willie L. Williams
Willie L. Williams was chief of the Los Angeles Police Department from 1992 to 1997, taking over after chief Daryl Gates' resignation following the 1992 Los Angeles riots. Williams was the first African-American police commissioner of both the Philadelphia Police Department and the LAPD...
. A second commission, the Webster Commission, headed by former FBI and CIA Director William H. Webster, was formed in the wake of the riots. Its report, released on October 21, 1992, was generally considered to be scathingly critical of the department (as well as other government agencies) and was especially critical of Gates' management of it.
Controversial rhetoric
Gates earned notoriety for his controversial rhetoric on many occasions. Some of the most notable examples of this were:- His testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee that infrequent or casual drug users "ought to be taken out and shot" because "we're in a war" and even casual drug use is "treason." He later said the testimony was calculated hyperbole.
- His dismissive response to concerns about excessive force by police employing "choke holds." Gates attributed several deaths of people held in choke holds to the theory that "blacks might be more likely to die from chokeholds because their arteries do not open as fast as they do on 'normal people.'" (In his autobiography, Gates explained that he had been misquoted, saying that black people were more predisposed to vascular conditions and therefore less likely to have normally-functioning arteries.)
Post-LAPD career
Gates remained active after leaving the LAPD, working with Sierra to create the computer game Police Quest IV: Open SeasonPolice Quest IV: Open Season
Daryl F. Gates' Police Quest: Open Season is the fourth installment of Sierra Entertainment's popular Police Quest computer game series. Released in 1993, it was created by retired Police Chief Daryl F. Gates, who was the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department from 1978 to 1992...
, an adventure game set in Los Angeles where gamers play the role of a Robbery/Homicide detective trying to solve a series of brutal murders. He appears in the game as Chief of Police, and can be found on one of the top floors of Parker Center
Parker Center
Parker Center was the headquarters for the Los Angeles Police Department from 1954 until October 2009, and is located in Downtown LA. It is named for former LAPD chief William H. Parker. Originally with the prosaic name, the Police Administration Building, ground for the center was broken on...
. In addition, Gates has been the principal consultant for Sierra's SWAT
SWAT series
The SWAT series are the follow-up of Sierra's classic adventure game series Police Quest. The adventure game decreased in popularity by the mid-nineties and Jim Walls, the former series designer, left Sierra and was replaced by real-life SWAT founder Daryl F. Gates. After Gates released Open...
series, appearing in them as well. In 1993, Gates was a talk show host on KFI
KFI
KFI is an AM radio station in Los Angeles, California. It received its license to operate on March 31, 1922 and began operating on April 16, 1922 as one of the United States' first high-powered, "clear-channel" stations...
, replacing Tom Leykis
Tom Leykis
Thomas Joseph Leykis is an American radio personality. He currently hosts The Tasting Room with Tom Leykis, a weekly lifestyle program dealing with fine food and drink, airing weekends mainly in West Coast markets...
. His tenure was short lived but he remained a frequent guest on talk radio, especially in regards to policing issues.
Businessman
Gates was President/CEO of Global ePoint, a security and homeland defense company dealing primarily in digital surveillance and security technology. He also served on the Advisory Board of PropertyRoom.com, a website for police auctions.Autobiography
In 1992 he published Chief: My Life in the LAPD, an autobiographyAutobiography
An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...
, written with the assistance of Diane K. Shah (Bantam Books). The book has much detail about Gates's career and high-profile cases, although the book went to press before the L.A. riots.
Later years
After Bernard Parks was denied a second term as Chief of Police by Mayor James K. Hahn in 2002, Gates, aged 75, told CNNCNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
that he intended to apply for his old job as LAPD chief. This led Los Angeles media to ridicule Gates' announcement as a publicity stunt
Publicity stunt
A publicity stunt is a planned event designed to attract the public's attention to the event's organizers or their cause. Publicity stunts can be professionally organized or set up by amateurs...
. Hahn ultimately appointed William J. Bratton
William J. Bratton
William Joseph "Bill" Bratton CBE is an American law enforcement officer who served as the chief of police of the Los Angeles Police Department , New York City Police Commissioner, and Boston Police Commissioner....
, a former police commissioner of Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
and New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, to head the department.
On April 16, 2010, Gates died at his home in Dana Point, California
Dana Point, California
-Climate:Dana Point enjoys a mild climate where temperatures tend to average around the 60's. The warmest month of the year is August with an average temperature of 79 degrees Fahrenheit. The coldest month is December with an average minimum temperature of 44 degrees Fahrenheit.-2010:The 2010...
at the age of 83 after a battle with bladder cancer.
Additional reading
- Alonso, Alex (2010), Out of the Void: Street Gangs in Black Los Angeles in Black Los Angeles: American Dreams and Racial Realities, (Eds) Darnell Hunt and Ana-Christina Ramon, New York University: New York. ISBN 978-0-8147-3735
- Cannon, Lou (1998), Official Negligence: How Rodney King and the Riots Changed Los Angeles and the LAPD, Crown. ISBN 0-8129-2190-9
- Corwin, Miles (1998), The Killing Season : A Summer Inside an LAPD Homicide Division Fawcett. ISBN 0-449-00291-8
- Domanick, Joe (1994), To Protect and to Serve: The LAPD's Century of War in the City of Dreams, New York: Pocket Books.
- Gates, Daryl F. (1992), Chief: My Life in the LAPD. New York: Bantam. ISBN 0-553-56205-3
- Starr, Kevin (2004), Coast of Dreams: California on the Edge, 1990-2003, New York: Knopf.
- Koon, Stacey (1992), Presumed Guilty: The Tragedy of the Rodney King Affair, Regnery Publishing. ISBN 0-89526-507-9
External links
Retrieved on 2008-01-24- Daryl Gates speech on drugs at the LAPD Medal of Valor ceremony, 1990