After delaying the announcement an additional 24 hours, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced today in Los Angeles that the current in-house Deputy Chief Charlie Beck will replace Chief William Bratton. During Bratton’s service of seven years in the position, crime decreased and he is also credited with improving race relations within the city.

The early responses to the nomination are positive from many, including the likes of other city officials.  Sheriff Lee Baca is quoted saying, “We have had a successful working relationship with the Los Angeles Police Department for many years, and we anticipate that partnership will continue under new Police Chief Charlie Beck.”

LA Times Opinion columnist Tim Rutten writes:

The mayor’s choice to lead the LAPD is committed to reform and has a strong support from civil rights activists and Latino, African American and immigrant leaders in the community.

The positive initial responses from key people in the city, as well as the supportive sentiments from those leaders representing many diverse factions of the city, are early indicators that Deputy Chief Beck will continue work on the track that Chief Bratton started – aiming for strong enforcement, while protecting the civil rights of the city’s residents.

Charlie Beck is a 32-year veteran on the LAPD force, who built relationships with many of the activists and leaders that supported him during his project of the rehabilitation of LAPD’s formerly-chaotic Rampart Division, as well as while he ran the department’s South Los Angeles operations.

Tags: civil rights, civil rights education, LAPD Police Chief, sojourn, sojourn to the past

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009 at 5:26 pm and is filed under Current Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.