The L.A. County Sheriff Civilian Oversight Commission is launching a “full-scale” investigation into allegations that the Sheriff’s Department is infested with secret and sometimes violent deputy gangs.
The oversight panel has assembled a team of attorneys from some of L.A.’s top law firms to carry out the investigation. It plans to use its subpoena power to compel people to testify and obtain documents, if necessary.
The new panel is modeled after the jail violence commission, which helped uncover efforts by former Sheriff Lee Baca to cover up the abuses. Baca and his former Undersheriff Paul Tanaka were eventually indicted and sentenced to federal prison after an FBI investigation.In its statement, the commission said “numerous reports demonstrate that deputy gangs still exist, but their scope and impact is unknown.
The survey found the topic of subgroups or gangs is sharply divisive within the department. The report says deputies' responses ranged from “those who belong to a subgroup hold themselves and each other to a higher standard and are the best the LASD has” to “they [subgroups] have destroyed many honest, hard-working deputies’ lives and careers.”
, eight Sheriff's deputies accused a group of their colleagues at the department's East L.A. station of being members of a secret"criminal gang" that violates their civil rights with a campaign of harassment and physical attacks.Support for LAist comes from
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