LAPD Chief Bratton lashes out at ACLU

Los Angeles city officials Monday hailed a judge’s decision on Friday to lift most federal oversight of the LAPD. The police chief, meantime, bristled at suggestion his department engages in racial profiling. KPCC’s Frank Stoltze reports.

Frank Stoltze: Los Angeles Police Commissioner John Mack, once one of the LAPD’s sharpest critics, called the end of eight years of federal oversight a turning point for a department with an often brutal history.

John Mack: We clearly have made giant strides in changing the institutional culture of LAPD.

Stoltze: The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California argued that there’s evidence the LAPD continues to engage in racial profiling, and that a federal judge should keep watch on it.

LAPD Police Chief Bill Bratton reacted angrily to the ACLU's position.

Bill Bratton: As far as the ACLU, they need to give it up. This department is a model for American policing. And I resent their continuing attempt to try to infer that this department engages in racial profiling. We do not.

Stoltze: At the same time, the federal judge who oversaw LAPD reforms said it must improve the way it resolves claims of racial profiling and complete plans to install video cameras inside patrol cars to record instances of profiling.