Charlie Beck

The City Council's Public Safety Committee on Monday unanimously confirmed Charlie Beck's nomination to be the next Los Angeles police chief. The vote came after a hearing in which community leaders and council members praised Beck's work at the Los Angeles Police Department and called him the right man to take over the department right now. Beck made his own presentation, saying his top goal was to extend the reforms begun by former Police...

Thirteen Los Angeles Police Department officers were recognized for heroism during a recent ceremony in Hollywood. Police Chief Charlie Beck last week presented the officers and detectives with the department's highest honors, the Medal of Valor and the Purple Heart. This was the second year the Purple Heart was bestowed on officers who suffered grave injuries in the line of duty. The officers included men and women, some injured or put at risk while on patrol, on undercover assignments or headed home after work.

To think deeply and compassionately about South Los Angeles as we approach the 20th anniversary of the L.A. riots is to inhabit a middle ground between optimism and bleak defeat. A lot of good is going on in the inner city. But the last two decades have also underscored how many problems remain, as stubborn and persistent as a strangling weed. "It's been a schizophrenic journey, these 20 years," said John Mack, my tour guide to riot ground zero a few days ago. SHARE YOUR STORY: L.A. riots South L.A., Mack said, "is a mix of success and failure.

Criticizing the chief Re "Beck facing rare criticism," April 16 The fact that suspects do stupid stuff that gets them killed or wounded is apparently lost on the L.A. Police Commission, which has criticized Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck for not punishing officers it found to have used improper force. By insisting that errors of the head be punished, the message to the rank and file is to hesitate the next time - and you too can be among the "honored fallen.

In 1974, Charlie Beck -- the man poised to become the next chief of the Los Angeles Police Department -- was 21 years old, unemployed, unfulfilled and adrift. He had spent his teenage years training as a professional dirt motorbike racer but reluctantly walked away after failing to compete at the sport's elite levels. For the first time in his life, he gave serious consideration to the profession his father, a high-ranking officer in the LAPD, had chosen. Beck took a job assisting detectives with their office work and, intrigued by what he saw, joined the force as a part-time reserve officer.

Re "As the LAPD evolved, so did he," Nov. 15 Charlie Beck is an outstanding and honorable man who will make a fine chief of police. I wish him nothing but the best. However, I am sad he has fallen victim to a revisionist view of history, denigrating previous chiefs and policing policies. I policed South-Central Los Angeles, albeit in a different uniform, from the 1970s through 2009. I witnessed the perfect storm of social, economic, cultural and political circumstances that resulted in an unprecedented level of violence in the Los Angeles area.

Los Angeles City Council members Tuesday formally appointed Charlie Beck as the city's new police chief, enthusiastically praising the selection of the LAPD veteran for the job, but also acknowledging that the city's ongoing fiscal crisis will inevitably complicate, and perhaps strain, his relationship with elected officials. Council members unanimously approved Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's nomination of Beck, who becomes the 56th chief of the Los Angeles Police Department. Surrounded by family and friends, Beck officially began the five-year term when he was sworn into his new position by Villaraigosa following the council's action.

The relationship between Los Angeles city government and its Police Department once was distinctly destructive: City Hall starved the LAPD for resources but, by way of consolation, allowed its officers to do their work without much second-guessing. The result was a kind of mutually assured destruction at the civic level, and the breaking point occurred in 1991 and 1992. The beating of Rodney G. King inflamed an abused public, and the riots that erupted when the officers responsible were found not guilty highlighted both the fury toward the police and the LAPD's inability to respond.

For a man widely seen as the disciple of just-exited LAPD Chief William J. Bratton, Charlie Beck on Wednesday exhibited some notable contrasts in style and strategy from the man he was tapped to replace. In an interview with Times reporters, editors and editorial board members, Deputy Chief Beck portrayed himself as a leader rooted by his ties to rank-and-file officers, as opposed to Bratton, who reformed the department by focusing on its upper echelon. The 32-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department said he would concentrate on pushing down reforms Bratton introduced into the mind-set of the thousands of officers who are the heart of the organization.

Los Angeles Police chief-designate Charlie Beck is widely admired as a capable manager who has tackled some of the department's thorniest issues with a steady hand and a disarming personality. He is credited with cleaning up the Rampart Division, ferreting out disarray in the crime lab and championing greater transparency and accountability in the department. But a Times review of court records found one incident over his 32-year career in which Beck was accused of mishandling a crisis, stifling reform and covering up the misuse of taxpayer money.

Responding to incidents of violence against transgender arrestees, the Los Angeles Police Department plans to open a segregated lockup for biologically male and female suspects who identify themselves as members of the opposite sex, officials said. By early May, a 24-bed transgender module will open at the LAPD women's jail downtown, the first such police lockup in the nation, according to Capt. Dave Lindsay, the jail division commander. "This is a major change," Lindsay said.

The price of power Re "Activists feeling burned," April 6 Southern California has many large, empty rooftops that could easily support a sea of solar panels. Exploitation of this vast resource, which is already connected to the grid, should be a top regional priority. Unfortunately, the decision-makers at our utilities prefer to stick with an outmoded business model that relies on corporate point-source energy production, in which solar power plants are substituted for coal-fired ones.

To think deeply and compassionately about South Los Angeles as we approach the 20th anniversary of the L.A. riots is to inhabit a middle ground between optimism and bleak defeat. A lot of good is going on in the inner city. But the last two decades have also underscored how many problems remain, as stubborn and persistent as a strangling weed. "It's been a schizophrenic journey, these 20 years," said John Mack, my tour guide to riot ground zero a few days ago. SHARE YOUR STORY: L.A. riots South L.A., Mack said, "is a mix of success and failure.

A jury found former Los Angeles Police Det. Stephanie Lazarus guilty of murdering the wife of a man who had spurned her, bringing an end to a remarkable case in which a new generation of the LAPD redeemed the failures of a past one. On Thursday, after little more than a day of deliberation, the panel of eight women and four men concluded that Lazarus brutally beat and then shot Sherri Rasmussen three times in the chest on Feb. 24, 1986. Three months before the attack, Rasmussen, a 29-year-old hospital nursing director, had married John Ruetten, who dated Lazarus casually for a few years leading up to the wedding.

L.A. County Sheriff Lee Baca said he would get behind a "sensible" plan to issue driver's licenses to illegal immigrants who have been in the country for several years without breaking any other laws. Baca's comments Thursday came the day after Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck also expressed support for such a plan, saying that it would reduce the number of hit-and-run accidents and uninsured drivers on city roads. Baca said such licenses should only be issued after illegal immigrants fill out comprehensive applications, similar to those for citizenship.

At first glance, a proposal by LAPD Chief Charlie Beck to clarify the way police handle cars they impound from unlicensed drivers doesn't sound controversial. But his proposal touches one of the city's hot-button issues - illegal immigration - and it reopens a larger, historical question: Who's in charge of the city's police? Under Beck's plan, police officers would be given guidelines for when they should impound the cars of unlicensed drivers for 30 days - a penalty that can impede a driver's ability to work and cost him or her almost $1,400 - and when they should instead merely hold a car until a licensed driver can pick it up. Factors such as the driver's record and the seriousness of the violation would dictate which approach would be employed and presumably discourage arbitrary and unequal treatment.

Social Security cards run about $20, green cards about $70 and a California driver's license between $60 and $250. The price jumps up for higher-quality documents, such as IDs with magnetic strips containing real information -- often from victims of identity theft. As the demand for counterfeit IDs skyrockets, the criminal organizations that produce them are increasingly relying on sophisticated technology to expand their operations and thwart authorities.

Shell casings and signals from one of the victim's cellphones led police to arrest two men in the slayings of two USC graduate students from China - a botched robbery that focused a harsh global spotlight on the campus that is a magnet for foreigners. At a news conference Friday evening, Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck identified the suspects as Bryan Barnes, 20, of Los Angeles and Javier Bolden, 19. Barnes was taken into custody Friday afternoon by a team of LAPD SWAT officers, along with FBI and other federal agents, who raided an apartment near the USC campus.

Unlicensed drivers without prior convictions would be given the chance to avoid having their vehicles impounded under new rules outlined Tuesday by the Los Angeles Police Department. The proposed changes to the impound procedures are a potentially explosive issue because LAPD Chief Charlie Beck designed the reforms to remedy what he believes is the unfair burden that impounds place on illegal immigrants. Since immigrants who are in the country illegally cannot get driver's licenses in California and most other states, they make up the majority of the drivers who have their cars impounded for the infraction.

When the tents started spreading out across the City Hall lawn seven weeks ago, Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck quickly realized that the Occupy L.A. protest could become a defining moment for his department. Beck immediately made it his business to know what was going on inside the loosely organized movement. He talked frequently to several protest leaders on the telephone and kept in close contact with civil rights lawyers who were advising the demonstrators. His officers made a point of talking up protesters on the ground — and trying to ignore the smell of marijuana that wafted through the camp.