Police Cadets

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca has ordered his academy to stop training new recruits until it addresses problems exposed by state inspectors, including the revelation that one instructor gave recruits the answers to their tests.

The next generation of California Highway Patrol officers was interrupted midway through basic training Wednesday with a warning that the state budget deadlock threatens to prevent them from being hired permanently. "You are potentially a surplus employee of the department," Assistant Commissioner Greg Augusta told the class of 144 cadets at the patrol's training academy. Many had quit other jobs to join the CHP.