Rampart District Los Angeles

A 14-year-old boy's association with a tagging crew may have led to his fatal shooting in the Rampart area near downtown Los Angeles, police said Tuesday. Rene Vargas was gunned down about 8:15 p.m. Monday in the 1300 block of West 7th Street by a man who got out of a black sport utility vehicle, said Det. Fred Faustino of the Los Angeles Police Department. Vargas was shot several times in the upper body; he collapsed near the intersection of 7th and Witmer streets, police said.

A veteran Rampart Division police officer was relieved of duty Friday after being accused of lying about a drug arrest. His suspension comes days before a judge is to decide whether to lift federal oversight of the department imposed because of a corruption scandal at the station six years ago. Los Angeles Police Department Chief William J. Bratton suspended the officer after a six-month sting operation by internal affairs investigators.

The LAPD officer suspended after being caught during an undercover sting last week had been accused several times over his 16-year career of planting evidence on suspects, with the city paying out $520,000 to settle two civil lawsuits filed against him. The district attorney's office is deciding whether to file charges against Edward B. Zamora, who was the subject of an L.A. police investigation in which he was given the opportunity to arrest an undercover officer.

Big, bad Rampart is no more. Home to MacArthur Park, once home to the city's densest murder cluster, the Los Angeles police division has undergone a transformation so broad that for the last two years, homicides per capita have fallen to the citywide average. Measured in murder, Rampart is now safer than Boyle Heights and is nearly as safe as the harbor area, a Times analysis shows.

Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton agreed Tuesday to create a task force to enact reforms recommended by a citizens panel that looked at the Rampart Division police scandal. But he warned that some of the changes, including a 3,000-officer expansion of the police force, require elected officials' approval and may take years to achieve.

A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge has ordered three former owners of a dilapidated apartment building in the Rampart area to pay more than $3.5 million to 19 tenants and the state -- the largest such judgment ever won by the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles. Under the judgment, the three must return to tenants all the rents they collected as owners of the building in the 300 block of north Park View Street.