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WHY would anyone want to become a police officer when even self- defense is now deemed "excessive force" and "racist?" Those charges have been hurled at Los Angeles police officers, who, on July 10, shot to death 19-month-old Suzie Marie Pena -- because her father Jose Raul Pena held the child as a human shield as he fired a stolen semiautomatic handgun toward police. Pena had wounded one officer during a 2 1/2-hour standoff. What's more, police had managed to rescue Suzie Marie's 17-year-old sister, who had called the police because Pena was threatening her, and he did fire his...

Los Angeles -- A lawyer representing the family of a toddler killed by police in a shootout with her father called on the U.S. Justice Department Monday to investigate the slaying. Suzie Pena, who was 19 months old, was shot after her father opened fire on officers who cornered him in his Watts auto repair business July 10 following an hours-long standoff. Jose Pena, 34, was holding the girl as he fired a 9 mm handgun, wounding one officer. Attorney Luis Carrillo said he requested a federal investigation because he doubted the Police Department would conduct an impartial probe. He...

Engaged in a high-stakes competition with other law enforcement agencies to lure the best recruits as it bolsters its ranks, the LAPD is looking to soften some of its requirements for new hires. Police Chief William Bratton, who hopes to see the Los Angeles Police Department grow from 9,220 officers to 10,500 within three years, said Thursday that the city should modify its stance on whether an applicant ever used drugs or had financial problems. "We have to be realistic, while looking to keep the highest standards," Bratton said. "I think, in this day, it is hard to find young...

An autopsy revealed evidence of cocaine in the body of Suzie Marie Peña, the toddler who died in a shootout between police and her father, who was using her as a shield, officials said today. Medical tests showed that the toddler's urine contained the drug benzoylechgoneine, into which cocaine metabolizes in the human body. The autopsy showed the presence of a trace amount of the drug, according to Craig Harvey, spokesman for the Los Angeles County coroner. Experts said it could have been ingested or inhaled. One official said the cocaine could have been eaten, come from breast milk, or...

For months, Iryna Singerman concealed her double life from her newlywed husband -- her shiny gold Mercedes, her illicit affair with a Woodland Hills playboy and the house she and her lover purchased together. Ronald Singerman learned of her secrets last week, when his 21-year-old wife failed to come home and financial documents belonging to the aspiring model were among the blood-soaked items found in garbage bags dumped in a trash bin behind a Woodland Hills strip mall. A decomposing body believed to be that of Iryna Singerman was found Tuesday, and police have intensified the search for her lover...

LOS ANGELES (AP) Dogged by scandal, the Los Angeles Police Department is looking beyond human judgment to technology to identify bad cops. This month, the agency began using a $35 million computer system that tracks complaints and other telling data about officers then alerts top supervisors to possible signs of misconduct. The system is central to a federal oversight program ordered by the U.S. Justice Department after a wave of abuse allegations in the 1990s cast doubt on the LAPD's ability and willingness to police itself. ``There definitely needs to be computerized management'' of officers, said Andre Birotte, the LAPD's...

LOS ANGELES -- A crowd assembled around a motorist being forcefully subdued by police eventually dispersed early Thursday, not far from demonstrators protesting an officer-involved shooting that left a baby dead, police said. The gathering of the two groups prompted the LAPD to go on citywide tactical alert, which was later scaled down to a South Bureau tactical alert, a Los Angeles police officer said. The incident involving the motorist started when a man who led police on a short pursuit that ended in his driveway at 84th Street and Towne Avenue shortly after 10 p.m. The man, whose name...

Los Angeles -- A toddler who was at times held by her father as a shield during an hours-long gunbattle with police died of a single gunshot wound fired by a rifle from a police officer, authorities told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

LOS ANGELES - A war of words is following a standoff and shootout with police that left a 19-month-old girl and her gun-wielding father dead. The man's brother on Tuesday called officers' actions "cruel" and the police chief hinted at Jose Pena's family troubles. "It's been cruel what's happened to my brother," German Pena told reporters in South Los Angeles. Pena described his brother as ill and criticized officers - one of whom was shot by Pena - for abruptly storming an office in an effort to end Sunday's nearly three-hour standoff. "They didn't have any patience, none at all,...

A man using his young daughter as a shield fired more than 40 rounds at neighbors and police before he was cut down by officers in an incident in which the child also died, Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton said this afternoon. Jose Raul Pena, 34, was embroiled in "a family dispute" that triggered his bizarre behavior Sunday night, police said. Bratton said the death of Pena and the hostage, his 19-month-old daughter Susie Lopez, was "a tragedy" that Pena brought on himself. No determination has been made about the cause of death as SWAT team members closed in....

Los Angeles police said Monday that the shootout that left a 19-month-old toddler dead occurred after officers attempted to rescue the girl by storming the used car dealership where her father was holding her hostage. The decision came more than two hours into Sunday's standoff when officers believed they had wounded Raul Peña and hoped they could save Susie Lopez, a pigtailed little girl whose somber face adorned magazine ads for his car lot. But instead of rescuing the girl, officers found themselves in a harrowing gun battle inside the business' cramped office. The gunfire ended with the suspect dead,...

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LOS ANGELES -- A 15-year Los Angeles Police Department officer was arrested for allegedly committing illegal sex acts with a teenage boy. Officer George Stan, 36, was taken into custody Wednesday at Los Angeles International Airport. LAPD officers and FBI agents met Stan when he returned from vacation. He is accused of multiple sex acts involving a 15-year-old boy over the past three years. He was booked for "oral copulation with a minor." According to an LAPD statement, "The investigation disclosed multiple illegal sexual acts involving Stan and a 15-year-old male victim. The acts occurred in the city of Simi...

The LAPD deliberately hid witness statements tying corrupt police to the slaying of Notorious B.I.G., a federal judge said .... [an] informant, cellmate to then-Officer Rafael Perez, the central figure in the Rampart police scandal, said Perez and rogue officer David Mack were involved in the slaying of the rapper, born Christopher Wallace .... LAPD robbery-homicide Det. Steven Katz's statement that he "forgot" that some of the documents were in his desk was "utterly unbelievable" ....

LOS ANGELES - A mistrial in the Notorious B.I.G. wrongful death case means his family won't get any immediate answers about his slaying but can file a new lawsuit seeking to link the unsolved 1997 killing to the Los Angeles Police Department's Rampart corruption scandal. U.S. District Judge Florence-Marie Cooper declared a mistrial Wednesday after she expressed concern at a hearing Tuesday that the LAPD had deliberately withheld evidence. Her clerk and attorneys on both sides confirmed the ruling, and a written order was to be issued Thursday. There were only three days of testimony in the trial, which began...

LOS ANGELES Los Angeles police have set up a special command center following a series of deadly explosions in London today. Police dispatcher Anthony Rivers says officials are meeting to discuss whether to step up security locally. He says he doesn't know whether officials will upgrade the city's security alert level at this point.

LAPD chasing stolen vehicle kidnap suspect live.

LOS ANGELES - Five police officers did not use excessive force against undercover immigration agents during a traffic stop five years ago, a federal jury ruled Friday. The panel deliberated one day before finding against the agents in a lawsuit.Shawn Butler said he was stopped in January 2000 while on a stakeout. He was investigating a counterfeit identification ring and was driving a car with unregistered license plates.Butler, who sued the Los Angeles Police Department, contended he was pulled over and handcuffed because he was black.Ezequiel Garcia arrived after Butler radioed that he had been pulled over.Garcia alleged he was...

Police departments must use race and sex preferences in hiring as a result of federal court consent decrees and political pressures. To meet these demands, many police departments have lowered, and in some cases eliminated, established standards for personal character and intellectual and physical capacity. Jan Golab writes about this in "How racial PC corrupted the LAPD" in the May 2005 issue of the American Enterprise. While most of Mr. Golab's article chronicles how Los Angeles damaged its police force in its quest for "diversity," where it has had to fire 100 police officers, identical damage has occurred in other...

Raul Garcia-Gomez, 19, is suspected of shooting two Denver police officers at about 1 a.m. Sunday after they refused to let him re-enter a baptismal party. Detective Donald Young, 44, died at the scene after being shot from behind three times in the back and head.