[10], Gates made substantial use of the LAPD's Public Disorder and Intelligence Division (PDID) squad, even developing an international spying operation. [citation needed]. Daryl Gates: The Story the L.A. Times Didnt Tell. At public events he would sometimes point me out in the audience and tell people not to believe what I wrote because he did not say what I quoted him as saying. They tossed Daryl in a cell but did not book him. Daryl Gates (born Darrel Francis Gates; August 30, 1926 April 16, 2010) was the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) from 1978 to 1992. I had found out about the undercover spy who was sworn in the back seat of a car at a beach parking lot and spent two decades spying for the LAPD, which built up its intelligence in good part because J. Edgar Hoover did not trust Gates' mentor, Chief William H. Parker. In 1965, Officer John Nelson came up with the idea to form a specially trained and equipped unit to respond to and manage critical situations while minimizing police casualties.[8]. In addition, Gates had been the principal consultant for Sierra's SWAT series, appearing in them as well. Gates finally announced his intention to resign on July 13, 1991.[16]. Enjoy! Strange, the burglar who cleans out a car's papers, leaving only registration, insurance card, coins and a gold ring. Then one evening in fall 1980 it all changed. [1][20], The 1992 Ig Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Daryl Gates "for his uniquely compelling methods of bringing people together."[21]. I had never seen the communist paper articles, but more significantly my reports described as disputed issues what the communists called matters of fact. He always talked to me, knowing it was better to get his oar in and know what was coming than to be surprised. There were undercover officers assigned to sleep with women to gather political information that went to Gates, who spent 45 minutes to several hours each week on his spy files. Gates was eager to take more recruits, particularly for CRASH units, when the city made funds available. A February blog posting attributed to his brother, Steve Gates, said he had bladder cancer that had spread to a bone near his hip. His brother said recently that the former chief had bladder cancer that had spread. Gates, considered the father of SWAT (Special Weapons And Tactics), established the specialized unit in order to deal with hostage rescue and extreme situations involving armed and dangerous suspects. On his promotion to lieutenant, he rejoined Chief Parker as Parker's executive officer. Among his roles as an officer, he was picked to be the chauffeur for Chief William H. Parker. Afterward people came up and asked me why I made up quotes. As he spoke I realized that he had to tell me this. Daryl F. Gates, LAs police chief during 1992 riot, dies April 22, 2010 Category: Stateside His brother said recently the former chief had bladder cancer that had spread. Daryl Allan Katz (born May 31, 1961) is a Canadian billionaire businessman and philanthropist. Gates joined the LAPD on September 16, 1949. On April 16, 2010, Gates died at his home in Dana Point, California at the age of 83[2] due to complications from bladder cancer.[27]. So I wrote a 4,000-word memo to my bosses making a point-by-point rebuttal demolishing every word in the report the LAPD had prepared, but made sure had no LAPD markings on it. Gates earned notoriety for his controversial rhetoric on many occasions. Clint Eastwood biographer Richard Schickel, who was on the set, wrote that Hackman referred to Daggett overseeing Ned Logan's torture as "my Rodney King scene.". One of these undercover officers admitted under oath to sleeping with a woman as part of his spying. I know some of what he had on some of them so I understand this cowardice. He is survived by grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. No. As an inspector, Gates approved this idea. A deputy chief told the councilmen that if he did that and any undercover officer turned up dead, the council members would all become murder suspects. Gates often remarked that he gained many administrative and professional insights from Parker during the hours they spent together each day. My piece on how LAPD instigated the May Day riot was virtually the last story I wrote before the paper shut me down and moved on to a new narrative that the political spying bad guy was a single sergeant who lived in a trailer, rather than the carefully directed work of Chief Gates. LAPD Chief of Police Charlie Beck eulogized, Daryl Francis Gates was a one-in-a-million human being. In the aftermath of the riots, local and national media printed and aired dozens of reports deeply critical of the LAPD under Gates, painting it as an army of racist beat cops accountable only to an arrogant leadership. There were no limits to what Gates would do to feed his insatiable need for secret information. Years later I interviewed his brother, who also did intelligence, about this story that was too hot for the L.A. Times. That gave the police a pretext to attack. Gates' personal life, like his career, was sometimes tumultuous. He went on to take pre-law classes at the University of Southern California. Who is Bill Gates Brother-in-Law? Bantam Books. There were safe houses and secret cash funds and contracts issued to relatives of high-ranking officers, once of which played a central role in the failure of what at the time was the most costly and difficult drug investigation the department had ever undertaken. Finally, in 1982, I complained to Reva Tooley, then the Police Commission chairman. (Gates later finished his degree at USC.)[1][2]. The fund-raising event was part of an effort to fight a city charter amendment on the June 2 ballot that would limit the power and term of the chief. I pointed to the tape recorder and told them every word that appeared under my byline as a quote from Gates was on a tape. When Gates knew I had the goods on his having officers overseas he grew determined to stop me. Daryl F. Gates was born October 1, 1953 to Frank and Thelma (Goldsworthy) Gates in Cresco, Iowa. Gene Hackman based his portrayal of Sheriff Daggett on Gates in the 1992 film Unforgiven. It was an early lesson it what we see today in the bizarre fact-free views of some Fox News fans. He asked me, in the crude language of cops, if I liked women with red hair and large bosoms. It was 19 months before he became police chief and my first year on the police beat for the Valley News, which later became the Daily News.I had just broken a story about an LAPD sex scandal that drew national attention. When he had run dry I smiled and, in the sometimes crude language of reporters, told Daryl, which is what I called him, that I did not care if he knew with whom I was intimate. No question about it, we have made some mistakes. Daryl Gates ruled the Los Angeles Police Department as if he were God, accountable to no one for 14 years because virtually alone among big-city police chiefs in America he had civil service status under the City Charter. I literally laughed when I read the report. Gates was President/CEO of Global ePoint, a security and homeland defense company dealing primarily in digital surveillance and security technology. There were also dead bodies, including a most inconvenient witness to a fatal fight in which one of the undercover officers took part and who soon mysteriously turned up dead, his body recovered from that gargantuan concrete gutter known as the Los Angeles River. [9] The lawsuit CAPA v. Gates, with the Coalition Against Police Abuse (CAPA) as one of two dozen or so plaintiffs, later sued the LAPD on First Amendment grounds that exposed the unlawful harassment, surveillance, and infiltration of the progressive movement in Los Angeles by LAPD agents. Daryl Gates (born Darrel Francis Gates;3 August 30, 1926 April 16, 2010) was the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) from 1978 to 1992. [26] Hahn ultimately appointed William J. Bratton, a former police commissioner of Boston and New York City, to head the department. My intersection with Daryl Gates began in late 1979 or early 1980 when David Rosenzweig, later Metro editor, asked me to cover a police commission meeting. After the Rodney King beating and the riots afterward, Gates retired from the police department. These officers were given special status and benefits, but in return they had to attend monthly trainings and serve as security for police facilities during episodes of civil unrest. See the complete profile on LinkedIn and discover Daryl Its report, released on October 21, 1992, was generally considered to be scathingly critical of the department (as well as other government agencies) and was especially critical of Gates' management of it. In 1993, Gates was a talk show host on KFI, replacing Tom Leykis. Gates shifted to making claims that I did not have my facts right. Still, they persisted, why did I make up the quotes? All were smooth jobs no broken windows or pry marks. That became clear the first time I saw him confront a scandal. And we made some mistakes. Like everyone who had covered these things, I knew that during the Vietnam War big city police departments built up their intelligence units. To continue reading for free, provide your email below. Gates had more than 200 officers as analysts and supervisors in the Public Disorder Intelligence Division, or PDID. Daryl was preceded in death by his parents; brothers, David Gates and Roger Gates; father and mother-in-law, Arnold and Marion DeBruyn and brother-in-law, Pastor Lawrence DeBruyn. The lawsuit against Gates and the LAPD proved successful. All of these burglaries had a common feature: every scrap of paper was taken, including twin 70-pound trunks of Grantsmanship Center training manuals that my wife used to teach grant writing and which I would take to and from LAX every few weeks when I dropped her off and picked her up. When "Police Quest: Open Season" was in development. Gates got so distracted that he made what even for Gates were amazing statements, amazing for their honesty and candor. Three other flags were presented to his other daughter, son and brother, retired Capt. Gates somehow managed to cow the owners and editors of the Times, keeping out of print any word about his global spying operation and the fact that one officer was undercover for nearly two decades gathering information on American communists. At the Los Angeles Breakfast Club, Gates gave his Jeremiah talk as if he was an Old Testament prophet warning the people of corruption and decay. Andrew Blankstein and David Zahniser (October 28, 2008). His first SWAT team, which Gates had originally wanted to name "Special Weapons Attack Team,"[9] was born LAPD SWAT, D-Platoon of the Metro Division. Absolutely not. [6][7] On March 28, 1978, Gates became the 49th Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department. Gates is co-credited with the creation of SWAT teams with LAPD's John Nelson, who others claim was the originator of SWAT in 1965. After the riots broke out, Gates told reporters that the situation would soon be under control, and left Parker Center to attend a previously scheduled political fundraising dinner. These units were called Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums, aka CRASH, immortalized in the 1988 film Colors. However, despite the program's wide use, peer-reviewed government-sponsored scientific research has discredited DARE's claimed effectiveness in reducing alcohol or drug use, and the program has seen a 73% reduction in taxpayer funding as a result.[13]. When Daryl Gates, who died on Friday, ran the LAPD from 1978 to 1992 he also ran a worldwide political spying operation. Once Gates and a buddy slugged two cops who ticketed him for double-parking. We're out there trying to save their communities, trying to upgrade the quality of life of people His testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee that infrequent or casual drug users "ought to be taken out and shot" because "we're in a war" and even casual drug use is "treason". Start with the 1984 LA Olympics, "RIOTS IN LOS ANGELES: The Overview; As Rioting Mounted, Gates Remained at Political Event", https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE6DD1F38F936A35756C0A964958260, "Once Synonymous, Gates, LAPD Go Separate Ways", http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/la-me-gates-archive,0,6067743.story, "Redeploy Police, Riot Response Study Urges LAPD: Panel headed by ex-FBI Director Webster offers sweeping recommendations. He grew up in Glendale and Highland Park, in the northeastern part of Los Angeles. Daryl Francis Gates was born into a working-class family on Aug. 30, 1926, in Los Angeles, the second of three sons of Paul and Arvilla Gates. [19] A second commission, the Webster Commission, headed by former FBI and CIA Director William H. Webster, was formed in the wake of the riots. HOLLYBLOG: The papers obit missed the parts about spying, abuse of power and its own deaf ear, (This article was excerpted from a longer piece that appeared on LA Observed. [1] (Later in life, Gates often remarked on the taunts and harassment he received from schoolmates because of his father's behavior.) When Zev Yaroslavsky, then on the City Council, finally worked up the nerve to ask at a hearing how many undercover political officers the LAPD had, and how much they cost, the response was not subtle. I was skeptical, even dismissive, of assertions by people associated with the ACLU that the LAPD was engaged in massive political spying. [1], Gates graduated from Franklin High School in Highland Park, and joined the U.S. Navy in time to see action in the Pacific Theater during World War II. SWAT was copied almost immediately by most US police departments, and is now used by law enforcement agencies throughout the world. And the city charter from 1922 and until after the Rodney King riots gave police officers a property interest in their jobs, a legal right of immense value. [17] These actions led to charges that Gates was out of touch. In response, the LAPD set up specialist gang units which gathered intelligence on and ran operations against gangs. The PDID was ordered to disband, and did so in January 1983. He knew how to speak in sound bytes and code. Visitation will be held one hour before the service on Saturday. I had my cars broken into seven times, once when my Fiat Spyder was parked in the underground garage at Parker Center, the LAPD headquarters. As Chief, Gates developed the nation's first police paramilitary Special Weapons And Tactics (SWAT) squads, and played a lead role in development of the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) cops-in-schools program. Daryl Francis Gates Net Worth is $1 Million Daryl Francis Gates Bio/Wiki, Net Worth, Married 2018 Daryl Gates (born Darrel Francis Gates; August 30, 1926 April 16, 2010) was the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) from 1978 to 1992. Ronald J. Ostrow, "Casual Drug Users Should Be Shot, Gates Says", Articles with unsourced statements from November 2014, Articles with unsourced statements from April 2014, Articles with unsourced statements from August 2014, Articles incorporating text from Find a Grave.com, Articles incorporating text from Wikipedia, United States Navy personnel of World War II, LAPD Metropolitan Division#S.W.A.T. Gates' brother said in February the former chief had bladder cancer that had spread to a bone near his hip. It was so obviously nonsense. [1] The Christopher Commission report, issued July 10, 1991, identified a police culture of excessive force and poor supervision, and recommended numerous reforms, as well as Gates's removal. Gates became LAPD chief of police a little over two months before the enactment of California's Proposition 13, during a time of tremendous change in California politics. The stories that Gates knew I was working on before the L.A. Times shut me down had to alarm him. (D Platoon), Public Disorder and Intelligence Division, Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums, "Daryl F. Gates dies at 83; innovative but controversial chief of the LAPD", http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-daryl-gates17-2010apr17,0,829169,full.story, "Daryl F. Gates, L.A.P.D. His was that he was watching me. I reported this in the Los Angeles Times in a story that told how the May Day 1982 violence between Revolutionary Communist Party marchers and the LAPD began when an undercover officer posing as one of the communists gave a signal for people to run. In addition to his brother, who is a retired LAPD captain, Gates is survived by two children. I would stand up, holding my tape recorder for all to see, and smile politely. His marriage ended in divorce and his son struggled for years with drug abuse, suffering an overdose during the 1992 riots. ", http://articles.latimes.com/1992-10-21/news/mn-605_1_police-response, http://www.improbable.com/ig/winners/#ig1992, Daryl Gates. At former LAPD Chief Daryl F. Gates' funeral Tuesday at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, his longtime attorney, Jay Grodin, told mourners that Gates did not avoid the tough path.. When I wanted to see what crazy thing Gates would say I would don a particular set of clothes and go see him: white cotton suit, socks and shoes, a pink shirt, a pink and teal tie, and a Panama hat with a pink hat band. In one case a report written on plain bond but sent by the chief to higher ups at the paper asserted I was taking material from a communist newspaper. His length of tenure was second only to that of William H. Parker.As chief of police, he took a hardline, aggressive, paramilitary approach to law enforcement. The Great Depression affected his early life: his father was an alcoholic, and frequently ended up in the custody of the Glendale police. Gates died at his Newport Beach home with his family at his side, according to a police statement. Gates worked hard to prepare for his promotional exams, scoring first in the sergeant's exam and in every promotional exam thereafter. The good people did all the time. What in the world, I thought, prompted that question? Daryl F. Gates, the polarizing former police chief whose 14-year tenure ended amid widespread criticism over his department's response to the [11] In February 1984, an out-of-court settlement awarded $1.8 million to the named plaintiffs, individuals, and organizations who had sued the City of Los Angeles [12], In joint collaboration with the Rotary Club of Los Angeles, Gates founded DARE, the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program designed to educate students and children about the dangers of drug abuse. After leaving the U.S. Navy, he attended Pasadena City College and married his first wife, Wanda Hawkins. He even critiqued the champagne I shared with the woman who has been my wife now for almost 28 years. He also, after a recess in his testimony, tried to soften it by saying he thought he really was her boyfriend. [citation needed], The operation lasted several years, with multiple sweeps, and resulted in over 25,000 arrests. David Cay Johnston covered the LAPD for the Los Angeles Times from 1980-83. "Chief: My Life in the LAPD". The 1992 Los Angeles riots began when a Simi Valley jury acquitted three white and one Hispanic Los Angeles Police Department officers accused in the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney King following a high-speed pursuit. Steve Gates. Gates and his department faced strong criticism in the aftermath of the beating; Mayor Tom Bradley also called for Gates to resign, but he refused, leading to a stand-off between Gates and the mayor. Anyone tailing me must have wondered what was in these trunks. Daryl Gates, Polarizing LA Police Chief During Rodney King Riots, Dead at 83. A bystander, George Holliday, recorded the beating on videotape. 1968) Daughter: Debby Ladesma Locally, people of interest had their homes, offices and cars burglarized. Some were tailed, sometimes quite openly to intimidate them, to make sure they knew they were being watched. Gates' aggressive approach to the gang problem was effective in suppressing gang violence[citation needed] but allegations of false arrest and a general LAPD disdain for young black and Latino men were made. Sure. Once he asked me why I wrote that outfit. I am sure of that. In the years after the Olympic games Gates, Mayor Bradley and city council officials found a way to continue the sweeping policies initially meant for the duration of the Olympic games by reviving old, anti-syndicalist laws, to jail masses of predominantly black and Latino youth, even though the overwhelming numbers of people arrested were never charged.[15]. The general, who once commanded American forces in South Korea, saw communists and conspiracies everywhere, a view Gates shared. pp. Gates' personal life, like his career, was sometimes tumultuous. His tenure was short lived but he remained a frequent guest on talk radio, especially in regards to policing issues. It is a remarkable tale of courage, dedication and intrigues, filled with revealing history about how government spies on its citizen's lawful political, labor and religious activities. Gates refused at A nonsmoker, I left several dollars of change in the open ashtrays of my sports car and my Corolla sedan. Burial will be at a later date. He says when he told Wasserman about this the mogul was astonished and wanted to know why. Gates also had a powerful bias against gays, despite his carefully nuanced public statements. No matter how angry Gates got over the facts I put in the paper, the chief always talked to me. Last Updated: September 17, 2010 @ 5:54 PM. Gates also co-founded D.A.R.E along with the Los Angeles Unified School District.[4]. He graduated from Harmony High School in 1973. Former LAPD Chief Daryl F. Gates Dies at 83 Los Angeles: Daryl F. Gates died today at 83 years of age after a short battle with cancer. He appears in the game as Chief of Police, and can be found on one of the top floors of Parker Center. I agree with TheWrap's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy and provide my consent to receive marketing communications from them. Daryl Gates (born Darrel Francis Gates;[3] August 30, 1926 April 16, 2010) was the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) from 1978 to 1992. His length of tenure was second only to that of William H. Parker. Years later I interviewed his brother, who also did intelligence, about this story that was too hot for the L.A. Times. After I spoke to Internal Affairs, and Gates obviously got a detailed report of what I said, the car burglaries stopped. By the time of the 1975 special investigation into the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy he was Assistant Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department. Because, Gates explained, you're important. Many commentators criticized Gates for Operation Hammer, a policing operation conducted by the LAPD in South Los Angeles. Daryl worked at Sherwood Auto and Kato Engineering. I even knew how the LAPD tried to get him made a sergeant without taking the civil service exam, a tactic that failed. At a press conference on December 23, 1980 at Parker Center, Daryl Gates, Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, announced that three suspects in the gruesome massacre at the Bobs Big Boy restaurant on La Cienega near Sawyer Street, in which three people were killed, were in custody and would be charged with first degree murder. And he lavished time on it, sometimes several hours each day, including all the dossiers and reports he got on the lawful activities of L.A. leaders, elected and not, as well as political and religious groups he suspected were up to no good. I realized that someone had seen us and knew Gates would want a full report and that Gates had this pathological need to make sure I knew what he knew. In 2004, he appeared in second season of Da Ali G Show, in episode "Respek". 114115. This SWAT unit was initially constituted as 15 teams of four men each, for a total staff of 60. This was not unprecedented: during the run-up to the 1984 Olympic Games, Mayor Tom Bradley empowered Gates to take all of the city's gang members known and suspected into custody, where they remained until shortly after the Games' conclusion. Daryl worked at Sherwood Auto and Kato Engineering. So you've got to make all of those quotas. He was a humanitarian. Three other flags were presented to his other daughter, son and brother, retired Capt. In a PBS interview, when asked whether the local people in the minority areas expressed thanks to the police for their actions, he responded: On March 3, 1991, Rodney King was arrested and beaten by LAPD officers after a car chase. But the community activists? After Bernard Parks was denied a second term as Chief of Police by Mayor James K. Hahn in 2002, Gates, aged 75, told CNN that he intended to apply for his old job as LAPD chief. Gates was at a social event and I walked over. Immediately, Gates began recounting to me a blind date I had been on a few nights before, down to the details of what we ordered at LA Nicola on Sunset near East Hollywood. We each got the other's message. This narrative got big play in the paper, but there was no explanation of why all these secret files were created, who was identified in them and why they ended up in the hands of a secretive group associated with an Army general. Gates is portrayed by actor Josh Pence in the 2013 film Gangster Squad. Gates's appointment as chief roughly coincided with the intensification of the War on Drugs. The mandate was created in an effort to encourage residents to report crimes without the fear of intimidation or deportation.[14]. Katz is founder and chairman of the Katz Group of Companies, one of Canada's largest privately-owned enterprises, with pharmacy, sports & entertainment, and real estate development businesses.Katz Group owns the Edmonton Oilers, and lead the development of Rogers Place and the Ice District. Gates later claimed that many officers recruited in the 1980sa period in which the LAPD was subject to a consent decree which set minimum quotas for hiring of women and minoritieswere substandard,[citation needed] remarking: [I]f you don't have all of those quotas, you can't hire all the people you need. At her insistence (and over the fearsome objections of some L.A. Times editors) I told my story to two Internal Affairs detectives, who sat stone-faced but listened and asked few, but smart, questions. We were out there oppressing whatever the community had to be, whether it was blacks, or Hispanics. Mine was that I am not afraid of anything or anybody and cannot be intimidated. He also served on the Advisory Board of PropertyRoom.com, a website for police auctions. So we'll err on the side of, 'We'll take them and hope it works out.'" Brother Steve Gates talks with members of the media about his brother, former LAPD Police Chief Daryl F. Gates, during a press conference after he On Page 231 of "Chief: My Life in the LAPD," Gates recounts how he knew every time Lew Wasserman, the head of MCA, the big movie and record company, got on an airplane to Las Vegas. Gates himself became a byword among some for excessive use of force by anti-gang units, and became a favorite lyrical target for gang-connected urban black rappers notably, Ice Cube. At the time of the Rodney King beating, Gates was at a community policing conference. After eight people were murdered at a birthday party in a drive-by shooting in 1987, Gates responded with an extremely aggressive sweep of South Los Angeles that involved 1000 officers at any given time. The paramilitary approach that Gates represented resulted in criticism and calls for the LAPD to shift to a community policing strategy. Enough cannot be said about Daryl Gates the human being. [18], Gates finally left the LAPD on June 28, 1992, and was replaced by Willie L. Williams,[18] who had been named Gates's successor just before the riots began. Read the article in full.). Father: Paul Gates (plumber) Mother: Arvilla Brother: Stephen Brother: Lowell Wife: Wanda Hawkins (div.