Blue: The LAPD And The Battle To Redeem American Policing, Domanick - B +

                                               This is the story of the police department in the last quarter of a century in the nation's second largest city. It is told through the prism of four successive chiefs of police. The reason redemption was required for the LAPD can be found in the decades leading up to the Rodney King riots of 1992. Its police chiefs believed that well-dressed robo-cop-looking policemen, who acted decisively with military precision and, often, military-like violence were what the city needed as it transitioned from middle class white Protestant to a black/brown ghetto. As the city became blacker and browner, and as the war on drugs clamped down on all offenders, the LAPD put in prison a third of the state's total and did so with unrestrained violence. The police were both feared and despised. When the all-white Simi Valley jury exonerated the cops who had beaten King, the city exploded. Within six months, the fifteen-year chief, the notoriously tough Daryl Gates, was forced out. He was followed by a black man from Philadelphia who was welcomed by one and all. Willie Williams was a nice guy. That was his calling card and primary skill. He was overweight in a police department that cared about how you looked, didn't carry a gun (he thrice failed the test out-of-state police officers had to pass to be permitted a weapon), was undermined at every turn, and was doomed to failure soon after his arrival.  His indifference and profound incompetence are difficult to fathom. It is as if he realized he was in way over his head and hung on as long as he could, presumably for the money and ego satisfaction. In 1997, he was replaced by Bernie Parks, one of LA's own.  Condescending, arrogant and focused on  minutiae, Parks wasn't meant to be either.  On his watch, the city entered into a consent decree with the Department of Justice because of its inability to rein in the police force. Next up was Bill Bratton, the man generally considered to have turned around both the Transit Police in New York and the NYPD itself. Over seven years, Bratton engineered an astounding change.  He met with his officers and captains and told them they had one job - reduce crime. He junked most of the command structure and let the department know that they had to meet with and work with the institutions and people of the city.  Arrests for their own sake were no longer the objective. Brutality and corruption were no longer standard.  Bratton changed the course of policing in LA. One of the key successes was the concept of gang interdiction. Former gang members were teamed with locals and the police, were educated, trained and successful in slowing down gang violence. The book finishes on an optimistic high note. That high note, though, is lost as the author recounts in his epilogue the plague of police violence against  blacks in the last few years. Add in some dicey statistics from LA, Chicago and NY and one begins to wonder if the touted reduction in crime has been a all that it  has been said to be. Nonetheless it appears, that because of people like Bill Bratton, our society is making some positive movement on this front.