The LAPD and the Community Safety Partnership

By Aaron Hagstrom

“I can get you a job, man,” Sanchez said to the gangster standing in a lot of the Jordan Downs Housing development. “You’re a smart guy. You just have to give up the dope dealing.”

Sanchez spoke in a pleasant modulating voice as if the gangster were his close friend.

The gangster stared fixedly at the ground, glancing intermittently at Sanchez and muttering, “yes sir.”

“He is a good and cooperative guy,” Sanchez said with a grin. “But really, how do you talk sense to someone who is making $300-400 per day selling dope.”

Unlike the traditional LAPD policeman, Sanchez avoids making arrests, though he does when necessary. He gives men like Calloway a second chance. He directs them towards employment opportunities. Not only that. Sanchez befriends them.

He could have arrested Calloway today, Sanchez said, but he would rather let him have the chance to be a productive member of society than be locked away again.

By a gang injunction, Calloway is prohibited from entering Jordan Downs, yet he comes to gamble and sell Marijuana anyway, Sanchez said. Sanchez said Calloway has been arrested previously for drug possession and the intent to sell.

He suspects Calloway is still dope dealing because he sees him with “wads of money” though he doesn’t work and he often smells like weed.

Sanchez is part of a new cooperation between the LAPD and South Los Angeles housing developments to improve the quality of life. The Community Safety Partnership (CSP) program is unique to the Southeast Station, which adopted it 18 months ago to serve Jordan Downs, Imperial Courts, Nickerson Gardens and Ramona Gardens.

According to a crimes comparison of the period 2011 through 2012, generated by the Southeast Division’s Crime Analysis Detail, it has been working. Violent crimes of assault, homicide, rape and burglary have decreased by half in the development. And homicides have completely stopped in Jordan Downs, Nickerson Gardens and Imperial Courts.

For the LAPD, the program is just one step closer to gaining greater repute. Officers patrol the developments daily — not just to just seek out criminals but also to greet children on the playgrounds, to encourage gangsters to seek honest employment and to make small talk with residents. They smile and laugh. For residents, this means they care about them.

Lucelia Hooper, a commissioner with the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles (HACLA), has lived in Nickerson Gardens since 1976. And, over the past eighteen months, she has seen a positive gradual change in the development’s relationship with police.

“They show me the love and respect that I deserve as a resident,” Hooper said. “Just the other day, the Tingirides visited me and they hugged me.”

Some gangsters disagree. Sanchez arrested the Grape Street gangster George Taylor, 41, for dope dealing last year. Taylor complained he was falsely arrested. He spent six months in jail and paid $80,000 in bail.

Sanchez said arrests aren’t made unless the evidence is undisputable. Usually, the gangster is identified by multiple sources, including undercover gang unit detectives and surveillance cameras.

“We only make arrests when we are absolutely sure,” Sanchez said. “It’s not worth his freedom or my integrity.”

Sanchez said he wants residents to be proud of where they live. The first step is to clear out the dope dealers who often come from across town. Gangsters hook residents on drugs and initiate gang wars. It is the goal of Sanchez and his fellow officers to protect “hardworking, loyal residents” like Hooper, he said.

The husband-and-wife team of Capt. Phil Tingirides, 54, and Sgt. Emada Tingirides, 42, came to the Southeast division in 2007 to serve, Hooper said.

Tingirides , the CSP coordinator, grew up just outside of Nickerson Gardens raised by a 15-year-old mother. Witnessing violence all around her instilled a desire to change the neighborhood.

The CSP sprang out of a common desire to protect the residents of South Los Angeles housing developments. Politicians and community advocates saw residents hurt by the dope-dealing and gang rivalries.

In one instance, black gangsters intimidated a Hispanic family in Nickerson Gardens by gambling regularly on their porch. When the family complained to police, the gangsters tried to burn the house down by tossing flaming balls of newspapers through the mail slot.

The family sued HACLA as responsible for the unsafe housing. Connie Rice, head of the Advancement Project — a social policy think tank — commissioned a comprehensive analysis of the situation and a plan of action, soon to be known as the Community Safety Partnership.

While the plans for CSP were still being drawn up, an incident happened that sped up its implementation. In 2012, Bounty Hunter gangsters intimidated a Korean family that had just moved into Imperial Courts. Before their furniture was out of the moving van, the gangsters had cornered a teenager daughter and tried to disrobe her in an upstairs room. If not for a maintenance worker calling the police, she might have been raped.

Capt. Tingirides, head of the Southeast Station, supported the program from the start, Sanchez said. When the community was up in arms about the shooting of a gangster who CSP officers had shot in the back, Tingirides invested in an expensive 3D simulation to prove the gangster had been shot, not while running away, but while shooting at an officer.

Community policing began in the early 90s to close the widening gap between residents and police in their radio-equipped cars. Foot beats played an integral role for knowing the turf

The first instance of a housing project cooperating with the LAPD was the Housing Authority of the County of Los Angeles. The project employed a small team of community police officers. Unlike the CSP, officers separated the tasks of enforcement and community relations.

Even though the Southeast Community Police Station covers some of the most violent 90 square miles in the county, according to Sanchez, CSP officers are friendly and informal. The officers wear the bike uniform — a polo shirt and shorts — he said, because it is less imposing.

“When you have confidence, you can put down the barriers and be yourself,” Sanchez said. “We don’t have time for formalities.”

The process to become a CSP officer was highly selective, Sgt. Tingirides said. Less than one quarter of the applicants was accepted. She said she chose the “compassionate” officers who have “umph” in the community. She chose only 45 officers in the end, an average of 10 officers per development.

They trained three months to work alongside gang interventionists in the developments. At the Advancement Project’s Lavita Academy, officers exchanged ideas with interventionists about how to solve problems.

Once training is complete, officers work primarily in one of four disciplines —enforcement, community affairs, and youth programming. But they are required to be able to switch at a moment’s notice.

“They are tutors, social workers mothers,” Sgt. Tingirides said. “They take on ten roles at the same time.”

Five senior leads and five officers monitor each development. A pair of officers is in charge of separate sectors, which have iconic names like “The Pill” and “The Island” for their shape. The developments were built as barracks during the Second World War to house industry workers. They are long, low buildings with large black numbers painted on them. Gradually, as these workers moved out, HACLA transformed them into low-cost housing.

Key to ensuring resident’s needs are met is a healthy relationship with HACLA, Sanchez said. He regularly attends resident advisory committee meetings, he said, where people air their complaints. When Sanchez asks for feedback on the CSP, he said, residents usually thank him or arresting pariahs of the community and for tutoring their kids or taking them on field trips. In the past, they were afraid of repercussions from gangsters if they spoke up — like slashed tires or vandalized cars.

Sanchez also regularly walks the grounds of Jordan Downs with HACLA supervisor Joel Lopez who points out dope houses, gangster hangouts and strategic locations for surveillance cameras.

Officer Danaher at the Southeast Station operates about 40 video cameras in each development from a control room.

“He is our eyes and ears,” Sanchez said. “Sometimes officers are chasing a suspect and he knows right away. He is like an octopus with six legs watching all the cameras.”

Sanchez also partners with intervention workers from the Gang Reduction Youth Development program (GRYD). The interventionists, supervised by Reginald Zachery, warn the station of imminent violence so officers can take preemptive action. Interventionists send reports to the station through Blackberry phones.

Sanchez pointed out a group of GRYD interventionists, working as crossing guards near Markham Middle School.

“Those guys monitor the block,” Sanchez said. “Lots of them are OGs, but they are not as respected as they once were in the past. So they are afraid of gangsters as well. “

Robert Lewis, an interventionist and former gangster, said he is willing to work with the police now because they treat them like men. In the past, they didn’t.

Sanchez said he asked Robert Lewis, a reformed Crip, to help him convince Calloway to leave dope dealing.

Officers also run youth programs that let the see opportunities beyond their neighborhoods. Officer Jason Archie runs a science program at the Tiger Woods Foundation in Anaheim twice per week. Johnny Coughlin, a Harvard graduate, runs a horseback-riding program.

Billy Lee runs the tutoring program. Formerly, he worked at the Princeton Review. When he came to the CSP, he asked to establish a unique program that emphasized education. For him, helping kids do their homework was the first step to success. Now he partners with Alpha Tau Omega, a USC coed fraternity, to tutor kids once per week.

“It’s the gangsters that get rewarded with the pretty girl, with the friends and with the respect,” Lee said. “That is why the drive for learning is not present. I want to reinstate that drive.”

In Jordan Downs, a divorced mother of two boys who goes by Thelma, told officers her teenage son Joseph was skipping school and staying out late at night.

“Well he can’t be a police officer if does that,” Sanchez said. “How about we take him out to dinner again and see what’s going on?”

Taking teenagers to dinner is not the usual role of LAPD officers, Sanchez said. But he sees it as one of the “little things” that make all the difference in building the trust that the community desperately wants from the police.

“We want to get inside his head and figure out why he is fucking up,” said Officer Christian Zuniga who accompanied Sanchez on the patrol. “I want kids in here to grow up with the same opportunities as mine.”

Sgt. Anthony Cato is in charge of the Jaguar program — a track-and-field program for at-risk youth from ages 5 to 13. Officers recruit kids from Nickerson Gardens, Jordan Downs and Imperial Courts. Every weekend is a meet. They buy track shoes for those who can’t afford them.

“We were all about suppression before,” Cato said. “But that created monsters that went to jail — a criminal’s university — where they became even smarter. Now, we build relationships early to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”

CSP officers also protect the children from gangsters who bully them on their way to and from school.

Officers Manny Sanchez and Sergio Sanchez patrol the neighborhoods around Markham Middle School.

“See that guy?” Manny said pointing to a man at a bus stop as he drove by. “He will stand there all day. He says he is waiting for the bus, but he is really waiting to force kids into his gang.”

Sanchez and his partner break up fights between teens from rival gangs, mostly the Bounty Hunters and Grape Street Crips. One is from Jordan Downs, the other from Imperial Courts.

Sanchez meets regularly with principals of 99th Street Elementary and Markham, both of which serve Imperial Courts to hear about troublesome children. He talks to them after school and finds counseling for them.

Driving near Markham, Sanchez noticed a group of middle-school children who were supposed to be in school.

“Hey, throw away your weed before you go to class,” Sanchez shouted outside his open window.

In his duties of protecting kids, he tries to keep youth from witnessing the lewd acts of prostitutes just outside the gates.

“Girls will raise their skirts and show their fannies right out in the open,” Sanchez said. “So we break that up.”

At the 99th street elementary school, Sanchez arrived to be greeted by waving children who are lined up behind their teachers on their way to breakfast.

“They have become so comfortable with us that their parents are also starting to like us,” Sanchez said. “We hope if get involved with kids early that they will come to respect us later.”

Today, Sanchez taught kids about appropriate touch, after they had played a game called corndogging and some boys had touched girls on the butt.

“Does everyone know their private parts,” Sanchez said pointing to his midsection, chest and rear. “These are off limits. Now do anyone want to ask me what it’s like to be a police officer.”

Despite all the CSP’s successes, there are challenges, nonetheless, Sgt. Tingirides said. One of these is balancing enforcement with programs. Officers do so much programming that it is sometimes difficult to keep up the foot beats, she said.

Officers are stretched thin, she said. Sanchez said some days — when there is a shooting or drug bust — he works for 19 hours straight and, too tired to drive home, he sleeps at the station.

Residents have higher expectations for officers, Tingirides said. They expect them to get them jobs and make sure their kids get to school safely. But, she said, this defeats the purpose of making the program sustainable.

She wants residents to eventually be able to take care of their development, so officers can attend to other matters. For right now, she said, the LAPD is just a crutch to get them on their feet

Tingirides hopes the CSP program will eventually expand to all 14 public housing projects in Los Angeles and possibly become a division in itself within the LAPD.

Tingirides hopes to prove to others, through intensive data collection, that the CSP works. These factors will include shots fired and eviction rates, youth arrests, and truancy.

Until the CSP achieves impetus, the work for Sanchez continues in Jordan Downs. Yesterday, he caught Calloway again in the neighborhood. This time, he was gambling. But Sanchez didn’t get the response he’s used to.

“He said, ‘I am sorry—didn’t mean to disrespect you,’ Sanchez said laughing. “He used to say ‘fuck you. This is my hood.’ So that’s an improvement.”

Sanchez hopes to eventually convince Calloway to find honest work. If he changed, the whole gang might follow his example since they consider him an OG.