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Nothing But The Truth by Paul Marks
The bus had stopped for a red light on a night that was bitter and cold. CC pierced our momentary silence by asking, “Van, do you believe in the truth?” “Why do you ask?” Like a doctor searching for a diagnosis, “Because I never know if you are telling the truth.” “You’re young. Give yourself time.” CC didn’t
understand, at least not then, that behind the police badge the truth resembles
a whore telling you that she is a virgin, or a convict telling you that he has
never been arrested. The truth sometimes is testifying that you saw the suspect
look in your The new LAPD, the one that glistens with freshness, that has blond hair and dimples, that speaks optimistically in high-pitched tones, that has a Master’s degree in psychology, and does police work from a computer, that is the LAPD CC belongs to. The LAPD I belonged to was the one that was hired after Viet Nam, the one that trusted SWAT and the battering ram, that believed people were basically evil, the one that knew the only way to make the streets safe was to arrest everyone on them. My job was to teach
CC how to do hers. The Department craved police officers who knew what they were
doing. Its reputation had recently been savagely molested as a result of two
officers having shot to death a black woman who had been arguing with gas
company employees over her unpaid bill. That woman’s death would simmer on the
streets for a very long time. The detail was a nice change from patrol. We got to wear regular civilian clothes. I didn’t shave. CC said that she didn’t, but I think she really did. We could go Code Xeven at any restaurant we wanted to at any time we wanted to. We were going to work the detail until the LAPD could brag to the press that we had arrested the suspects and, hopefully, take people’s attention away from the shooting of the lady with the gas bill. When I got on the first bus that night, I was afraid I didn’t look like a real dope fiend. I felt disconnected and alone, even with CC next to me, dressed like a street tramp. When I looked around the bus and saw all that blackness, I knew, I mean I really knew, that I was white. “CC, do you come here often?” “No. Too many people. I prefer a back alley.” “What’s the going rate these days?” “Ask your wife.” “If I still had one, I would.” The banter was
comforting even if the demographics were not. Within the command logic of the
Department in the late 1970's, it made sense to assign two white officers to
work undercover in a black neighborhood. Maybe that was because there weren’t a
lot of black She acted like I hadn’t said a word, “I got to pee.” “How bad?” “Bad enough to announce it to you.” “There’s a gas station at Imperial. It’ll have a bathroom, and with a little luck, the door will close and the toilet will flush.” As we stepped off
the bus at Imperial, CC and I looked in the direction of the gas station. It was
one of those cheap stations that you never use unless you live in the
neighborhood. I don’t remember the name of the place. You'd think I would, but I
don’t. Trying to preserve my status as a smart ass I asked, “Are you pregnant?” What happened next depends on who does the talking. What CC and I say we saw was a black man walking to a cashier booth at a gas station. We were watching a robbery. That is exactly what we saw. I jumped off the bus first. CC ran behind a telephone pole as I took cover behind a car. We both yelled, “Police Officers. Drop the gun.” As soon as we did, the man pointed the shotgun at us. CC and I both shot him until he stopped moving. And that is the absolute truth. The man yelled in unfathomable agony, but his legs didn’t move. CC covered me as I put my handgun into my holster and then quickly handcuffed the suspect. And that is exactly what he was, a suspect with a shotgun. The handcuffs hadn’t finished clicking when people on the other side of a low block wall were yelling at us. Someone threw a bottle. A petite black woman ran from the cashier booth, screaming hysterically. Police car lights
and sirens exploded onto the parking lot of the gas station. Another bottle
shattered on the ground near CC and me. Two patrol officers grappled with the
hysterical woman, trying to calm her. Other officers dispersed the crowd. The
ambulance responded and took the wounded man away. Yellow crime scene tape soon
corralled the entire scene. A sergeant put CC and me in the back seat of a
police car and then had two officers drive us to the station. About an hour
later the detectives from Robbery Homicide arrived and began their It turns out the hysterical woman was the wife of the man CC and I had shot. The wife said that her husband was the owner of the gas station. She also said that her husband was carrying the shotgun for protection because of all the robberies. Those people behind the wall, the ones who threw bottles at us, told the detectives that the man never had a chance, that we gunned him down in cold blood for no reason. They said that we jumped off the bus and just started shooting. They said that we never identified ourselves, that we never did anything except shoot. They swore that was the truth. At about two in the morning, after we had been sitting in the captain’s office for hours, Lieutenant Mike Galpin, a tall beast of a man with a crewcut and massive arms, and who always wore white, short-sleeved dress shirts, walked in. He had that pained look you get when you know something you don’t want to know. Lieutenant Galpin’s I influence on the department was incalculable. He was the only lieutenant on the LAPD who had a direct line to the Chief of Police. He was an international expert on officer involved shootings. Even captains called him, “Sir.” Lieutenant Galpin said that he wanted to ask us a couple of questions. “Now you’re sure that you identified yourselves as police officers?” CC and I nodded our heads and said, “yes” at the same time. “And you identified yourselves as police officers before you shot?” I answered indignantly, “Yes.” The lieutenant then asked, “Are you absolutely sure that he pointed the shotgun at you?” I was incredulous, “Why are you even asking us? We already told you he did. About a dozen times. He pointed that goddamned shotgun at us and we shot him. Do you think we shot him because we didn’t have anything better to do?” Lieutenant Galpin said matter-of-factly, “That’s what the people by the wall think.” I could no longer speak. But CC could, and did, reverently, and emotionally, “Lieutnant, we shot that man for one reason. He was going to shoot us. We defended ourselves exactly the way the Department taught us to. And that is the God’s honest truth.” Barely louder than a whisper, Lieutenant Galpin replied, “I believe you. I God honestly do.” I recovered my
ability to speak sufficiently enough to ask, “Then what’s the problem?” I said as respectfully as I could, given where we were, and why, “Well, sir, someone is lying. And it isn’t us.” Lieutenant Galpin replied with an aura of detachment, “Let’s see what the physical evidence says.” And then he left. What happened to those two officers who shot the lady with the gas bill was nothing compared to what happened to us. The District Attorney and the LAPD used their investigations to counter some of the damage done to their respective reputations by the earlier controversial shooting. Even the Feds investigated our shooting. CC and I ended up being indicted by the District Attorney, charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, and with color of authority. Before the trial, CC and I took polygraph tests that showed we were being truthful about what had happened. But polygraphs aren’t admissible in court, so the jury never knew about the tests or their results. All they knew was that two Los Angeles police officers, who were both white, shot an innocent black man who was just trying to make a living. The man had never been arrested. You could tell in the jurors’ eyes that the shooting did not make sense to them. The trial was covered by press from all over the country. A couple of times we were on the network news. We were front page news in the Los Angeles Times every day of the trial. The press stalked our homes. The frenetic proceedings lasted two weeks. Every day CC and I received death threats. For our protection we were escorted from our cars to the defense table by police officers and sheriff deputies. My daughters had to be taken out of school. At the trial,
Lieutenant Galpin tried to help us. He testified that an excruciatingly
exhaustive analysis of all the physical evidence, a thoughtful review of the all
of the statements, an exacting reconstruction of the shooting, and an accurate
re-enactment of the The lieutenant explained to the jury that all of the investigations revealed that when CC and I yelled “police officers” the man naturally turned around to see who was yelling. As he did, his shotgun involuntarily followed his movement, and he ended up unintentionally pointing the weapon in our direction. That’s when we shot him. The District Attorney put on witnesses who testified that we never shouted anything, that we never showed our badges, that we acted like cowboys. He painted the picture of two police officers who were out of control, who saw what they wanted to see, and then just fired away. A doctor testified that the man was paralyzed from the chest down, that he would never again move his arms nor his legs. The jury never did reach a verdict. I guess it didn’t know which version of the truth to believe. As if it matters.
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