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Did you ever have your impartiality challenged? If so, how did you respond?
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Angel
Alderete
[Full Interview] [Topic Top]
Once this report came out, what did that do to your relationship with the cops? Could
you continue to work with them?
Answer:
Hey, the commission accepted it. I don't know if the LAPD had any ill feelings towards me
personally, but they didn't have any ill feelings towards the agency. This is a report that was
done. It wasn't saying that the LAPD is a racist so-and-so. It says the LAPD does racist things,
or that
some LAPD people do racist things. That's a hell of a lot different. So I think that deep down,
they
agree. I'm sure that the chief saw it that way and wished that it didn't happen, "But by golly, I'm
a cop's cop and I'm going to go down with them." That's how he saw it.
Werner Petterson
[Full Interview] [Topic Top]
Question:
Is your impartiality ever challenged?
Answer:
Oh yes.
Question:
And what did you do?
Answer:
I guess I'd try to ask them why they had drawn that conclusion because people have
opinions and feelings, but I don't think it does any good to talk about feelings and opinions. I
would ask, "what happened that has brought you to that opinion?" Maybe it was something that
I said, something I did, other times there was some explanation and that helped clear the air.
Sometimes it was just my being a representative of the Justice Department, I mean, there is no
way I can rationalize things that the department did in a situation. I think one of the very
interesting things that CRS struggled with was that CRS has always been kind of an aberration to
the Justice Department. There would be positions the Justice Department would be taking, say
school desegregation, or fair housing and I would work out an agreement in federal court and I
had questions raised saying, "that's not a policy."
I think that's being a mediator within a legal context you're helping parties reach agreements
that may be extra legal, and as long as the courts say this is okay then that's the answer. On the
other side you are the representative of the Justice Department and people who are involved and
invested in issues know what the Justice Departments position is on particular issues. You get
involved in the community and people know those positions. They'll have questions about what
you're doing.
Question:
Did you ever find that you had to address the fairness of a
settlement?
Answer:
No. To me, as long as the parties understood that somebody outside the agreement might say
it's not fair and I can't, I don't go there.
Will Reed
[Full Interview] [Topic Top]
Question:
Did anybody accuse you directly saying, "Hey. You're not being
impartial, you're
favoring one side?"
Answer:
Not when I got out into the woods. Maybe somewhere in the city that might have happened,
but no.
Because most of the time I was not. I was impartial as hell. I had my feelings. Nothing you do
is going to
take away from that. You can't just take that away. See, that goes back to
some
people being concerned about, "Hey, you got a black guy coming into a black situation? You
know he's
not going to be impartial." That's because that's a reflection on themselves. Because they know
they're
dishonest. And they see you coming in, they figure you're going to cheat. I was
always ready for
that. When somebody started to say something and tried to catch my reaction, I
would not give them eye contact. I would look off and look on the ceiling.
You learn all of these dynamics because I came out of corrections and prisons and all of these
places
before I even came to CRS.
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