LAPD Backing of Cunliffe Bid for Records May Help Her Cause

Last spring, the Los Angeles Police Department cleared Sylvia Cunliffe’s internal security force to receive sensitive criminal arrest records on her department’s own computer terminal, it was learned Thursday.

Cunliffe’s General Services Department so far has not obtained the computer access, but the LAPD’s preliminary approval, granted last April, could help Cunliffe in her lengthy fight to keep her job as general manager. A key element in Mayor Tom Bradley’s move to fire Cunliffe is that she was not authorized to possess arrest records.

The Los Angeles City Council is scheduled to begin deliberations on Cunliffe’s possible ouster this morning. Her attorneys, however, threatened Thursday to sue unless the council awaits a ruling on a pending legal challenge against the city attorney.

Nearly half of the 20 charges filed by Bradley against Cunliffe in October involve her obtaining and using arrest records despite repeated warnings by top city officials against the practice. In one case, Bradley accused her of using the arrest records to embarrass and discredit one of her critics.

Cunliffe has claimed that not only was she entitled to receive the arrest records, but that Bradley’s office agreed they were necessary to fight crime within her department, a supplier of goods and services to other city agencies. Bradley denies her claims.

Sought Direct Access

Last April, Cunliffe asked the LAPD for direct access to the Network Communications System (NECS), a computerized system providing local, state and federal law enforcement agencies with information ranging from outstanding parking tickets to individuals’ felony arrests and convictions.

On April 21, Cmdr. Bernard C. Parks of the LAPD’s Support Services Bureau wrote Cunliffe:

“The Los Angeles Police Department is pleased to assist the Department of General Services by providing direct access to the Network Communications System through a (computer) terminal owned by (General Services),” Parks said. “Access will be provided with the understanding that the terminal will be housed in a secure location in GSD not available to the general public, and is only to be used by GSD security personnel who have peace officer status.”

LAPD spokesman Cmdr. William Booth told The Times that Cunliffe was told final approval would rest with the state Department of Justice.

Not just anyone can obtain LAPD approval to criminal records, Booth said.

“Knowing that General Services has the employees who were defined by the (California) Penal Code as having peace officer status for specific purposes, and the state was the authorizing agency in determining the criteria were met to gain access, and we were presented with documents or proof that they were so authorized, then we would (grant approval),” Booth said.

John Carr, a state Department of Justice official, said General Services never applied for the access, a process that could take as long as six months. But he noted that two other city agencies, the Housing Authority’s police and the Department of Transportation, recently gained limited access to the system.

It was not immediately clear why Cunliffe’s department did not pursue the state computer access approval or why she waited until last spring to seek it from the LAPD, nearly two years after complaining she needed the records to help curb crime.