1 Million Pages of Files Sought in LAPD Inquiry : Investigation: Panel studying use of excessive force wants data on 21 officers present at King beating.

The commission formed to conduct a sweeping investigation of excessive use of force in the Los Angeles Police Department has requested more than 1 million pages of police documents as part of its unprecedented review.

As part of the massive request, the Independent Commission on the Los Angeles Police Department also has asked for personnel files on 21 officers who were present at the March 3 beating of Altadena resident Rodney G. King, according to a lawyer for some of the officers.

Commission Chairman Warren Christopher and staff members made the disclosure about the size of the document request during an interview Wednesday. They said the commission will hold its first public hearings beginning next week.

Christopher said the commission’s work, which could result in historic changes in the Police Department, will be financed by a $250,000 grant from the Weingart Foundation. He and the nine other commissioners have set a July 1 deadline for the report to be completed.

In addition to files on incidents of the use of force and citizen complaints, the request is for records on such things as recruitment, officer assignments and promotions and the disciplinary process, said John W. Spiegel, the commission’s general counsel.

Diane Marchant, an attorney hired by the Police Protective League to represent 17 officers who watched the beating, said the officers at the King beating have not objected to their personnel files being reviewed by the commission as long as the information is kept confidential.

Cmdr. Rick Dinse, who has been assigned by Police Chief Daryl F. Gates to act as a liaison between the commission and the Police Department, said he does not know the exact number of the pages asked for but added that the department intends to cooperate fully with the request.

“I don’t know if 1 million is right but they’re asking for an awful lot of material,” Dinse said. “Whatever it is, we are going to cooperate and provide any paperwork they want in their time frame.”

Dinse acknowledged that honoring the request places a “significant” burden on the department.

“It will require a lot of work from a lot of people,” he said. “I don’t know now just how many people because much of what needs to be done has not been analyzed.”

Dinse would not say specifically what records the commission wants to see, saying only that much of what has been requested is confidential. The commission, he said, has agreed to respect that confidentiality.

Bryce Nelson, a spokesman for the commission, said Wednesday that it has already begun to receive some of the documents.

In addition to reviewing the Police Department records, the commission is expected to interview hundreds of people, including at least 100 past and present members of the Police Department, and consult numerous experts on such things as law enforcement procedures and violence.

Some of the testimony will be heard in private, Nelson said, because some witnesses have been assured that their statements will be kept confidential. The sessions, he added, will be recorded on audiotape, but there are no plans to make transcripts.

The commission has already conducted several closed-door hearings. Among those who have testified are Michael Armstrong, general counsel for the Knapp Commission, which was formed in the early 1970s to investigate corruption in the New York Police Department; former Police Department Assistant Chief Jesse Brewer; Hubert Williams, a former Newark, N.J., police chief who heads the Police Foundation in Washington, D.C.; UCLA criminologist James Q. Wilson, and former Los Angeles Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Curt Livesay.

The first public hearing will be held next Wednesday in the auditorium of the Security Pacific Plaza in downtown Los Angeles. Other public hearings will be held May 8 in South-Central Los Angeles, May 13 in the San Fernando Valley, and May 20 in East Los Angeles.

At the first public hearing, the commission has invited representatives of several community organizations to testify. The groups include the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund. Also invited is Citizens in Support of the Chief of Police, which was formed to defend Gates after the public uproar over the King beating.

To meet its July 1 deadline, Christopher said, the commission’s staff of 30 lawyers will work at a “grueling pace,” including late night and weekend sessions.

The staff, which Christopher said could grow, includes Gary Feess, former U.S. attorney in Los Angeles; Ernest J. Getto, chief of litigation for Latham & Watkins, one of the city’s largest law firms, and Louise A. LaMothe, vice chairperson of the American Bar Assn.’s litigation section.

“The commission is looking for an objective report for the people of Los Angeles who don’t want to wait a year or two years,” said Christopher, a former deputy secretary of state in the Carter Administration. “Ninety days from the time the commission was created seemed to me to balance the need of the people.”

The report, he said, will not focus on the King case but will make recommendations about how to prevent excessive use of force. Copies will be distributed to various government agencies including the mayor’s office, the Police Commission and chief of police, Nelson said.

One of the issues the commission will be looking at, he said, is whether the people of Los Angeles are better served by a Police Department that emphasized crime detection or one that “is focused more broadly on community service.”

The commission was formed by Mayor Tom Bradley on April 1 to investigate the Police Department in the wake of the King beating. It was later merged with a committee Gates created March 27 to examine incidents of excessive force and recommend reforms of Police Department policies.

Retired State Supreme Court Justice John A. Arguelles, who had headed the Gates committee, is vice chairman of the merged panels, informally known as the Christopher Commission.

Questions about the commission’s credibility have already been raised by some community activists who believe it is too closely linked to the city’s power structure. Christopher said Wednesday that he is sensitive to the concern and has taken steps to ensure that the commission not become a vehicle for someone’s agenda.

“None of the commissioners has a predisposition and we have screened the staff for open minds,” he said. “People who have taken public positions we felt were not appropriate.”

He also noted that the Weingart grant and the fact that the commissioners and their staff are donating their services ensures that the commission is not dependent on government money. The commission’s day-to-day work space, a suite of offices in the same building as Christopher’s law firm, was donated by Merrill, Lynch, Pierce Fenner & Smith, the brokerage firm.

Armstrong of the Knapp Commission praised Christopher and his staff after his testimony last week.

“It’s a good commission and they have a very good staff,” he said.