Bobbi Murray

Photos by Slobodan Dimitrov and Ted Soqui The soul and substance of police reform is on the line next week when the City Council faces off opposite an obdurate police chief backed by a compliant civilian-oversight panel. City Council members will be reviewing measures to strengthen the L.A. Police Department’s......

Photo by Ted Soqui The momentum toward civilian oversight of the Los Angeles Police Department hit a speed bump last month when Police Chief Bernard Parks sharply opposed five of seven recommendations by the City Council’s Public Safety Committee to strengthen the role of the department’s embattled inspector general. Parks’......

Photo by Slobodan Dimitrov Even at the best of times, Katherine Mader encountered only grudging cooperation in her pioneering role as the LAPD’s first inspector general. More often, she was regarded by the police department in terms one captain offered soon after she accepted the post: "A host organism trying......

It had nothing to do with presidential sex and it wasn't a military strike, but a report last week about Los Angeles County's welfare-to-work program collected front-page headlines from here to Washington, D.C. - and left Los Angeles welfare-rights advocates wondering if they had wandered into the Twilight Zone. The......

The white hound dog with pale tan spots and a pink nose leaps joyfully against the fence in cage 27 of the East Valley Shelter. His excitement fills the narrow kennel, barking nonstop, ears flying, tail swinging. Each jump leaves a smear of pale brown paste on the mesh —......