Photos of Los Angeles Police Rampart Division 1994

In 1994, photographer Joseph Rodríguez twice gained unprecedented access to cover Los Angeles police for the New York Times. It was three years after the beating of Rodney King was videotaped and two years after the riots broke out over the acquittal of the four officers involved, which led to the calculation of the use of force as it is not known today. has not been resolved.

Rodríguez, a well-known Brooklyn-based documentary photographer who is no stranger to the criminal justice system, was sent to document a police force trying to revive his image within the community. The unit with which he embedded, called the ‘Rampart Division’, is now notorious for a corruption scandal that broke out a few years later. At the time, Rodríguez was watching and documenting police as they responded to shootings and domestic calls, pulled guns on gang members and patrolled neighborhoods day in and day out.

At a time when many interactions with the police are captured on mobile phone videos and shared on social media, it is striking to see images documenting the complicated role of officers as well as out of service. The photos of Rodríguez highlight the questions we still struggle with today about justice, violence, racism and who can use violence against whom. Although taken two decades ago, the photographs provide insight into how the police see themselves, an important thing to understand when we consider who we are as a society. Rodríguez turned the work into a new book, LAPD 1994. The photos are also on display in the Bronx Documentary Center (and conveniently online). He spoke to BuzzFeed News about his complicated feelings about policing and how a social documentary can help move stories.

How did this assignment begin?

When this project popped up, I had two years of deep research on LA gangs. I was really burnt out, but one thing I learned from Gilles Peress, the Magnum war photographer, is that when you get access, you have to take it. I knew it was a one-time deal. We were about to walk into a police station (which was apparently very corrupt), but they gave me access and let me drive around with them for a few weeks. It was weird sitting in the back seat of a police car, but this time with a camera. I knew what I was looking at and just had to keep my eyes open. I knew it was not going to last, and I basically just did not sleep for just two weeks.

What was the reaction you got to show compassion to the police?

I believe there are a lot of good police here. There really is. I understand the criminal justice system and how it works. There are good people and there are bad people, but I was very alert to this blue shield of silence.

Am I trying to make them look good? No, I’m just a humanist. So I take the person down in front of me, and that’s it. The biggest crime in this country is actually domestic violence. And they see it every day, and it keeps you going. However, let’s not be naive – Rampart [Division] was really corrupt. It was one of the most corrupt police departments, and I only found out after a story was published and the FBI went in there and whatever.

At the time, you had two of the most powerful gangs in Los Angeles, MS-13 and the 18th Street gang. I took some of those guys down, so I knew how serious these guys were. This accident unit I was driving around with was their main task in getting the guns off the street.

In a way, LAPD was like any other gang. They would do things and keep things quiet. The history is there in the book, and there will be an open discussion at the BDC. It will be interesting, how people read these photos and what they mean.

How do you feel about policing now?

I saw things get tense after we militarized the police. What I saw on the ground, the militarization of the police after 9/11 – there was just an incredible amount of money coming in. It’s built up from Reagan, Clinton, and all of a sudden there’s this barrage of police coming in like the Avengers. . They don’t even talk to anyone, just grab everyone, grab the guns.

What do you think is the ideal role of a police officer?

You see some of it in LAPD 1994. There was Officer Llanes. They were on patrol one night and came across this woman. She cries and screams in a phone booth, and they come out. There are no guns or anything. This is a very different picture. They see her every other day, and that’s community policing. They talk to her and try to get her off the streets.

In another picture, you barely see Llanes in the frame. It’s a big, wide picture, and you have the father and the little child, and it’s a domestic violence call, and he’s trying to calm things down. This is how I remember I had to be in the 60s and 70s policing. You had the regular officers who worked in the same neighborhoods for 20 years, so they got to know the pizza place and got to know the high school kids. So it was more of a conversation. Today there are very few conversations, and there is the latent issue of “Where do the police stand on their own racial problems?” If you do the work day in, day out of these neighborhoods, I mean, whew. The guys said they have more divorces than any other department. This is a difficult task to do. But I’m not here to make you look good. I’m just here to show the truth, to show the moments. Even with my own subjective feelings and problems with the police, I kept it separate because that is the job. I’m not an activist. I’m not going there to make you look bad either.

I loved that one moment where there was a new baby in the area and the officer in the car was like: Oh hey, look, there’s our new baby. This is the old way. He was no angel either, but it was nice to see that humanity.

I want to make it clear – one of the things that attracted me every night was the sheer feeling of gun violence. It was as if we were walking down the street at 2pm, and there would be some knuckleheads with a bunch of shotguns, AK-47s, firing it. It really was that way. I got very tired. I spent six months in therapy East Side Stories [another book by Rodríguez]. PTSD is a funny thing; it builds up on you and it hits you like a ton of bricks.

What is your favorite image from this work?

I like the first photo of the police officer shining his shoes. There is something on the statue, with the sign on the wall: “Everyone here brings happiness.” Oh man, come on, are you serious? And you look at the face of the shoemaker coming in. It’s just – with all the black polish coming out of the box, it represents a lot of our history to me. Who is above, who does service.

This other image I liked a lot was the two detectives, the close-up, because it was so different: policing in LA versus in New York. In LA, they wear Armani suits. They really like it. In New York, they wear polyester. I thought it was quite interesting.

This is not the kind of book that makes you feel good or gives you the feeling of warmth. This is a document about the specific time and what happened there. One of the other photos that I think is almost surreal to me is the gun in the grass after this guy has just been shot. That’s the proof there. This is America’s problem there.

Do you have advice for aspiring photographers?

Access is 90% of the game. To get that person on the other end of the phone. I know what it’s like to be on the bottom. I know what it’s like to be in trouble. I know what it’s like to be in a bad space. I use my photography to give something hope. I would not say that it is a very hopeful book, but it is OK. You can see it in me Taxi book, which at the time was a very different book from New York. I’m a guy with social realism. I grew up with this social documentary practice: ‘Where’s the problem? What is the problem? Let’s try to make corrections. “I believe in looking back sometimes to make sense of today.