Police chief in LA takes over during a period of uncertainty

Jim McDonel is a cop.

This is hardly a surprise. In the end he is The most chief of the Los Angeles Police DepartmentOne of the most historical, imitating and criticized law enforcement authorities in the nation – celebrated by Dragnettorn to pieces of Rodney KingS

But not all LAPD chiefs are cops at their base. Bill Braton, chief from 2002 to 2009, was a political leader trained in law enforcement, but was most distinguished by the command of the city’s power structure. Willie Williams, who chaired the department from 1992 to 1997, was the organizer of a community-qualified community, but less with a rank and file.

McDonel is different. He stepped through the ranks of the department and knows his customs and combinations, which are at least as important that they lead him as an understanding of ideas for reform or political relations. Beyond this attempt, he also had tours as Chief of Long Beach Police Department and Sheriff of Los Angeles County. So while he is a creature of Lapd, he is also a student on him.

And he’s a cop. When talking about the priorities of the department, he does not immediately turn to budgets or reforms. He talks about reducing crime, enhancing public safety and improving public perception of crime. He calls his officers as “copper”. And he speaks with a sense of history and perspective: today Los Angeles is significantly more convenient than the city who patrols as a young officer – and that I have covered as a young reporter – a fact that is often lost in the midst of political campaigns and the piercing demands for refusal or reorganization of the police.

“Every crime is too much,” he admitted in a recent interview. “But we are in a relatively good place.”

McDonel comes at the helm of Lapd in a moment of uncertainty. The city was not facing a crime crisis, as it was in the 1990s, when the killings exceeded 1000 years and the violent crime was widespread. However, this is not a period of calm; More recently, this is one of the mixed signals.

The killings dropped in 2024.Like most violent crimes. However, ownership crimes have reduced a little during the first months of 2025, but in recent years they have been persistently resistant to police efforts, police show.

McDonel will have to make sense of this complex picture, realizing that he makes this crime of property has a way of becoming violent if left without a check. This observation, the nucleus of James Q. Wilson’s “broken windows” theoryHe runs many police departments, including LAPD, to the historical restoration of the safety of US cities.

But his victories must be won again and again. There is no complacency in the police.

Even when McDonel properly focuses on crime, he faces the extra challenging tasks of Los Angeles’ preparation for the 2028 Olympics, responding to street homelessness, Restoration of police morality and patrol neighborhoods devastated by the fire of the Pacific Palisades. Each of them would be a high order for the police chief – all of them would immediately emphasize the whole department.

However, he is optimistic. The fires, McDoenel said, have provided a course for a crash in interdepartmental cooperation, calling on police officers and firefighters to coordinate their work with that of the Ministry of Water and Power and others. The city’s emergency center is activated by Mayor Karen Bass in the early hours of the fire, and LAPD went on a tactical signal – an increased state of placement during which the vacations are retained – for one month. It was exhausting, McDonel said, but also instructive.

“I look at this as valuable,” he said, creating communication and confidence lines that are essential for work on homelessness and will be useful for gathering security plans for the World Cup and the Olympics, among other upcoming events. “Will really relate to relationships.”

Nothing happens in LAPD without employees wishing to fulfill the mission, and McDonell, echoing bass, emphasizes morality and recruitment as essential to the success of the department.

“Everyone has problems with staffing,” he said, and is right. Ever since the murder of George Floyd and the national disgust in this act, it was It is difficult to persuade young people to join the police forcesWhere they should expect to be considered and held for high standards for professional behavior.

Somehow this is useful: it detaches the possible officers who are attracted to the chance of the chance to wear a gun and a boss people around. But it also deprives police agencies, including LAPD, from quality candidates who are simply not ready to put up with the shortcomings of work.

“Will really relate to relationships.”

Jim McDonel, chief of Police in Los Angeles

McDonel said he hoped to make it clear that Lapd supports his employees, that young people can come to the department to defend and serve, and can rely on the support of the department as long as they do their work in good faith. The main complaint he has heard about morality, McDoenel said, is the fear that LAPD’s disciplinary system is unfair that it allows frivolous or malicious complaints to retain.

To deal with this, he offers quick complaints when the claim can be easily checked – against the Bodycam video, for example. If the claim is excessive force and the camera disproves it, then the complaint can be rejected without an extended review and without having to “bench” the officer.

“We have to be more reasonable,” McDonel said. The city should require “a high level of accountability … But if you can show that this absolutely has not happened, clean it.”

There is a danger along this way. Too far to reassure the police that the department will support them can encourage a violation. Officers who defeated King, for example, insisted on two criminal court processes that they simply conducted LAPD’s policies and practices for the use of power.

But not all slopes are slippery and it makes a great sense to reject the claims that are transparent false. If McDonnell can develop a system to spread these cases early, it can strengthen morals and help recruiting staff without going so that it undermines accountability.

Combating crime, preparing for the international scene, accommodation of homeless and restoration of the city – It’s a lot to deal withS McDonel knows it.

Sometimes only the cop will do.