James E. Davis (police)
Encyclopedia
James Edgar Davis was Chief of Police
of the City of Los Angeles Police Department
from 1926–1931 and from 1933-1939. During his first term as Police Chief, Davis emphasized firearms training. Under Davis, the L.A.P.D. developed its lasting reputation as an organization that relied on brute force to enforce public order. It also became very publicly entangled in corruption
. Members of the L.A.P.D. were revealed to have undertaken a campaign of brutal harassment, including the bombings of political reformers who had incurred the wrath of the department and the civic administration.
Under Chief Davis, civil service reforms were implemented in the City Charter via the ballot initiative process that insulated the police department from political influence.
. When Chief Davis created a "gun squad" staffed with 50 policemen, he made a public pronouncement that "the gun-toting element and the rum smugglers are going to learn that murder and gun-toting are most inimical to their best interest." David declared that the L.A.P.D. "would "hold court on gunmen in the Los Angeles streets; I want them brought in dead, not alive and will reprimand any officer who shows the least mercy to a criminal." For his efforts, he won the moniker "Two-Gun Davis."
The primary "targets" of Davis' department were purveyors of vice, radicals, and vagrants.
Davis was a proponent of the use of radio in police work. In 1929, he ordered his staff to investigate the use of radio for dispatching officers. However, it was up to his successor, Roy E. Steckel
, to put the radio in LA.P.D. vehciles..
, Davis served as chief from 1933 to 1939. In his second-go-round as chief, Davis developed a reputation as a reformer. Under Chief Steckel, departmental regulations forbidding the solicitation of rewards or the acceptance of gratuities by policemen had lapsed; Davis reimplemented the restrictions. He also fired 245 police officers for misconduct in the first four years of his second term.
However, in reality, Two-Gun Davis was to serve one of the most corrupt mayors in Los Angeles history, Frank L. Shaw
. A pro F.D.R.
/pro-New Deal
Republican, Shaw had been elected despite the opposition of the Chandler Family
, conservatives who owned the powerful Los Angeles Times
newspaper. (The 1910 L.A. Times building bombing
had been carried out by a union member, upset with the anti-union stance of publisher Harrison Gray Otis
, whose son-in-law Harry Chandler would take over as publisher of the Times in 1917. The bombing killed 100 newspaper employees and injured another 100.)
To curry favor with the Chandlers, Shaw appointed Davis chief. Chandler was fiercely anti-labor, and Davis, as chief, could provide police muscle to discourage unionization.
Davis formed a "Red Squad
" in order to "investigate and control radical activities, strikes, and riots." According to the Official L.A.P.D. Web Site, one Police Commissioner declared his support for Davis' Red Squad, saying, "The more the police beat them up and wreck their headquarters, the better. Communists have no Constitutional rights and I won't listen to anyone who defends them."
Mayor Shaw appointed his campaign manager, James "Sunny Jimmy" Bolger, to serve as Davis' secretary, in order to keep a tight rein on the Chief.
Under Chief Davis, the L.A.P.D. would become mired in corruption, becoming active agents in the promotion of vice.
for shooting events. In recognition, the Olympic Committee donated the dormitory used as the Olympic Village
, and the dormitory building was dismantled and reassembled at the site of the rage in Elysian Fields. The building would eventually house the restaurant for the new training facility that would become the L.A.P.D.'s Police Academy. From 1935 to 1995, all recruits were trained at the Elysian Field site, when the new Recruit Training Center was opened in Westchester. The Elysian Park facilities, the legacy of Chief Davis, are to be used for in-service training.
The rules and regulations for the new Police Academy were drafted by L.A.P.D Lieutenant William H. Parker, who would go on to become Chief of Police in 1950.
Parker also drafted civil service
reforms enacted into the City's charter that were designed to protect the chief and police personnel from political interference. Charter Amendment 14-A, which was passed by the electorate in April 1937, changed City Charter Section 1999 so that the Chief of Police could not be removed without a hearing before the L.A. Board of Civil Service Commissioners.
, based on these events, Davis was played by Colm Feore
.)
For several months in 1936, during the height of the devastation from the "Dust Bowl
", Chief Davis sent L.A.P.D. to the California-Arizona border in an attempt to stop the flow of migrants. These migrants were commonly referred to as "Okie
s", named for the early migrants who fled Oklahoma after the state was ravaged by the Dust Bowl.
(who had overseen a grand jury that nearly brought down L.A. District Attorney Buron Fitts
for corruption), CIVIC issued a minority report that was only published after Judge Bowron's intervention.
A notary public that testified before the grand jury that the foreman was a corrupt ally of Mayor Shaw was beaten by police at his own home in the presence of Fitts and the grand jury foreman. Clinton was harassed by city officials, who boosted his taxes and denied him a license to open up a new cafeterias, while the Los Angeles Times attacked him and his restaurant chain. Then his home was bombed, most likely by members of the L.A.P.D.'s secret Intelligence Squad, and the backwash enveloped Mayor Shaw and Chief Davis. The Intelligence Squad wiretapped Clinton's home, as well as the home of Judge Bowron and other members of the reform movement.
A second bombing brought down Mayor Shaw. Investigator Harry Raymond, a former policeman who worked as a private investigator and was digging up dirt on the Shaw administration, survived a car bombing on January 14, 1937. The bomb was planted by L.A.P.D. Captain Earl Kynette, who headed a secret intelligence unit that had Raymond under surveillance. The L.A.P.D. and the Los Angeles Times, which was in league with D.A. Fitts, said the bombing was a publicity stunt staged by Clinton and Raymond, but witnesses testified that the police had had Clinton's house under surveillance. Seven members of the intelligence squad refused to testify before the grand jury, pledging their right not to incriminate themselves. Captain Kynette later was convicted of the bombing.
District Attorney Fitts and Chief Davis began a desultory investigation that led the director of the L.A. Chamber of Commerce
to send a letter to U.S. Senator Hiram Johnson
, which called Fitts a psychopath. The public outcry led to Mayor Shaw being recalled by voters in 1938 and the election of Judge Bowron as mayor.
Davis was called as a witness at the trial of Captain Kynette. It was revealed that the L.A.P.D. had been operating a vast intelligence operation targeting not only reformers but politicians, judges, and even a federal agent investigating corruption in San Francisco. Chief Davis did poorly on the stand and he was forced from office by Mayor Bowron, who went on to sack many of the senior officers of the L.A.P.D.
arrived in Los Angeles. He eventually went into business with Mickey Cohen
, a minor league hood from Chicago who would one day reign as Los Angeles's crime boss. Both Siegel and Cohen found that the Los Angeles rackets were controlled by "The Combination", which included the police, who were active in running gambling and vice and were hostile to outside racketeers. The bombing scandals and the resulting wave of reform instigated by Mayor Bowron likely influenced the Mafia to move its gambling operations from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. However, corruption continued to flourish in Los Angeles. Another chief, Clemence B. Horrall
, was dismissed for that reason in 1949.
Davis died of stroke in at a Montana
ranch in 1949.
Chief of police
A Chief of Police is the title typically given to the top official in the chain of command of a police department, particularly in North America. Alternate titles for this position include Commissioner, Superintendent, and Chief constable...
of the City of Los Angeles Police Department
Los Angeles Police Department
The Los Angeles Police Department is the police department of the city of Los Angeles, California. With just under 10,000 officers and more than 3,000 civilian staff, covering an area of with a population of more than 4.1 million people, it is the third largest local law enforcement agency in...
from 1926–1931 and from 1933-1939. During his first term as Police Chief, Davis emphasized firearms training. Under Davis, the L.A.P.D. developed its lasting reputation as an organization that relied on brute force to enforce public order. It also became very publicly entangled in corruption
Police corruption
Police corruption is a specific form of police misconduct designed to obtain financial benefits, other personal gain, or career advancement for a police officer or officers in exchange for not pursuing, or selectively pursuing, an investigation or arrest....
. Members of the L.A.P.D. were revealed to have undertaken a campaign of brutal harassment, including the bombings of political reformers who had incurred the wrath of the department and the civic administration.
Under Chief Davis, civil service reforms were implemented in the City Charter via the ballot initiative process that insulated the police department from political influence.
First Term
James E. Davis made a name for himself in the department as the head of the vice squad during ProhibitionProhibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...
. When Chief Davis created a "gun squad" staffed with 50 policemen, he made a public pronouncement that "the gun-toting element and the rum smugglers are going to learn that murder and gun-toting are most inimical to their best interest." David declared that the L.A.P.D. "would "hold court on gunmen in the Los Angeles streets; I want them brought in dead, not alive and will reprimand any officer who shows the least mercy to a criminal." For his efforts, he won the moniker "Two-Gun Davis."
The primary "targets" of Davis' department were purveyors of vice, radicals, and vagrants.
Davis was a proponent of the use of radio in police work. In 1929, he ordered his staff to investigate the use of radio for dispatching officers. However, it was up to his successor, Roy E. Steckel
Roy E. Steckel
Roy Edmund Steckel served as Los Angeles Police Department Chief of Police from December 30, 1929 to August 9, 1933. He succeeded and was succeeded as chief by James E. "Two-Guns" Davis. During Steckel's reign as Chif of Police, Los Angeles hosted the 1932 Summer Olympic Games. The L.A.P.D....
, to put the radio in LA.P.D. vehciles..
Second Term
After being succeeded by and succeeding Police Chief Roy E. SteckelRoy E. Steckel
Roy Edmund Steckel served as Los Angeles Police Department Chief of Police from December 30, 1929 to August 9, 1933. He succeeded and was succeeded as chief by James E. "Two-Guns" Davis. During Steckel's reign as Chif of Police, Los Angeles hosted the 1932 Summer Olympic Games. The L.A.P.D....
, Davis served as chief from 1933 to 1939. In his second-go-round as chief, Davis developed a reputation as a reformer. Under Chief Steckel, departmental regulations forbidding the solicitation of rewards or the acceptance of gratuities by policemen had lapsed; Davis reimplemented the restrictions. He also fired 245 police officers for misconduct in the first four years of his second term.
However, in reality, Two-Gun Davis was to serve one of the most corrupt mayors in Los Angeles history, Frank L. Shaw
Frank L. Shaw
Frank L. Shaw was the first mayor of a major American city to be recalled from office, in 1938. He was also a member of the Los Angeles City Council and then the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors...
. A pro F.D.R.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
/pro-New Deal
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
Republican, Shaw had been elected despite the opposition of the Chandler Family
Harry Chandler
Harry Chandler was an American newspaper publisher and investor who became owner of the largest real estate empire in the U.S.-Biography:...
, conservatives who owned the powerful Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
newspaper. (The 1910 L.A. Times building bombing
Los Angeles Times bombing
The Los Angeles Times bombing was the purposeful dynamiting of the Los Angeles Times building in Los Angeles, California, on October 1, 1910 by a union member belonging to the International Association of Bridge and Structural Iron Workers. The explosion started a fire which killed 21 newspaper...
had been carried out by a union member, upset with the anti-union stance of publisher Harrison Gray Otis
Harrison Gray Otis
Harrison Gray Otis was the president and general manager of the Times-Mirror Company, publisher of the Los Angeles Times.-Early life:...
, whose son-in-law Harry Chandler would take over as publisher of the Times in 1917. The bombing killed 100 newspaper employees and injured another 100.)
To curry favor with the Chandlers, Shaw appointed Davis chief. Chandler was fiercely anti-labor, and Davis, as chief, could provide police muscle to discourage unionization.
Davis formed a "Red Squad
Red squad
In the United States, Red Squads were police intelligence units that specialized in infiltrating, conducting counter-measures and gathering intelligence on political and social groups during the twentieth century. Dating as far back as the Haymarket Riot in 1886, Red Squads became common in larger...
" in order to "investigate and control radical activities, strikes, and riots." According to the Official L.A.P.D. Web Site, one Police Commissioner declared his support for Davis' Red Squad, saying, "The more the police beat them up and wreck their headquarters, the better. Communists have no Constitutional rights and I won't listen to anyone who defends them."
Mayor Shaw appointed his campaign manager, James "Sunny Jimmy" Bolger, to serve as Davis' secretary, in order to keep a tight rein on the Chief.
Under Chief Davis, the L.A.P.D. would become mired in corruption, becoming active agents in the promotion of vice.
Police Academy
Starting in 1933, David began transforming the pistol range and related facilities of the Los Angeles Police Revolver and Athletic Club (LAPRAAC) in Elysian Park into a true training facility for recruits. Police recruits had begun training in an armory located in Elysian Park in 1924. The LAPRAAC had been founded as a private club in 1925 by L.A.P.D. officers to practice their marksmanship. In 1932, their range was used during the 1932 Summer Olympics1932 Summer Olympics
The 1932 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the X Olympiad, was a major world wide multi-athletic event which was celebrated in 1932 in Los Angeles, California, United States. No other cities made a bid to host these Olympics. Held during the worldwide Great Depression, many nations...
for shooting events. In recognition, the Olympic Committee donated the dormitory used as the Olympic Village
Olympic Village
An Olympic Village is an accommodation centre built for an Olympic Games, usually within an Olympic Park or elsewhere in a host city. Olympic Villages are built to house all participating athletes, as well as officials, athletic trainers, and other staff. Since the Munich Massacre at the 1972...
, and the dormitory building was dismantled and reassembled at the site of the rage in Elysian Fields. The building would eventually house the restaurant for the new training facility that would become the L.A.P.D.'s Police Academy. From 1935 to 1995, all recruits were trained at the Elysian Field site, when the new Recruit Training Center was opened in Westchester. The Elysian Park facilities, the legacy of Chief Davis, are to be used for in-service training.
The rules and regulations for the new Police Academy were drafted by L.A.P.D Lieutenant William H. Parker, who would go on to become Chief of Police in 1950.
Parker also drafted civil service
Civil service
The term civil service has two distinct meanings:* A branch of governmental service in which individuals are employed on the basis of professional merit as proven by competitive examinations....
reforms enacted into the City's charter that were designed to protect the chief and police personnel from political interference. Charter Amendment 14-A, which was passed by the electorate in April 1937, changed City Charter Section 1999 so that the Chief of Police could not be removed without a hearing before the L.A. Board of Civil Service Commissioners.
Controversy
During his first stint as Police Chief, Davis was involved in the scandal surrounding the Wineville Chicken Coop Murders. (In the 2008 film ChangelingChangeling (film)
Changeling is a 2008 American drama film directed by Clint Eastwood and written by J. Michael Straczynski. Based on real-life events in 1928 Los Angeles, the film stars Angelina Jolie as a woman who is reunited with her missing son—only to realize he is an impostor. She confronts the city...
, based on these events, Davis was played by Colm Feore
Colm Feore
Colm Feore is an American-born Canadian stage, film and television actor.-Early life:Feore was born in Boston, Massachusetts to Irish parents who lived in Ireland for several years during Feore's early life. The family subsequently moved to Windsor, Ontario, where Feore grew up.After graduating...
.)
For several months in 1936, during the height of the devastation from the "Dust Bowl
Dust Bowl
The Dust Bowl, or the Dirty Thirties, was a period of severe dust storms causing major ecological and agricultural damage to American and Canadian prairie lands from 1930 to 1936...
", Chief Davis sent L.A.P.D. to the California-Arizona border in an attempt to stop the flow of migrants. These migrants were commonly referred to as "Okie
Okie
Okie is a term dating from as early as 1907, originally denoting a resident or native of Oklahoma. It is derived from the name of the state, similar to Texan or Tex for someone from Texas, or Arkie or Arkansawyer for a native of Arkansas....
s", named for the early migrants who fled Oklahoma after the state was ravaged by the Dust Bowl.
Corruption
In 1937, restaurateur Clifford Clinton, a reform-minded businessman who ran a chain of cafeteria-style restaurants, got himself been appointed to the Los Angeles County grand jury. Clinton proved to be a gadfly who demanded an investigation of vice in Los Angeles, and was turned down by the grand jury foreman. Angered, he went to Mayor Shaw, who endorsed an independent committee, CIVIC (Citizens Independent Vice Investigating Committee) over the objections of Chief Davis. A corrupt politician who eventually was recalled from office in 1938, Mayor Shaw soon regretted his decision. CIVIC and its citizen volunteers discovered that vice was rampant in Los Angeles. The profits from 600 brothels, 1,800 bookmaking operations, 23,000 slot machines and prostitution were being used to finance political elections, and the L.A.P.D. was working hand-in-hand with the underworld. The grand jury rejected CIVIC's report, and after seeking the advice of Superior Court Judge Fletcher BowronFletcher Bowron
Fletcher Bowron was the 35th Mayor of Los Angeles, California from September 26, 1938 until June 30, 1953. Until Thomas Bradley passed his length of service during the 1980s, Bowron held the distinction of having the longest tenure in that position in city history.Bowron was born in Poway,...
(who had overseen a grand jury that nearly brought down L.A. District Attorney Buron Fitts
Buron Fitts
Buron Rogers Fitts was a California politician, who was the 29th Lieutenant Governor of the state from 1927 to 1928 and Los Angeles County district attorney thereafter until 1940....
for corruption), CIVIC issued a minority report that was only published after Judge Bowron's intervention.
A notary public that testified before the grand jury that the foreman was a corrupt ally of Mayor Shaw was beaten by police at his own home in the presence of Fitts and the grand jury foreman. Clinton was harassed by city officials, who boosted his taxes and denied him a license to open up a new cafeterias, while the Los Angeles Times attacked him and his restaurant chain. Then his home was bombed, most likely by members of the L.A.P.D.'s secret Intelligence Squad, and the backwash enveloped Mayor Shaw and Chief Davis. The Intelligence Squad wiretapped Clinton's home, as well as the home of Judge Bowron and other members of the reform movement.
A second bombing brought down Mayor Shaw. Investigator Harry Raymond, a former policeman who worked as a private investigator and was digging up dirt on the Shaw administration, survived a car bombing on January 14, 1937. The bomb was planted by L.A.P.D. Captain Earl Kynette, who headed a secret intelligence unit that had Raymond under surveillance. The L.A.P.D. and the Los Angeles Times, which was in league with D.A. Fitts, said the bombing was a publicity stunt staged by Clinton and Raymond, but witnesses testified that the police had had Clinton's house under surveillance. Seven members of the intelligence squad refused to testify before the grand jury, pledging their right not to incriminate themselves. Captain Kynette later was convicted of the bombing.
District Attorney Fitts and Chief Davis began a desultory investigation that led the director of the L.A. Chamber of Commerce
Chamber of commerce
A chamber of commerce is a form of business network, e.g., a local organization of businesses whose goal is to further the interests of businesses. Business owners in towns and cities form these local societies to advocate on behalf of the business community...
to send a letter to U.S. Senator Hiram Johnson
Hiram Johnson
Hiram Warren Johnson was a leading American progressive and later isolationist politician from California; he served as the 23rd Governor from 1911 to 1917, and as a United States Senator from 1917 to 1945.-Early life:...
, which called Fitts a psychopath. The public outcry led to Mayor Shaw being recalled by voters in 1938 and the election of Judge Bowron as mayor.
Davis was called as a witness at the trial of Captain Kynette. It was revealed that the L.A.P.D. had been operating a vast intelligence operation targeting not only reformers but politicians, judges, and even a federal agent investigating corruption in San Francisco. Chief Davis did poorly on the stand and he was forced from office by Mayor Bowron, who went on to sack many of the senior officers of the L.A.P.D.
Mafia
It was during Davis' second term as chief when New York mobster Bugsy SiegelBugsy Siegel
Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel was an American gangster who was involved with the Genovese crime family...
arrived in Los Angeles. He eventually went into business with Mickey Cohen
Mickey Cohen
Meyer Harris "Mickey" Cohen was a gangster based in Los Angeles and part of the Jewish Mafia, and also had strong ties to the American Mafia from the 1930s through 1960s.-Early life:...
, a minor league hood from Chicago who would one day reign as Los Angeles's crime boss. Both Siegel and Cohen found that the Los Angeles rackets were controlled by "The Combination", which included the police, who were active in running gambling and vice and were hostile to outside racketeers. The bombing scandals and the resulting wave of reform instigated by Mayor Bowron likely influenced the Mafia to move its gambling operations from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. However, corruption continued to flourish in Los Angeles. Another chief, Clemence B. Horrall
Clemence B. Horrall
Clemence B. Horrall was Los Angeles Police Department Chief of Police from June 16, 1941, when he succeeded Arthur C. Hohmann to serve as the 41st Chief of the L.A.P.D., and June 28, 1949, when he resigned under pressure during a grand jury investigation of police corruption...
, was dismissed for that reason in 1949.
Davis died of stroke in at a Montana
Montana
Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...
ranch in 1949.
See also
- Los Angeles Police DepartmentLos Angeles Police DepartmentThe Los Angeles Police Department is the police department of the city of Los Angeles, California. With just under 10,000 officers and more than 3,000 civilian staff, covering an area of with a population of more than 4.1 million people, it is the third largest local law enforcement agency in...
- List of Los Angeles Police Department Chiefs of Police