Ed Davis: Tough Talking Chief Reshaped LAPD and California GOP
Los Angeles Police Chief Ed Davis is photographed in his office at police headquarters in December 1975. A family spokesman says the former Los Angeles police chief and state senator Ed Davis has died of complications from pneumonia at 89. Davis died of complications from pneumonia Saturday night at a hospital in San Luis Obispo, Calif., said family spokesman Rob Wilcox.
Los Angeles Times: Tough-Talking Chief Reshaped LAPD
Ed Davis, the flamboyant and innovative former Los Angeles police chief who later defied stereotypes by supporting environmental issues and gay rights when he was a Republican state senator, died Saturday. He was 89.
A Morro Bay-area resident, Davis died about 7:15 p.m from complications of pneumonia. He was admitted to Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center in the San Luis Obispo area earlier this month when his wife, Bobbie, was unable to wake him up one morning.
Ed Davis has passed but his plain spoken quotes live on…………
THE QUOTES:
Known for his controversial statements, in 1972 Davis suggested reinstating the death penalty in California to punish airline hijackers.
“I recommend we have a portable gallows, and after we have the death penalty back in, we conduct a rapid trial for a hijacker out there and hang him with due process out there at the airport,” Davis said.
The proposal earned him the nickname “Hang ‘Em High Ed.”
Davis, who was chief of the Los Angeles Police Department from 1969 to 1978, gained notoriety for his many controversial public utterances, including his method for dealing with hijackers: Give them a trial, then “hang ’em at the airport.”
When he was under a court-imposed gag order not to discuss a legal case, he invited reporters to a news conference, tied a handkerchief around his mouth and mumbled: “I’m one of the few men in the country without freedom of speech.”
“After it was all over, he said it was better police work to save a life than kill someone.”
Still, Davis was a shrewd enough bureaucrat to employ scare tactics when he appeared before the City Council and argued for more LAPD funding. He once advised residents to “bar your doors, buy a police dog, call us when we’re available and pray.”
“When you see the cross-section of the Republican Party, you don’t see America,” he said shortly before he left politics. “If the Republican Party wants to be the majority party, it must be like a church. The church is supposed to open its doors to all sinners, not just Anglo European people.”
“I’m not seeking anything, but people do call me up,” he said in 1996.
And then the quotes about Chief Davis’s life:
“Ed Davis was a dynamic leader in law enforcement,” said Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton in a statement. He credited Davis with helping to formulate the management principles of the LAPD, creating many successful crime-fighting programs and starting the Los Angeles Police Memorial Foundation to help families of police officers killed in the line of duty.
“He realized your true value and success depended on your relationship with the community,” said Councilman Bernard C. Parks, who joined the LAPD in 1965 as a street officer and became chief in 1997. “He realized that if you cultivated the community and they were your eyes and ears and they were the ones that were taking an active role and called when they saw something suspicious, then the Police Department grew by thousands of people taking an interest in the community.”
Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca, who took police science classes from Davis at Cal State L.A. decades ago, called him “one of the most intelligent and innovative police chiefs in America.”
At the end of Davis’ tenure, then-Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky, who had occasionally criticized the chief’s policies, said Davis was a remarkable leader. “Davis commands the respect of his subordinates without question, like nobody in this city does. They’re afraid of him, they love him, they respect him. He’s like the Vince Lombardi of the Police Department.”
One Republican critic denounced him as “the Legislature’s leading crusader for homosexual rights.”
Los Angeles Police Chief Edward M. Davis speaks at a news conference in Los Angeles in June 1974.
Flap first met California State Senator Ed Davis in 1982 after Flap lost his first race for elected office (November 1981), Area 2 of the Ventura County Community College District. Flap was interested in some dental/regulation tax issues and Flap called his district office who recommended that I meet with the Senator and discuss the issues. We met at the old Thousand Oaks City Hall on the Hill and we talked for at least an hour about politics. He was ever encouraging, sitting smoking his pipe and imparting his words of political sage.
It always amazed me how open Ed Davis was. He was never pretentious and “told it like he saw it.”
Flap could always count on the Chief for political help. I became one of the Davis cadre, along with others: Tom McClintock, Michael Bradbury, Colleen Toy White, Hunt Braly, Scott Wilk, Eric Rose, Rob Wilcox, Marlee Means and others who Flap will apologize for not mentioning. The 1980’s were exciting times. Reagan was President, Dukemejian and later Wilson were California Governors and Ed Davis was the political “KING” in Ventura County.
Ed Davis revitalized Flap’s political career, encouraging me to run for the Ventura County Republican Central Committee. Now, it was improper for an incumbent Republican office holder to endorse a candidate in the GOP primary election but Ed was ingenious. He gave me his printer and allowed me to send direct mail with Flap and him shaking hands to all Republican households in Thousand Oaks. Flap won. And Flap won re-election until he was appointed to the Thousand Oaks Planning Commission in 1987 and then elected to the Ventura County Community College District in 1989 – all with Ed Davis’s help, recommendation and encouragement.
In Flap’s last campaign in 1992, Ed Davis, did Flap a final favor: television commercials for Flap’s unsuccesful Thousand Oaks City Council race.
In the meantime, Ed’s former chief of staff Tom McClintock was elected to the California Assembly. Tom now holds Senator Davis’s former California State Senate seat and is a candidate this November for Lt. Governor.
Chief,,,,,,Rest in Peace……
Los Angeles Police Chief Ed Davis announces at a news conference in Dec. 1969 that warrants have been issued for the arrest of a man and two women in the slayings os seven people, including actress Sharon Tate and four others at her home.
MSM:
AP: Former LAPD Police Chief Ed Davis Dies
L.A. Daily News: Iconic ’70s LAPD Chief Ed Davis dies at 89
Ventura County Star: Ed Davis, ex-L.A. police chief, state senator, dies at 89
San Francisco Chronicle: Ed Davis — former L.A. police chief
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Former LAPD Chief and California Senator Ed Davis: RIP
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