The lawyer for the LAPD chief blamed by Union for having disclosed photos of officer

Los Angeles Police Head, Jim McDonnell, has ahead of the department’s constitutional police office, separating from a high -level lawyer who had attracted the anger of the police union for his role in the controversial liberation of thousands of Mugshot style photos.

In the most significant change in its staff since its management of the department, McDonnell has ousted Lizabeth Rhodes, the highest civilian employee of the LAPD. McDonnell informed Rhodes by means of a subordinate that his services would no longer be necessary, according to several sources of the department which requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the changes of staff.

“I am grateful for the dedicated years of service of Ms. Rhodes, in particular during some of the most difficult periods of the ministry,” said McDonnell in a press release. “His leadership and contributions played an important role in training the management of the Los Angeles police service.”

Attempts to reach Rhodes to its phone number issued by the city failed.

Rhodes should stay with the department until June when she takes leave accumulated during her mandate, said the sources of the department.

In its role, Rhodes supervised operations of various units, in particular the group of legal affairs of risk management, the audit division and the strategic planning section. His office was created in the early 2000s as part of the Consent Decree of the United States Ministry of Justice, which forced reforms to solve the fundamental problems of responsibility that have rose decades.

Former federal prosecutor appointed by the chief of the time Michel Moore in 2019, Rhodes was a deeply polarizing figure inside the department. Among her donors, she was considered a freelance leader who had helped direct the department through constantly evolving legal problems, including traffic stops, access to the press and news events.

But the powerful Los Angeles police protection league frequently targeted Rhodes with spicy criticism in its monthly magazine, including a policy that has limited the “pretextual stops” of motorists and pedestrians.

The union, which represents basic officers, also blamed Rhodes and Moore for having published thousands of photos of police under the law on public state files in 2022.

The images and other information such as the officer Pay and Rank were given to journalist Ben Camacho and the activist group Stop Lapd Spied Coalition, which transformed the equipment into an online database available for Watch the Watch.

Users can look for the photo of an officer using their name or badge number, which website creators have called a step towards greater police transparency. The union leaders blamed Rhodes and Moore for having published information that endanger the officers, including some who would have worked under cover.

After the Watch site, the Watchers site was put online in March 2023, Moore said that he was not aware of the photo press release until he already occurred. He apologized and ordered an internal investigation. The Inspector General of the LAPD office launched a separate probe.

At the time, Mayor Karen Bass described the release of “unacceptable violation that put the lives of our officers and their families in danger”.

More than 300 police officers filed a complaint against the city, alleging that their family had also been endangered. The city, in turn, continued Camacho and stopped the LAPD, trying to recover the photos.

The officers who signed the legal challenge against the city – in number in the hundreds and listed like John – argued that the press release put dozens of LAPD employees in danger, in particular those who work in sensitive assignments which must go largely to disguise their identity.

In November, however, the city conceded in legal files that the vast majority of the officers involved were not really under cover. The case against Camacho and the Stop Lapd spy coalition was thrown in court, and the city was ordered to pay $ 300,000 in legal costs. The dispute of officers against the city remains unanswered.

The lobbyists of the department have since pushed changes to the law of the state to prevent similar disclosure in the future.

The city refused requests for public files by the Times for communications sent and received by Rhodes and Moore about the release of the photos.

Before coming to the LAPD, Rhodes worked in the office of the local American prosecutor alongside Eileen Decker, which would later serve the LAPD police committee.

Rhodes continued several highly publicized cases, including that of the former Sheriff of the County of the Lee Baca, sentenced in 2017 for thwarting a federal investigation for his role in maintaining an informant outside the scope of his FBI managers and far from a great jury.

His work at the LAPD was to ensure that the officers followed the law, but the militants deplored what they considered his reluctance to put pressure on a transformer change.

The police union, on the other hand, accused Rhodes and other department leaders of making progressive interests and of making more difficult for the cops of doing their job.

In recent weeks, signs have started to appear that Rhodes had apparently fallen into disgrace with McDonnell.

She has rarely been seen around the police headquarters and replaced a recent presentation to the police committee by her predecessor as director of the constitutional police, Arif Alikhan.

Alikhan had been brought to the department last year to work on “risk management and harm reduction strategies, department’s programs and other critical problems”. He received a salary of $ 240,000 over six months, thanks to a donation from the police foundation.