The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) is the police department of the city of Los Angeles, California. With 9,925 officers and 2,879 civilian staff, covering an area of 498 square miles (1,290 km2) with a population of 3,792,621 million people as of the 2010 Census, it is the third largest local law enforcement agency in the United States, after the New York City Police Department and the Chicago Police Department.
The LAPD has been copiously fictionalized in numerous movies, novels and television shows throughout its history. The department has also been associated with a number of controversies, mainly concerned with racial animosity, police brutality and police corruption.
Read more about Los Angeles Police Department: History, Organization, Rank Structure and Insignia, Chiefs of Police, Work Environment, LAPD Awards, Commendations, Citations and Medals, Fallen Officers, In Popular Culture
Famous quotes containing the words los angeles, los, angeles, police and/or department:
“Los Angeles is a Yukon for crime-story writers.”
—Christina Stead (1902–1983)
“Of Eva first, that for hir wikkednesse
Was al mankinde brought to wrecchednesse,
For which that Jesu Crist himself was slain
That boughte us with his herte blood again—
Lo, heer expres of wommen may ye finde
That womman was the los of al mankinde.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“Prejudices are useless. Call Los Angeles any dirty name you like—Six Suburbs in Search of a City, Paradise with a Lobotomy, anything—but the fact remains that you are already living in it before you get there.”
—Clive James (b. 1939)
“I’ve met a lot of murderers in my day, but Dr. Garth, whatever he is, is the first man I’ve ever met who was polite to me and still made the chills run up and down my back.”
—Robert D. Andrews. Nick Grindé. Police detective, Before I Hang, describing his meeting with Dr. Garth (1940)
“We all live in a house on fire, no fire department to call; no way out, just the upstairs window to look out of while the fire burns the house down with us trapped, locked in it.”
—Tennessee Williams (1914–1983)