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Life & Times Transcript
10/04/06 Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times -- Being a cop is tough, but it's nothing compared to the challenges this officer has to face. Kristina Ripatti>> I kind of realized, you know, I can't feel my legs. I can't walk any more. I can't get up and walk across the room and that's when it hit a lot more. Val Zavala>> And then, southern California is blessed with beautiful beaches, but wait until you see the unholy mess we make on other shores. These stories and more next on tonight's Life and Times. Announcer>> Life and Times is made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education. And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg. Val Zavala>> Every year in America, about a hundred sixty police officers are killed while on duty. You're about to meet one police woman who was almost one of them. She's alive, but her life will never be the same. Hena Cuevas has the story of this remarkable woman who refuses to feel sorry for herself. Hena Cuevas>> Five times a week, LAPD officer Kristina Ripatti heads to the gym. These intense workouts are helping her rebuild her strength as well as her life. Kristina Ripatti>> I only have feelings to just above my chest line, so basically my whole core abdomen here is just like a noodle. I have no support. Like if I fall, I just fall forward. I can't stop myself and I can't push myself up like this. I have to physically push myself up. Hena Cuevas>> For Ripatti, being a police officer wasn't just a job, but a way of life. She graduated from the police academy ten years ago. Also in her class, the man who would eventually become her husband, Tim Pearce. A year after graduation, they became patrol partners. Tim Pearce>> Everybody knew that there was something between us long before we did (laughter). Kristina Ripatti>> We started hanging out together off duty and then, you know, we became really good friends and he pretty much confessed his love for me (laughter). Hena Cuevas>> That confession led to marriage three years ago. Then last year, their daughter Jordan was born. Kristina Ripatti>> We were confident that we could both be successful police officers and, you know, good parents to Jordan. Hena Cuevas>> But on June 3, the world Kristina and Tim had built together collapsed. One of their biggest fears was about to become a reality. At about 10:30 that night, this gas station which is right across the street from the Southwest Division Police Station was robbed at gunpoint. Immediately the announcement went out to all of the units alerting them that a robbery suspect was in the area. Kristina Ripatti and her partner, Joe Meyer, were patrolling a block away. Moments before the call, Ripatti and Meyer say they spotted a man walking quickly down the sidewalk. What about his attitude made you think that he was suspicious? Joe Meyer>> Well, he just kept looking back over his shoulder at us and then there were times when usually one time he would look behind, but when he keeps looking back at the police, it brings our attention to him like they're nervous that we're there. Hena Cuevas>> The man was fifty-two year old James Fenton McNeal, a convicted murderer and armed robber with an extensive criminal history. The officers decided to stop him. When he took off running, Ripatti chased after him. Joe Meyer>> So he started running this way. Kristina was up front of me, again, like about eight feet. I remember I got around here and Kristina had just got to the top of the stairs. When she was at the top of the stairs, I saw her reach for the guy like this and he was trying to get in this door here. As she grabbed him, I didn't see it, but I heard the first shot. Kristina Ripatti>> I just remember the smell of the gunpowder was so strong. It was like the gun was just inches from my face. Hena Cuevas>> With his partner down, Meyer said he moved to the other side of the porch. Joe Meyer>> I knew Kristina was here and he was there, so I couldn't come right this way because he would have been between us, so I moved to the other side of the wall over here. Kristina Ripatti>> It was just a small revolver maybe in his waistband or his pocket and he shot high into my armpit and higher than the vest was covering. That was the bullet that ended up paralyzing me and it dropped me immediately. As I was going to the ground, he shot a couple more times into my arm. Hena Cuevas>> Meyer says McNeal then started shooting at him. Meyer returned fire and killed him. The bullet holes are still visible in the porch. Joe Meyer>> He fell right about here and Kristina was here. She was bleeding pretty bad. The blood actually trailed all the way down to the bottom step down here. Hena Cuevas>> When the "Officer Down" alert went out over the radio, Ripatti's husband was only a few miles away. He knew there was a chance Kristina was hurt and then his phone rang. Tim Pearce>> I picked it up and it was her sergeant. I can here the chaos in the background and he goes, "Tim, where are you?" I said, "I'm getting off the freeway." He goes, "It's Kristina." I said, "I know. I'll be right there." Kristina Ripatti>> The bullet hit an artery. You know, it turns out I was totally going into shock and that's when my memory gets really foggy. Joe was just over me telling me to fight. Joe Meyer>> I had my finger like in the hole. You could feel the blood pulsating through the hole and I knew at that time it was an artery for sure that was hit. Hena Cuevas>> At that moment, did you think she was going to make it? Joe Meyer>> No, I didn't because of how much blood. I mean, I was covered in blood. She was covered in blood and then all the blood that was down here. Hena Cuevas>> Tim arrived at the same time as the paramedics. Tim Pearce>> I jumped over to the other side of the porch and got down next to her. I figured the only thing I can do is tell her I love her and hopefully she hears that I'm here. I started saying, "Kristina, it's me, it's me. I made it to you." Kristina Ripatti>> You know, I remember kind of like that internal instinct to fight. I didn't want to die, that's for sure. Hena Cuevas>> Ripatti was rushed to the hospital where doctors worked frantically to save her life. She had lost six pints of blood, about seventy-five percent of a body's entire blood supply. Kristina Ripatti>> I remember the bright lights and the doctors standing over me, you know, saying, "Stay with us" or something like that. "Stay with us, stay with us" and I was saying like, "I'm right here, I'm right here", but they couldn't hear me. Hena Cuevas>> The first bullet not only severed the artery, but lodged itself in her spine. Ripatti wouldn't be able to walk again. It was her husband, Tim, who had to break the news. Kristina Ripatti>> Initially, I was like, well, okay, there's nothing I can do about it now, so move on. You know, a few weeks later, once I got into the rehab hospital, it was a lot different. Then you kind of realize like, you know, I can't feel my legs. I can't walk anymore. I can't get up and walk across the room, and that's when it hit a lot more. Hena Cuevas>> Everything has to be relearned, like how to get around her own house. Kristin Ripatti>> You know, one day you might be upset that you can't walk. The next day, you might be upset because you realize you lost your career. The next day, you might be upset because you can't deal with Jordan the same way. Everything is changed. Hena Cuevas>> They're selling the two-story house and moving into a single-story one. They hope the move, along with extensive physical therapy, will give Kristina more independence. They've been told her injury is permanent and she'll never walk again, but she's a fighter, so she wants to push what limited mobility she has to the fullest. Do you think you might be pushing yourself too hard? Kristin Ripatti>> No (laughter) No way. I don't think it's possible. I think I could push myself even harder. Hena Cuevas>> The LAPD still has a place for her, but Ripatti says it's going to take time. She has to decide on a job, be it at the police department or somewhere else that she'll love as much as patrolling the streets. Kristina Ripatti>> I'm sad that it has to end so soon. There was so much more I could have done, but, you know, there's probably something else out there for me. Hena Cuevas>> I'm Hena Cuevas for Life and Times. Announcer>> Kcet.org is the place to look for the very latest on Life and Times. You'll find previews of upcoming stories, plus transcripts and audio of past episodes and links to some of our most interesting features. Just go to kcet.org, scroll down the page and click on "Life and Times". Val Zavala>> Police Chief, Bill Bratton, has been Los Angeles's top cop for more than four years now. He came from New York where there are twice as many officers per resident as there are in Los Angeles. One of Bratton's biggest challenges has been to increase the number of officers on the force. First, it was a money issue, but earlier this year, this Los Angeles City Council approved a hike in trash pickup fees. The additional millions will go to boost the force from about nine thousand officers to ten thousand. But qualified applicants are few and the competition among cities is fierce. In July, a minor feud broke out between Bratton and the City Council over drug policy for recruits. Some council members criticized the policy. Bratton responded by saying they "don't know what the hell they're talking about." I sat down with Chief Bratton to hear what he has to say about city politics and the recruitment challenge. One of your biggest challenges is recruitment. You want to hire a thousand new officers over the next five years. Why is it so hard? Chief William Bratton>> Well, we have three challenges right now. We have our normal attrition of three hundred some odd officers a year. That's going to be compounded by a program that was initiated several years ago that officers who are retiring agree to stay on for an extra five years. We have this year alone an additional three hundred officers that will be leaving under that program. So almost all the officers I'll hire this year will be to replace what's going out the door. The reason it's going to take us so long to hire the thousand officers is that we have to take care of normal attrition, that extra attrition, and then try to get new officers. But the challenge is that we only hire about one out of every twelve or thirteen applicants. We have very high standards. But we'll do it. The beauty of the trash fee is that we know that we can hire without interruption for the next five years and that's critically important. As for the last several years, we've been stop and go, stop and go, and young kids aren't going to wait around. They're going to take a job someplace else if they don't know with certainty that they have a job waiting for them at the end of the process. Val Zavala>> Is it more difficult in general, given our society and the values in society or how young people perceive police work? Is it harder to get young people interested in police work these days? Chief William Bratton>> There are a number of difficulties we're facing in the police profession and not just in Los Angeles in hiring young people. Everywhere in the country is having trouble hiring people. One, we have the war keeping a lot of young people in the service who might ordinarily be available. Two, we have a pretty good economy right now. Employment is very high. Unemployment is very low. We have a compounding factor in big cities in that a lot of the minority candidates that we seek to acquire, Latinos and African-American, the dropout rate is phenomenal before they ever get out of high school. We have a minimum of a high school education, but in a city like Los Angeles where fifty percent of the kids that we normally seek to go after don't even make it through high school, that compounds the issue of trying to hire minorities. So there's a lot of factors at work. We are a very aggressive agency in seeking out women, gays, ethnic diversity. The good news is, our department almost mirrors the community we police almost exactly in terms of our percentage of personnel. Val Zavala>> You mentioned that one of the things you might have to do is be more flexible or change some of the standards. Now that's led to some criticism that you have lowered the standard, especially in terms of drug use. What is the drug use standard for recruits? Chief William Bratton>> Actually, the issue was with tightening up rather than relaxing any standards. For example, we now hair test every candidate that gets through our process. Hair testing will give you drug use going back six months. The traditional urinalysis, which the department used for many years, will give you three days. So if somebody is a habitual drug user, they're not going to be able to stay off drugs for the six months we can test for. We use the polygraph. If they tell us, "Oh, I used drugs five years ago. I just experimented", we can confirm that answer through the polygraph. So we have the tightest hiring standards in the country for drug testing and we did not always have that system in place. So we've tightened our standards rather than lowered them. Additionally, we've put into a place a concept called "the whole police officer", the whole person. We look at all aspects of that person's life and, if there is an issue, we don't disqualify them necessarily just based on that issue. We take it in the context of that person's whole life. As a result, if somebody has made a mistake in the past that is not going to be repeated again, why deny ourselves access to a person that made a mistake such as somebody that might have experimented with marijuana in college? In today's day and age, it's a rare kid that probably gets through college without having some experience with some type of drug. Val Zavala>> So you're willing to consider that, consider past drug use, if it's confined, isolated, it has not become a problem? Chief William Bratton>> Experimental, not of a major consequence, and we can confirm that drug use by a polygraph and by hair testing. I would point out that the standards we use are the same as the FBI uses, the same that are used for top secret clearances in this country, so that what we are doing is not the exception. It's rather the norm. Val Zavala>> Now it's no secret that you've had some run-ins with the City Council. What do you feel the relations are between you and the City Council? Chief William Bratton>> Well, it's just the Council, by and large, is very good, but from time to time, they are strained. That's the nature of politics. From time to time, we have differences of opinion. We certainly have a difference of opinion on this issue, one that I'm happy to explain. I report to the Police Commission and will be giving a presentation to the Police Commission and we'll make a presentation to the council. Again, I'm very comfortable with what we're doing and, if the council seeks to disagree, well, if they can get a majority to overrule it, fine. That's their role and that's their responsibility. But I think you'll find the majority of the council members understand what we're doing, understand the importance of it and, more importantly, understand that we're still hiring the best candidates in America. Val Zavala>> To what extent do you think the tensions are a result of the fact that there's a former police chief on the council? Chief William Bratton>> Most of the tensions are a direct result of that and we can be very clear about that. But again, former police chief Parks, now council member Parks, basically we make cases to him and to his colleagues and, by and large, we get what we're looking for. Val Zavala>> Do you ever regret being so blunt? Chief William Bratton>> Not at all. Why should I regret that? That's my nature. Val Zavala>> (Laughter) Because it causes tension and squabbles and whatnot? Chief William Bratton>> That's life in the big city. If you can't stand it, get out of the business. We're not in this business to be polite to each other all the time. You're in this business to do the best job we can and, unfortunately, sometimes you have to be very pointed in making your remarks and that's the way it is. Val Zavala>> Chief Bratton, thank you very much for your time and your hard work. Chief William Bratton>> Good being with you. Val Zavala>> When AIDS emerged in the gay community about twenty years, gays urged public officials not to label AIDS as simply a "gay" disease. Well, nowadays most people realize that AIDS affects everyone, both genders, all races. So why now should a prominent gay organization launch this campaign? It's slogan? "HIV is a gay disease". This comes after decades of messages to the public saying that AIDS affects everyone, not just gays. The campaign even drew the attention of the Los Angeles Times front page. Darrel Cummings is Chief of Staff for the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center, the organization behind the campaign. He says, if you look just at Los Angeles County, the vast majority with HIV are gay. The gay community is, what, how much of Los Angeles? Darrel Cummings>> Somewhere between five and ten percent are gay and bisexual men. Val Zavala>> Only five or ten percent and yet -- Darrel Cummings>> But yet we account for more than seventy-five percent of the entire epidemic, so the disproportionate impact on our community is staggering even after twenty-five years. Val Zavala>> But at another prominent AIDS group, the message is not as welcome. Craig Thompson is with AIDS Project Los Angeles whose clientele is not just the gay community, but women and minorities as well. He was disturbed when he first heard the message that HIV is a gay disease. Craig Thompson>> I was surprised. I mean, I think we have to understand that going back fifteen or twenty years, this was what the religious right and conservatives wanted to say. They wanted to say that this is a gay disease. This is about gay peoples' deviant behavior and we fought for fifteen or twenty years to say, no, no, HIV is much broader than that. HIV is a disease caught by behavior. It's not about a particular group of people who identify. So I was shocked that they would march down that step and take that step in this way. Val Zavala>> So if that's the kind of message that you've been fighting against all these years, why did they do it? Craig Thompson>> Well, I think they were very targeted. They intended this campaign to be seen only by openly gay and bisexual men, people who wouldn't be astounded by using the word gay. And they wanted to be bold and I think they got controversial out of it. You know, you try to catch peoples' imagination, to get their attention, and you take some risks doing that. So I think that's what they were trying to do and they got a little more than they probably bargained for. Val Zavala>> But back at the Gay and Lesbian Center, Darrel says the campaign is narrowly targeted. Darrel Cummings>> We're trying to reach exclusively with this campaign our gay and bisexual men. In other words -- Val Zavala>> -- very local. Darrel Cummings>> Very local. Just in Los Angeles and just those people that are accessing gay publications. It's that population that we're initially trying to reach to inspire this conversation, but it's Los Angeles specific and really among gay and bisexual men only. Val Zavala>> So when we hear, oh, it's going up among minorities, going up among women, that's not necessarily the case here in Los Angeles? Those are nationwide figures? Darrel Cummings>> Well, it's interesting because, even here in Los Angeles, when you hear people talk about it's going up within minority communities, what you don't often hear which is true is that, in Los Angeles, those minority communities and we're talking about the Latino and African American communities that happen to be the majority population in Los Angeles, those are gay and bisexual men. Not exclusively, but mostly, so they have so disentangled the word gay from this epidemic that we believe that, you know, after twenty-five years, it's now becoming possible. Val Zavala>> So how do you explain the difference in the messages? One that it is a gay disease and one that is, no, it isn't. It affects everyone. Darrel Cummings>> Well, in Los Angeles County which is very different from this epidemic across the country and worldwide where it's largely a heterosexual epidemic particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, in Los Angeles, this continues to be largely and disproportionately among gay and bisexual men. Val Zavala>> So there's like two realities here statistically. Nationwide and here in Los Angeles in California. Darrel Cummings>> That's correct. Nationwide, we find that somewhere between forty-five and fifty percent of the epidemic are among gay and bisexual men, which is still an enormous number, given the small size of our relative population. But it's very different on the east coast, for example, than it is on the west coast. Val Zavala>> So why is AIDS in Los Angeles different from the patterns nationwide? Craig Thompson>> Well, there's a couple of things. The most important is the use of injection drugs in Los Angeles. It's different than it is on the east coast. So there's much less needle sharing among injection drug users on the west coast than there is on the east coast. We don't have shooting galleries in Los Angeles like we do and hear about a lot in areas of New York City, Newark and Washington, D.C. In Los Angeles, people tend to go and buy their drugs and go home and shoot them with family and friends, as we call it. So they're much less likely to be sharing needles with dozens or hundreds of people. That's about the easiest way to get HIV is obviously to take blood from an HIV-infected person, have it in a needle and inject it back into another person. Val Zavala>> So what does all this mean to the average person? They hear it is a gay disease or it's spreading beyond gays. What should we believe and what should the messages say? Craig Thompson>> Well, the first thing we have to understand is that we talk about this is a country of AIDS epidemics. There are many, many epidemics in this country in a number of different groups and the epidemics we talked about vary regionally. They also vary among different populations. So we have to be careful about talking about any epidemic in this country. Darrel Cummings>> We are very clear in our intent which is not to have a conversation among the entire Los Angeles community. We want to inspire a conversation among ourselves within our community about the realities of this epidemic. Craig Thompson>> I think the problem is that those messages, if they get outside the targeted audience, they begin to say things again like we have fought for fifteen or twenty years or they begin to say, look, this isn't a gay disease. We don't want help from anybody who isn't gay. You know, this is our problem, our solution, so stay away. It can potentially have the impact of turning people off, either funders or people who would otherwise be involved in volunteers or otherwise connected and supportive to this epidemic. Val Zavala>> So the message is fine. HIV is a gay disease is fine as long as it's confined to the Los Angeles gay community. Then it's fine, but it's not a good message to get out to the overall public, correct? Craig Thompson>> I think that's fair to say. Val Zavala>> But there is one thing they can all agree on. Darrel Cummings>> The current reality is not okay for the next twenty-five years. We have got to change that. Val Zavala>> Darrel Cummings with the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center, thank you so much. Darrel Cummings>> You're very welcome. Announcer>> To send a comment or a question to our program, you can reach us by mail at this address: Life and Times 4401 Sunset Blvd. Los Angeles, California 90027 You can also call our viewer comment line (323) 953-5555) or contact us the fast way by e-mail at kcet.org. Val Zavala>> It's hard to believe that trash from Los Angeles can travel thousands of miles across the ocean and end up on a beach in Hawaii, but it does. Tons of it. And now the Los Angeles Times has documented this traveling trash in print and video. Here's their report. Narrator>> The islands of Hawaiian archipelago act like the teeth of a giant comb, snagging debris drifting around the Pacific. Just walking on the Big Island beaches can be hazardous. Decades ago, Noni Sanford walked these beaches looking for driftwood. Now this is where she can get all she needs for the annual Hilo Trash Art Show. Noni Sanford>> Well, before the first cleanup, just right next to me here, this is like eight to ten feet high and nothing but junk. Bill Gilmartin>> The first time I was down here, you basically drove over plastic. You couldn't see sand on the beach. Narrator>> Retired wildlife biologist, Bill Gilmartin, has been organizing beach cleanups for a couple of years now. Bill Gilmartin>> The beach was just solid nets and other kinds of plastic debris. Narrator>> Tons of trash have been removed, but more keeps coming, brought here by the tides. Bill Gilmartin>> We bring people down here that have seen other beaches and even thought they were bad beaches until they saw this one. They're shocked. Narrator>> For Charles Moore, the shock came when he sailed this catamaran through the North Pacific subtropical gyre. Mile after mile of floating trash. Spurred into action, he returned two years later to conduct a high-speed survey. It wasn't just the big stuff he was reporting out of the ocean. With a fine-mesh net used to collect plankton, Moore noticed the ocean was full of a confetti of plastic. Some of it broken fragments and some of it still in pellet form, the raw materials from most plastic products. Moore says that it's places like this southern California rail yard that are the source of most of the pellets. Charles Moore>> Like a pellet beach. This particular rail yard has more tonnage of pellets on the ground that have the potential to reach the catch basins, storm drains, rivers and oceans than any place else that I've surveyed. Narrator>> This is the Los Angeles River where it empties into the ocean. Booms corral some of the trash that surges down the channel after a rainstorm, but much of it slips past and rides the currents for thousands of miles, a plastic plume that is transforming the ocean in ways that are unmistakable. Val Zavala>> The Los Angeles Times also reports that there are huge garbage dumps floating in the ocean. One of them between here and Hawaii is as big as the state of Texas. If you'd like to read or watch more about our ocean environment, you can go to their website at latimes.com. And that's our program. I'm Val Zavala. For everyone at Life and Times, thanks for watching. We'll see you next time. Announcer>> Life and Times was made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education. And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg. Sponsored in part by:  | |
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