Geissert Backs Police Investigators

Torrance Mayor Katy Geissert told a Los Angeles Superior Court jury that the city’s Police Department conducts thorough investigations when its officers are accused of misconduct and that city officials have never seen any reason to appoint an outside agency to review such allegations.

“Generally speaking, I have had confidence in the Torrance Police Department investigative unit. I have been impressed, on occasion, by the severity of the discipline,” Geissert testified Friday, midway through the trial of a lawsuit that has questioned the integrity of the Police Department.

Geissert was the first Torrance official from outside the Police Department to be called in the 3-week-old trial.

The case stems from a 1984 traffic accident in which 19-year-old Kelly Rastello of San Pedro was killed in a traffic collision with off-duty Torrance Police Sgt. Rollo Green. A suit filed by Rastello’s father, John, blames the crash on Green and claims that police colleagues covered up for the sergeant as part of a pattern of concealing police abuses.

Has Seen No Pattern

But the mayor, who appeared composed during her brief appearance on the witness stand, said she has seen no such pattern.

Geissert told the jury that with more than 230 officers, the Torrance Police Department, the county’s third largest, is big enough to investigate its own members without creating conflicts of interest.

Under questioning by Brian Panish, a lawyer for John Rastello, Geissert said that the Torrance City Council has never increased punishments ordered by Police Chief Donald Nash. Geissert said that the council had once reinstated an officer who had been fired, an apparent reference to James Lynch, who was fired in 1980 after being accused of using excessive force. He was reinstated in 1981.

The plaintiff’s attorneys are scheduled to conclude their case Monday, with the defense opening its case Tuesday.