"Qualities to Shun and Characteristics to Seek"

"When Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck retires in June, he'll leave to his successor the best department in the city's history—one that's no longer a hated, pugnacious symbol of repression or the kind of instigator of class and race volatility that ignited two of the bloodiest riots in American history.
"The principal reason for the LAPD's old notoriety was myopic, insular leadership—sometimes megalomaniacal, sometimes self-serving, and often deadly racist. The principal reason for its current achievements is leadership again, but of an entirely different kind."

Joe Domanick in the Los Angeles Times looks at past LAPD chiefs to see which ones to emulate in the future.