Los Angeles Police DepartmentPolice: Flaws that enabled corruption still not fixed, study finds. The chief concedes that mediocrity has become a way of life at all levels of the department. The Los Angeles Police Department repeatedly failed to take steps that could have avoided the worst corruption scandal in its history, according to a sweeping self-indictment prepared by the department's own leaders. In a letter accompanying the long-awaited report from the commission investigating corruption centered in the department's Rampart Division, Police Chief Bernard C. Parks called the scandal a "life-changing experience for the police department." Los Angeles Police Department” in which corrupt officers took advantage of lax oversight to commit criminal acts. “As an organization, we provided this opportunity,” Parks wrote. The 362-page report was delivered Tuesday evening to Mayor Richard Riordan and members of the Police Commission and will be made public today and to the rest of the city's elected leaders. It was provided to the Times on Tuesday by senior LAPD officials. According to the report, many of the breakdowns that allowed the Rampart police scandal to fester and spread, including the failure to conduct background checks on police recruits, monitor police misconduct. and to supervise officers in the field — remain unchanged despite growing public and political criticism of the LAPD and city leaders. These revelations effectively embarrass all of the city's political leaders. More directly, they demonstrate that the LAPD ignored some calls for reform and created an atmosphere ripe for corruption. At the same time, they also suggest that Riordan and city council members supported the policies... middle of paper ......t officers who failed to perform these procedures, not the procedures they themselves, according to the commission of inquiry. While this gives the report a sometimes strange tone, defending a system whose serious failure it acknowledges, it also provides some of the document's most obvious introspection. One passage in particular warns of the consequences if the police let their guard down. “Essentially, many of the problems found by this [committee of inquiry] boil down to individuals not doing their jobs with a high level of consistency and integrity,” the report said. "Unfortunately, we found this to be true at all levels of the organization, including senior management, front-line supervisors and operational staff. Clearly, pride in one's work and commitment to doing "doing things right the first time seems to have happened" he said, "you have to stop accepting mediocre work."