Long-ill L.A. county sheriff Sherman Block dies at 74

Published: Friday, October 30, 1998

Friday, October 30, 1998

OBITUARY: Candidate dies three days after surgery, within week of election

By Amanda Covarrubias

The Associated Press

Sheriff Sherman Block, the longtime leader of the nation's largest sheriff's department, died Thursday night, less than a week before Los Angeles County voters were to decide whether to give him a fifth four-year term. He was 74.

Block, who underwent surgery Monday for removal of a blood clot on the brain, died at USC University Hospital, county Supervisor Mike Antonovich said through a spokesman. The blood clot was discovered after Block fell at his home on Saturday.

"Block was a man of honor and integrity," Antonovich said.

The sheriff was seeking re-election despite significant health concerns: He had twice battled cancer and required kidney dialysis several times a week.

Popular with voters in past years despite a low-key, bland demeanor, Block was in a tough battle for re-election. The challenge by a former subordinate, retired Sheriff's Department division chief Lee Baca, made Block the first incumbent in more than a century to be forced into a runoff.

Despite serious problems in the department during his tenure, Block avoided the kind of wrenching examinations of leadership that engulfed higher profile counterparts at the Los Angeles Police Department.

Block became the nation's highest paid elected official, earning $234,016 a year - more than the president's $200,000 annual salary.

He oversaw 12,400 employees, including 8,000 deputies, responsible for policing 2.5 million people in unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County as well as 40 cities that contract with the department for service. He also operated the nation's largest urban jail system, with 19,000 inmates.

Block came to Los Angeles from Chicago in the 1950s and worked his way up department ranks, building an influential roster of supporters. Even as Block lay hospitalized after surgery this week, politicians ranging from Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan to U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein attended a fund-raiser for his campaign.

County supervisors appointed block to the vacant sheriff's office in January 1982 and he was first elected to the post later that year. Over the years he became a stalwart of the Los Angeles political scene.

Block's key vulnerability in this year's campaign for re-election was his advancing age and flagging health, the subjects of critical radio ads aired by Baca in the June primary campaign.

Near the end, Block received dialysis treatment three times a week for his damaged kidneys. Still, he insisted he was fit enough to run the department, noting that he worked by telephone when undergoing dialysis.

Block guided the department through years in which it dealt with natural disasters - earthquakes, fires and floods - and grappled with such major law enforcement problems as the explosion of gang violence, drug trafficking, soaring jail populations and the 1992 riot that followed the acquittals of police officers in the Rodney King beating trial.

But there were also internal department problems ranging from a drug money-skimming scandal involving members of an elite narcotics squad to operational problems such as repeated errant releases of prisoners from jails. And there were costly lawsuits.

In 1995, a jury found that 25 of his deputies made false arrests, used excessive force and conspired to violate civil rights during a disturbance that erupted when they responded to a report of trouble at a Samoan American family's party. The family was awarded $15.9 million in 1996, and just last month the county had to pay 36 plaintiffs a total of nearly $24 million - the amount to which the original judgment grew during years of unsuccessful appeals.

In 1992, investigators appointed by the county Board of Supervisors issued a scathing account of the department's brutal style of policing in black and Hispanic neighborhoods. In 1997, the U.S. Justice Department cited his department for civil rights violations in its treatment of mentally ill prisoners.

Earlier this year, the Sheriff's Department was rocked by allegations of bribery in the $20 million food-services division of the downtown jail and alleged inmate beatings provoked by the deputies.

Despite his sometimes boring demeanor, Block showed flashes of the comedian. Last month he called a news conference to talk about neighborhood policing. It was the day before the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur and prefaced his remarks by telling reporters, "Tomorrow is the holiest day of the year in my religion, so I'll be praying for all of you."

Born on July 19, 1924, in Chicago, he spent his youth there and then served in the Army during World War II. He majored in engineering at Washington University in St. Louis before heading West.

He became a deputy almost by accident. Driving home one night from his job as a counterman at what is now Canter's delicatessen on Fairfax Avenue, he was pulled over by a policeman.

Remembering stories of police corruption from his youth in Chicago, he expected the worst. Instead, the officer advised him that a tail light on his car was burned out and suggested he get it fixed soon. Then the officer bade him goodnight.

Block was so impressed that from that moment, he wanted to become a policeman. Three years later, in 1956, he applied to the Sheriff's Department and was accepted.

Over the years, he earned a bachelor's degree in police science, took graduate courses in public administration and attended the FBI Academy in Quantico, Va. He was the first deputy in the department to work his way through each successive rank to become sheriff.Sheriff challenger Lee Baca

Sherman Block

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