Police chief left LAPD detectives during Simpson trial

By CONSTANCE SOMMER
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

There's never been a murder in Lake Forest Park since incorporation 37 years ago, says Police Chief John Rogers, who qualifies as one of the more interesting characters in Lake Forest Park.

Lake Forest Park remains a fairly safe place. Last year, the city recorded 10 violent crimes (three robberies and seven aggravated assaults) and 362 property crimes, the majority of which were theft, according to figures compiled by the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs.

Rogers came to the 19-officer department in 1995 after nearly three decades at the Los Angeles Police Department. His most recent stint before he moved north was as the officer in charge of the homicide special section of the robbery-homicide division of the LAPD.

That may sound like a long snooze of a title, but it meant he was one of the first officers at Bundy Drive the night Nicole Brown Simpson, O.J. Simpson's ex-wife, was killed.

This is not Rogers' favorite story, because it makes him mad. "I don't think he did it -- I know he did it," he says of Simpson.

But the upshot is that he went to Brentwood that night with detectives Philip Vannatter and Tom Lange, identified the body and headed over to tell Simpson, who was not home because he was on his way to Chicago. Later, he met the former football star in person when Simpson came down to police headquarters to talk about the case.

He testified at the preliminary hearing but, unlike his detective buddies, was not asked to return for the trial. By then he was ensconced in Lake Forest Park anyway, and happy to stay out of the fray.

"I had 28 years" of the action, he says. "I had my share."

Today, the focus of his job is a bit more mundane, although he insists equally as absorbing: making sure his officers have as many warm and fuzzy contacts with residents as they do unpleasant ones.

"When I got here three years ago, we had a reputation as a speed trap," he says. "I told every officer that for every negative contact, I want a positive one." So Rogers encourages his troops to make chitchat with residents and otherwise keep themselves as friendly and approachable as possible.

He says everyone in the city faces the same challenge. "The question is not how do you make this place a good place to live," he says. "The question is how do you keep it that way?"