KTLA News: "Officer Fanchon Blake files a discrimination lawsuit against the LAPD" (1973)

well they implemented the new Jacob career plan uh when the ordinance was presented and passed they did not include us higher than Sergeant 2 or investigator 2 and this closes us off for the opportunity to take the promotional exam to Lieutenant and hire only because you are a female that's what I've been told now will this suit that you're filing with the uh equal opportunities Employment Commission resolve that if they judge in your favor I think so do I call you officer or Mrs Blake um I respond to both how long have you been with the police department almost 25 years and what job are you now handling I'm assigned to uh bun of forgery as an investigator too that's as high as I can go on that classification Mrs Blake why are you filing this suit well we uh went before our police commission two weeks ago and uh last Wednesday uh the police commission uh approved uh the Department's unisex proposal plan which will now go over to the city council and uh in as much as we have not been given any feeling of uh backing uh towards correcting the arbitrary discriminatory practices of the last 27 years and we've gone through uh innumerable uh meetings and surveys and uh uh delaying tactics that um it's very obvious that if we're going to get this problem resolved that uh it's not going to happen uh with the police department it's not going to happen with the police commission and uh I have doubts that the city council would be able to resolve it at this time and all we can see in our future would be more meetings more delays more harassment and after 27 years my patience My Hope and uh our career it just it just come to a screeching halt something had to be done somebody had to do it and uh so I've done it what restrictions keep you from rising above investigator 2 the government and um I I never thought the day would come when uh uh I would find it necessary to uh have to come to EOC or the state organization but um there's just no hope and there's been uh no indication of hope that our our top police administrators are even in sympathy with our requests for consideration for equal uh opportunity in promotion and assignment area do you feel that you are physically and mentally capable of something higher as an investigator to in the line of work that you know well you're approaching me at the end of my career uh I've had my feet operated on twice to stay a police officer and in the last uh five years I have come up with a heart condition uh I'm still classified as uh General assignment on Los Angeles Police Department however um in asking this last week to be considered for a felony team in forgery uh I was refused by my captain on the grounds that I would best be utilized to the Department's best interest on the desk in bun of forgery and I I suppose that's where I'm going to have to stay I'll have no opportunity now for felony felony investigative team but my particular position in this program is immaterial now I I'm at the end of my career Mrs Blake you do not look nor sound like a woman wom's Liber is that true well uh the women's lib movement has its merits but uh I've always considered myself a child of God and I uh like the classification of woman and I like men to be men and uh this business on unisex which uh in my estimation uh places a category of it on both the men and the women is uh I resent it I don't like it and I think it's uh a disservice to human dignity to all of our police officers do you feel that women should have preferential treatment because of their sex no I do not the women I have worked with through the 25 years on this department as well as with the Los Angeles County Sheriffs before I came on the uh women I have worked with in the United States Army in uh Criminal investigative work uh you Rose on your merits your background your ability to educate yourself your ability to produce and give to the job classification that you earned and that's the way it should be I I don't want anybody give me something I haven't earned but I'd like the opportunity to earn it and that's what's been denied uh