He attended and graduated from Garfield High School in East Los Angeles, where he was student body president.

"[8] As an Assembly member in Sacramento, wrote Times reporter Denise Hamilton, Alatorre earned a reputation as a "hard-nosed deal maker.

But his combination of the crude and the pleasant, of bluntness and courtliness, casts an aura that puts off people used to more conventional, or polite, politicians.

[4] He also worked for Philip Montez, who became "one of Alatorre's political mentors" and later the regional director for the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights in Los Angeles.

In addition, he was western regional director for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, where he successfully initiated lawsuits on behalf of children, many of whom had been assigned to classes for the mentally disabled because they were Spanish speaking.

Alatorre dated Carole Creason when she was working for Walter Karabian and State Senator Alfred Song in 1968.

[16] In his Assembly years, from 1973 to 1985, Alatorre "proved himself a reliable member of Speaker Willie L. Brown's fund-raising political machine that milks the business community for money needed to elect Democrats.

"[8] "Back-room powerbrokers" in the Assembly also "put him in charge of fashioning a legislative and congressional reapportionment that gave Latinos their most substantial political representation in history.

"[4][10] He "helped shape the state's farm labor law, which gave migrant workers collective bargaining rights.

The councilman proposed a year-long moratorium on the construction of mini-malls on Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock, but "too late to save a 72-year-old brick building" that was torn down at Townsend Avenue.

The suit contended that Alatorre and the treasurers of his two political finance committees, including his sister, had used money from his State Assembly campaign fund to run for City Council.

[9] The case was settled in August when Alatorre admitted "personal negligence" and agreed to pay a record $141,966 in fines, of which $5,000 was to come from his own pocket.

[9][25][26] In April 1987, the state's Fair Political Practices Commission said it was investigating whether Alatorre violated state laws regarding conflict of interest when he recommended that The East Los Angeles Community Union (TELACU) be awarded a $722,000 city grant to provide dial-a-ride service—this after accepting a $1,000 fee for speaking at one of the group's meetings.

[29] In the end, the judge ordered that the girl, then 10, should be returned to the Alatorres, in part because she had enjoyed "love, caring, affection and security" with them.

"[31] In 2001 he agreed to plead guilty to felony tax evasion, admitting to not reporting almost $42,000 he received from individuals attempting to influence him in his official duties.

[1] Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley announced in November 2008 that he was looking into Alatorre's lobbying work.

The news came a year after the Los Angeles Times reported that Alatorre "had contacted at least seven city departments and five council members on behalf of various businesses without registering as a lobbyist."