By Richard
WintonThis post has been updated. See note below for details.
A judge will allow
a recording of a former Hollywood and banking executive acknowledging he used
bath salts to be used only for impeachment purposes in his civil rights trial
against Los Angeles police for beating him during an arrest.
U.S. District Judge
R. Gary Klausner made the decision Tuesday as the civil rights and excessive
force case against the LAPD began Tuesday for Brian Mulligan, a former
Universal and Deutsche Bank executive.
The decision means
Mulligan's statements to Glendale police two days before the LAPD arrest could
be used only if he contradicts them in court.
The judge also
decided the eight-person jury will not hear allegations that one of the
officers Mulligan says beat him, James Nichols, was under investigation for sex
acts with women informants unless they first find excessive force was used.
At the time of the
alleged beating incident, Nichols was under investigation for misconduct in the
LAPD's Hollywood Division.
Events unfolded in
the May 2012 beating when officers responded to reports of a man trying to get
into locked cars. They came upon Mulligan, who was on his way to an Eagle Rock
marijuana dispensary, in the street and stopped him.
They found in his
car what appeared to be bath salts, a synthetic substance not illegal to
possess but that can cause powerful reactions similar to cocaine when ingested,
according to a recounting of events by the Police Commission, which oversees
the LAPD.
Although officers
noticed he was “sweating profusely and appeared unsteady,” they determined
Mulligan was not drunk or under the influence of illegal drugs.
Mulligan asked the
officers to take him to a motel, according to accounts given by the officers
and a police supervisor who was at the scene. They agreed, dropping him off at
one nearby.
About an hour
later, the same officers saw Mulligan “screaming and dragging a metal trash can
in the street,” police reports show. Mulligan ran away from the officers,
according to the LAPD's official account of the incident.
The officers
chased Mulligan and found him snarling, thrashing and swiping at them as if he
believed his hands were claws. They claimed Mulligan charged at them. The
officers said they pushed him to the ground and kicked and struck him in the
torso with a baton, according to police records.
Mulligan's nose
was broken in several places and his shoulder blade fractured. After an
internal investigation, the Police Commission found the officers' use of force
was justified.
Mulligan had a
very different account of the encounter. Through an attorney, he claimed the
officers took him to the motel against his will and attacked him when he fled,
beating him in the face and on the head and deliberately breaking his shoulder
blade.
He accused the
officers of fabricating their arrest report.
In announcing
plans to seek millions in damages against the LAPD, Mulligan denied having ever
used bath salts and accused the officers of lying about the arrest.
In response, the
Los Angeles police union released a recording an officer in nearby Glendale
made when Mulligan had struck up a conversation with him a few days before his
arrest.
Sounding agitated
and paranoid, Mulligan admitted to the officer to using a potent type of bath
salts.
Klausner decided
Tuesday that if jurors determine the city was at fault in the excessive-use
portion of the trial -- setting off a second phase on negligent supervision --
the evidence against Nichols can be heard.
A woman who
accused Nichols and another Los Angeles police officer of threatening her with
jail unless she had sex with them will be paid $575,000 to settle her lawsuit
against the city.
The Los Angeles
City Council last week unanimously approved the payout to the woman, one of
four to accuse Nichols and another officer of coercing them into having sex
with them, according to court documents.
Nichols, who is on
paid leave, denies any wrongdoing. His attorney, Robert Rico, said the woman
and the other accusers "had no credibility."
[Updated at 8:15
p.m. PST, Jan. 21: An earlier version of this post omitted part of the sequence
of events that led to the L.A. police union releasing a recording of Mulligan
acknowledging to Glendale police that he used bath salts.]