Misha DiBono
SAN DIEGO – The San Diego
police officer who sexually assaulted women he pulled over for allegedly
driving while drunk may get out of prison on technicality, an attorney said.
Ex-SDPD officer Anthony
Arevalos was sentenced for bribing and sexually assaulting women he stopped in
the Gaslamp District for drunken driving and other offenses. (2-10-2012)
Newly released video of police
evidence presented during the criminal sexual assault trial against 18-year
police veteran Anthony Arevalos shows once of his victims talking with him on
the phone while being recorded by police investigators. In the conversation, he
admits that he groped and fondled her in exchange for not arresting her on a
charge of driving under the influence.
The video shows Officer Laurie
Adams asking the victim to write down everything she remembered about an
alleged assault from inside a 7-Eleven bathroom in 2011. The victim’s notes
were never brought up in the trial that convicted Arevalos of several sexual
assaults.
“The defense — paid for by the
police department for Officer Arevelos — is going to use [the notes] as a
pretext excuse for Arevelos to be turned out of prison and go back out on the
streets,” said the woman’s attorney Browne Greene.
During a hearing scheduled for
Friday, Arevalos is expected to ask for his criminal conviction to be
overturned based on the “notes” technicality, Greene said.
On Tuesday, Greene released
surveillance video of a private investigator hired by the city following the
victim in a store. Greene said the city
is re-victimizing the victim.
“[The City of San Diego is]
trying to make her the issue, when it should be about (Avelalos),” Greene said.
City Attorney Jan Goldsmith
said the surveillance is standard pre-trial procedure and it is inappropriate
for Greene to have released the video to the public.
“It’s supposed to be
confidential,” said Goldsmith. “I am not going to talk about the report or the
video.”
Greene said the victim, known
only as “Jane Doe,” will not settle unless the city agrees to implement a
monitoring or oversight system of its police department – which may never
happen.
Goldsmith said no such proposal
was ever put forth.
The civil case will go to trial
in May.
