In
San Diego, Wild Discrepancies Between Video Footage And A Police Report
Voice of San Diego has a
head-spinning story of a policing debacle involving a late-night cop patrol,
two Peruvian-American brothers and a break-in that wasn't.
Late one night in July, Luis
and Diego Lobaton were ambushed by San Diego police; Luis was beaten up and
arrested. Their crime: walking into their family's store, to which they had
keys, after a cigarette break. H.G. Reza reports:
"There was no 911 call, no
worried neighbors who drew the officers there that night. Police on patrol
simply watched the brothers separately take out keys and enter the store, and
decided something nefarious was in the works. The whole thing went down because
of a suspected burglary in the brothers' own home."
But where this story really
goes off the rails is in the miles of sunlight between the police report and
the video footage from the store's surveillance camera, according to Voice of
San Diego's analysis:
• Police say Luis, 21, took a "fighter's stance"
and that Luis attempted twice to hit one of the officers. "Lobaton does
not appear to swing or lunge at the officers in the video and actually appears
to be backpedaling when an officer rushes inside and begins striking him,"
says the Voice report.
• Police say Diego, 20, tried to lock the door to stop
officers from going inside. This never happens on the video.
• Police say the boys' mother, Hedy Julca, tried to pull the
door shut when one of the officers attempted to talk to Luis. The video shows
Julca opening the door, another officer holding it open and the cops entering
the store.
There are also notable
discrepancies between the family's account of what happened and what the police
report says:
• The officers say it wasn't until after the arrests were
made that anyone mentioned the brothers' connection to the store. The mother
says this isn't true, and that she told the officers that Luis and Diego were
her sons and that she owned the store.
• The police report says Diego told the offiers that Luis
was a gang member. The family denies that Diego said this, and alleges that the
cops pressured Diego to say he "understood" why officers would
suspect Luis as a burglar. "That hurt," Diego told the Voice.
The family also argues that it
doesn't make sense for Luis to get in a fistfight with the cops, or anybody,
because he has a brain tumor. Hedy and her 3-year-old son, who also witnessed
the incident, are in therapy, and she is facing possible deportation to Peru.
Luis says the minutelong confrontation left him with memory loss and neck pain.
The charges against Luis and
his mother were eventually dropped. And while the police report claims that
Luis told police officers that he appreciated the officers' concern for his
mom's store, Hedy and the Lobaton brothers have filed a claim against the
police department, which is already under scrutiny.
"The Police Department has
faced numerous charges of officer misconduct in recent years, and a federal
review of the department's misconduct policies is due later this month. Police
Chief Shelley Zimmerman has instituted reforms aimed at cracking down on
misconduct, including outfitting officers with body cameras. The family says
that the officers weren't wearing them the night of the incident; SDPD would
not confirm whether any of the officers were wearing them or not."
Go read Voice of San Diego's
in-depth investigation, which includes two videos contradicting the police
reports. The investigation also reveals that five months after the July
incident, San Diego police once again followed one of the brothers into the
same store, telling their mother he was "acting suspicious."
