Advertisement

After Rialto Suspect’s Death, Sheriff Defends Use of Force

Share
Times Staff Writer

A security camera recording that shows a deputy shooting into a moving SUV in a Rialto shopping center parking lot in August, killing an unarmed suspected jewelry thief, has San Bernardino County sheriff’s officials defending the use of lethal force in the crowded area.

Antuan Conners of Rialto was shot seconds after plainclothes deputies traveling in unmarked police cars boxed in his vehicle in the parking lot, then exited with guns drawn. Conners hit one car and smashed into another as he was shot by 15-year Sheriff’s Department veteran Det. Hector Gomez.

Deputies had Conners under surveillance that day, Aug. 26, because he was a suspect in two jewelry store thefts in Victorville that month.

Advertisement

Conners’ father, Andre Conners of Los Angeles, said he believed the shooting was unjustified and said that his son did not know the armed men surrounding him were law enforcement officers.

“Antuan didn’t have to go that way,” said his father, who suffered a stroke days after his son’s death. “The police were wrong, and they killed my son. That hurts me, and I want justice.”

The district attorney’s office is reviewing the shooting.

Sheriff’s homicide investigators have reviewed the recording and say it verifies the accounts from deputies and witnesses who said Gomez was compelled to shoot because he feared for the safety of the deputies around him.

“They were clearly identified as police,” said sheriff’s spokeswoman Cindy Beavers. “They feared for their lives.”

Although there is no audio accompanying the surveillance video, Gomez shot Antuan Conners, 20, after the driver failed to heed orders to stop and exit the SUV, then appeared to drive toward deputies, said Sheriff’s Sgt. Frank Bell, who led the shooting investigation. Bell said deputies had identified themselves as law enforcement officers, and were wearing vests that did the same.

Bell said that department policy generally is to not shoot at moving vehicles, but Conners became an exception because he accelerated toward the officers.

Advertisement

Detectives intended to execute a search warrant at Conners’ Rialto apartment on the day of the shooting and followed his SUV when he unexpectedly drove away, said sheriff’s spokeswoman Cindy Beavers.

Conners served time in California Youth Authority institutions from March 2000 to January 2005 after being convicted of felony assault with a firearm and misdemeanor grand theft as a juvenile in Los Angeles County. He was on parole when he was killed.

Victorville detectives requested assistance from the sheriff’s Crime Impact Team to execute the search warrant because two informants, who allegedly implicated Conners in the jewelry store thefts, told detectives that he might be armed and dangerous, Bell said.

Attorney Olivier A. Taillieu, who is representing the Conners family, questioned why the deputies tried to arrest Antuan Conners at a busy shopping center parking lot, especially if they thought he was armed and dangerous.

No weapon was found inside Conners’ vehicle.

A surveillance camera mounted outside Family Land clothing store at Willow Avenue and Baseline Road recorded the shooting, which occurred just after 2:12 p.m. The store owner said she turned the footage over to the Sheriff’s Department and gave a copy to the Conners family attorney.

The recording showed the following:

Conners’ white GMC Yukon pulled into the parking lot and started to turn toward a lane of parked cars.

Advertisement

An unmarked white Mercury Mountaineer driven by a sheriff’s detective swiftly pulled in front of Conners, blocking his path. Conners stopped and backed until he tapped the front bumper of a sheriff’s Ford Crown Victoria, also unmarked, that had pulled in behind him.

A detective wearing a bulletproof vest jumped out of the Mountaineer with his gun pointed at Conners. Conners then accelerated his Yukon forward and to the right, away from the Mountaineer.

Gomez, who had exited the Crown Victoria, was moving toward Conners’ driver-side window. According to Bell, the detective fired three times through the window as Conners’ Yukon lurched forward.

The recording then showed the Yukon smashing into a small pickup , driven by another detective, that had pulled alongside the Mountaineer to block Conners’ path.

Sheriff’s officials said two of Gomez’s bullets struck Conners in the upper body. Conners was pronounced dead at a county hospital 46 minutes after the shooting.

Conners’ attorney said the only one in danger was Conners.

“These unmarked cars start blocking him in, and from his perspective, these are a bunch of guys coming at him with guns drawn and no indication of who they are from their vehicles. No sirens. No lights,” said Taillieu, who added that the family was considering filing a lawsuit against San Bernardino County. “Antuan never had time to react to what anyone was saying outside his car.”

Advertisement

Bell disputes that and said the deputy who shot Conners perceived that the officer who exited the Mountaineer was “in the line of the path of Antuan’s vehicle.”

“We can all sit back and look at it on video and make our judgments, and I don’t think that’s fair,” Bell said.

“The [Conners] vehicle wasn’t stopping, it was accelerating forward, and [Gomez] didn’t have time to stop and look at the direction the wheels were aimed on Antuan’s truck.”

One of the key witnesses was a passenger in Conners’ SUV, Donivan Munford, 20, who is currently a fugitive. Bell said Munford told sheriff’s investigators after the shooting that he and Conners knew that he was surrounded by police officers when he accelerated.

Conners and Munford “did not know they were under surveillance, but the passenger said [Conners] recognized immediately that they were cops,” Bell said.

But Conners’ father said Munford had told him a different story when they discussed the shooting before Antuan’s funeral.

Advertisement

“Antuan thought those guys were going to rob him,” Andre Conners said.

Munford later emerged as a suspect in the Victorville jewelry store thefts and is now missing, authorities said.

Andre Conners, 42, suffered a stroke one week after his son’s death. He blames the stress of the fatal shooting for his own deteriorating health.

“I know I didn’t fail as a parent,” he said recently, wiping away tears.

“I was trying to keep Antuan on the straight and narrow. They didn’t need to kill him. He was a good boy.”

Andre Conners said Antuan was the oldest of his six children. Antuan was born and raised in South Central Los Angeles, and played high school football in South Gate. His mother was killed in a 1994 drive-by shooting, the father said.

Upon his release from the California Youth Authority this year, Conners was sent to live with an uncle in Rialto. Antuan landed a job earlier this year with Federal Express, his father said.

“I wanted Antuan to move up north [to Rialto] to stay away from the rough crowd, to get his life on the straight and narrow,” his father said.

Advertisement
Advertisement