Medical Point Delays Decision in Slaying Case

The district attorney’s office said Wednesday it needs more medical information before deciding whether to file criminal charges against a Silver Lake man who fatally shot a suspected car burglar after holding him at bay with a handgun.

The prosecutor turned down for now a Police Department request that Robert Cooper, 44, be charged with murder in the death of 17-year-old Henry Paul Velasco.

Cooper, who claimed Velasco lunged at him, shot the teen-ager three times with his .22-caliber weapon Saturday night.

The shooting occurred just as police units were driving up to the scene. Cooper was taken into custody, booked and held without bail until Wednesday when he was released.

‘Get Out of Town’

“I’m scared,” Cooper said as he walked out of Parker Center Jail Wednesday afternoon. “The police told me I ought to get out of town” to avoid possible retaliation, he said. He declined to discuss the shooting.

Norman Shapiro, a deputy district attorney in the agency’s complaint division, said no decision will be made on prosecuting Cooper until police detectives determine why the first bullet that struck Velasco--wounding him in an area near the heart--was not removed when Velasco underwent surgery at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center.

Surgeons removed two other bullets from Velasco’s wrist and torso. The question, Shapiro said, is whether failure to remove the third bullet cost Velasco his life. If the answer is yes and if the district attorney’s office later determines that Cooper’s actions constituted a crime, he would likely be charged with a lesser offense.

Police were also asked to obtain toxicological data to verify an indication that Velasco was under the influence of drugs, Shapiro said.

Morrison Chamberlin, chief executive officer of the hospital, said the issue of the bullet was moot. Surgeons’ first concern was massive blood transfusions needed to keep Velasco alive, Chamberlin said. He said Velasco died despite receiving 50 pints of blood and 40 minutes of cardiac massage.

Neighbor Calls Police

Cooper, who owns an apartment building in the 3200 block of Desconso Drive, told police he saw Velasco breaking into cars on the other side of the street Saturday night and accosted him. Cooper said he held Velasco at gunpoint while a neighbor called police. But as police were driving up the street, Cooper said, the unarmed Velasco lunged at him and he fired in what he said was self-defense.

Police said they interviewed a witness to the shooting, but declined to identify him.

Under California law, a case such as Cooper’s hinges on whether he has a “reasonable and honest belief that he is in imminent peril” from “some sort of force likely to cause great bodily injury or death,” according to Gary Hahn, a supervising deputy in the state attorney general’s office.

In evaluating whether the defendant’s belief was reasonable, the courts ask “whether a reasonable man would have perceived the same thing in that person’s shoes,” Hahn said. “If somebody does something and you could obviously rectify it with less than deadly force, that’s the standard you’re held to.”

The shooting of Velasco occurred in a hillside neighborhood above Sunset Boulevard, where residents complain of frequent burglaries by street gang members. The residents say the gang members congregate on Sunset and make forays into the residential areas.

‘It’s Unfortunate’

Several residents reacted enthusiastically to Cooper’s shooting Sunday, saying it would send a message to potential criminals. One of them, angered when police arrested Cooper on suspicion of murder, said Wednesday he plans to go door-to-door in an effort to recruit residents to protest the arrest and to appear in court in support of Cooper when and if he is charged.

Kent Manthorne, a former president of a Silver Lake Neighborhood Watch group that collapsed two years ago, said, “It’s unfortunate that anybody who does the work the police are supposed to be doing is deemed to be a vigilante.

“So he got three shots off? So what? In a stress situation, it’s entirely possible.”