Surviving Memories of the Massacre: 2 Different Stories : Victim Remains Bitter at Police

Alberto Leos was frying hamburgers at McDonald’s when James Oliver Huberty began killing people. Leos hid in the back and said he watched 30 agonizing minutes tick off the employee time clock before Huberty finally found him, shot him four times and left him for dead.

A year later, the wiry, athletic Leos, 18, has virtually recovered from his wounds, but his bitterness over the time it took San Diego police to kill Huberty has hardly ebbed.

“The cops didn’t have the guts to go in sooner,” Leos says today. “They had all that gear, all those guns and stuff. What good did it do? They just sat there and watched and waited while people were getting hit.”

Others who were there or who lost loved ones agree.

“They should have acted faster,” said Graciela Gonzales, whose 19-year-old daughter died in the massacre. “They gave (Huberty) a long time.”

A SWAT marksman killed Huberty 77 minutes after the gunman entered the restaurant, and 70 minutes after police first arrived on the scene. Police say it took that amount of time to deploy officers, determine that Huberty was acting alone and get a clear shot at him without risking the lives others inside.

No officers were injured in the episode.

After conducting autopsies on those killed, the San Diego County coroner’s office determined that all of Huberty’s victims died within 10 minutes of his entering the restaurant.

“They’re liars,” Leos says today. “People were dying up until the very last.”

San Diego Police Chief William B. Kolender has maintained that his officers moved as swiftly as possible and that their prudence helped save the 24 people who came out of the restaurant alive. A year later, however, Kolender concedes that he remains deeply troubled by what happened.

“Every one of us would have liked it to be over with in 10 or 15 minutes . . . So do I feel guilty? I sure do,” Kolender says. “It was the worst thing I’ve ever seen in my life. I still think about it more than I probably should.”

Since the massacre, the San Diego SWAT team has quietly revised many of its tactics and training methods. SWAT members point out that the department has ordered ultra-modern, bulletproof shields to be used when advancing upon armed gunmen like Huberty. Donations also are being raised to buy a tank-like armored rescue vehicle.

In addition, there are plans to implement a full-time, 10-member hostage rescue team to augment the department’s 75-officer SWAT unit.

Those changes hold little consolation for Leos, who spent 15 days in the hospital, underwent three operations and was forced to miss his senior year of high school football. Doctors may operate a fourth time to deaden the pain that Leos still feels in his left bicep, which bears the jagged, crescent-shaped scar of a passing bullet.

This fall, Leos plans to attend San Diego State University, majoring in computer science or law. He hopes that his vivid memories of Huberty will subside so that he can concentrate on his studies.

“I keep thinking that some nut with a gun could come in anywhere and get you,” Leos said. “And the cops wouldn’t do a thing.”