Family’s Inquiry Into Jail Death Frustrated

Susana Oviedo stared at a recent picture of her brother and began sobbing. “All we want to know is what happened,” she said. “Why did he die?”

On Jan. 31, her brother, Arthur G. Oviedo, 25, of Santa Fe Springs, was found dead in an Orange County Jail medical ward. He was serving a sentence for misdemeanor battery on a police officer.

Attempts by the family to learn why and how Oviedo died have been frustrated while the Orange County district attorney’s office investigates the incident for “possible criminal conduct.”

The family wants to know why Oviedo was put in a medical isolation ward and given prescription drugs that made him feel sick, his sistersaid.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Bryan F. Brown, who is in charge of the investigation, said: “We’re still trying to get an idea of what happened. We’re attempting to make a determination whether or not there has been criminal conduct in the case.”

The investigation is expected to be completed next week, Brown said.

There was bruising on Oviedo’s neck, his sister said, but the Orange County sheriff-coroner’s office has not released preliminary autopsy findings.

Meanwhile, a report by a private pathologist, hired by the family, who conducted a second autopsy has been delayed because a deputy coroner is on leave due to a family illness.

“The pathologist said he needed to get a few more samples of tissue and also toxicological tests from the deputy coroner,” said P. Samuel Paz, the family’s attorney, who was retained after Oviedo’s death.

Although bruises on the neck would suggest strangulation, Paz said, that has not been confirmed by the pathologist. Paz said he did not want to “jump to conclusions.”

Another sister, Irma Oviedo, 35, said the family now feels guilty for not trying to raise the $50,000 bail needed to free their brother after his arrest and before he pleaded guilty to a reduced charge.

“We thought the jail was a safe place. We wanted to make him feel responsible. Make him feel that he had to take it like a man,” Irma Oviedo said.

“But he didn’t deserve this,” she said.

Oviedo’s brush with the law began when he was seen walking at 1:40 a.m. Jan. 8, in the parking lot of a mall in Fullerton. When Sgt. Michael Vice, the arresting officer, first spotted Oviedo, he thought the 5-foot-10, 175-pound fitness buff was garbed as a “Ninja” warrior, Sgt. Charles (Bud) Lathrop said. A “Ninja” is a martial arts expert trained as an assassin.

According to the arrest report, Oviedo wore a black jump suit, dark gloves and a ski scarf that covered his face below the eyes, Lathrop said.

When Vice noticed a syringe protruding from a glove, Oviedo ran, then turned and tackled Vice like a “football linebacker.” In the ensuing scuffle, Oviedo bit Vice on the finger, then ran. Oviedo was eventually apprehended, with the help of two private security guards, Lathrop said.

Police later found a needle and two syringes in Oviedo’s pocket, Lathrop said.

Family members said Oviedo had experimented with marijuana but denied that he used hard drugs.

“He was into fitness and exercise, and I think that the syringe may have been related to that,” said Oviedo’s criminal attorney, MacDonald Becket Jr., a deputy public defender.

“Basically, he was stopped by the police for walking by the parking lot and doing absolutely nothing,” Becket said.

Oviedo ran from police because he thought he was going to be beaten, Becket said.

Oviedo later pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of misdemeanor battery on a police officer. Fifteen days after his arrest, Oviedo was sentenced to five months in the county jail.

“He acknowledged he was in a difficult situation explaining what happened and that it was his word against that of a police officer’s. We were grateful to get the charges reduced to the misdemeanor,” Becket said.

The family is in a unique situation. Oviedo’s father has Alzheimer’s disease and is living in Mexico City. News of Oviedo’s death has been kept from his mother, who is recovering from surgery for advanced rheumatoid arthritis.

For Susana Oviedo, 29, the loss of her brother has been tough, especially because she was the one he would telephone from the jail.

‘A Losing Battle’

“I told him he should know better,” she said. “That it’s a losing battle with police. You can’t fight them. You try and fight one of them and suddenly you’re fighting 10. It was futile.

“He kept saying on the telephone that the drugs they gave him never made him feel right. In court he had to (lie) down because he said he was sick.

“Now, we feel so guilty. We just didn’t know the system would allow something like this to happen.”