Cinco Trial : Drug Stupor Led to Killings, Defense Claims

WESTMINSTER — In a “drug-soaked moment of fear and panic,” Joselito (Jerry) Cinco shot and killed two San Diego police officers, Cinco’s attorney said Monday, describing during first-day proceedings in the long-awaited trial the circumstances leading up to the 1984 shootings. Opening statements in the trial, which a judge ordered moved here in 1985 because of excessive pretrial publicity, included remarks to the jury by defense attorney John G. Cotsirilos that on the night Cinco killed Officers Kimberly Tonahill and Timothy Ruopp, he was impaired by the large amount of drugs and beer that he had consumed in the hours leading to the slayings. Cotsirilos’ comments represented the first explanation of Cinco’s actions on the night of the killings.

Killings Not Denied

Cotsirilos made no attempt to deny that Cinco killed the two officers and wounded another. Instead, Cotsirilos said that the trial issue will be why Cinco shot the three police officers. The prosecution, citing special circumstances, has asked for the death penalty, but Cotsirilos said that the killings were not a “premeditated and deliberate act” by Cinco. The defense attorney has said he sees his main task as preventing a death-penalty verdict.

According to Cotsirilos, on the day of the incident, Cinco and two co-workers free-based about 1 1/2 grams of cocaine, smoked methamphetamines, drank a six-pack of beer and inhaled more cocaine over a period of three hours at Cinco’s home. Afterward, the three men went to the home of a woman co-worker, where they ingested more cocaine, smoked marijuana and drank more beer.

Cinco and Victor Casillas, who was arrested with Cinco but not charged in the slayings, left the woman’s house for the home of another acquaintance in Chula Vista, where they used more cocaine, Cotsirilos said, before picking up two teen-age girls and driving to an area of Balboa Park called Grape Street Park, where the shootings occurred.

Two Officers Killed

Tonahill, 24, was shot four times by Cinco and died from a bullet that pierced her heart and a lung. She died at the scene. Ruopp, 31, was wounded in the leg and calf before he was mortally wounded by a bullet that entered above his right eye and exited through the back of the head. Assistant Dist. Atty. Richard Neely said that the wounded Ruopp tried desperately to escape his killer by attempting to hide behind his patrol car before he was shot in the head. He died two days later.

Ruopp and Tonahill did not have a chance to draw their service revolvers before they were shot. Tonahill, who was single and lived in La Mesa, had been on the force for 11 months. Ruopp, a 2 1/2-year veteran, was the father of four children younger than 6.

Officer Gary Mitrovich, 29, was also injured in the Sept. 14, 1984, incident, which occurred about 11 p.m. Mitrovich, a 7 1/2-year veteran of the department, responded to the shootings and was wounded in the shoulder during an exchange of gunfire with Cinco, who was not injured. Mitrovich later returned to duty.

While Cotsirilos portrayed Cinco as being in a drug-induced stupor on the night of the shootings, Neely painted a different picture of Cinco in his opening statement. Neely argued that Cinco was cool and calculating on the night that he shot the three officers.

“This murderer’s mission was accomplished with such lethal efficiency,” Neely told the jury.

The prosecutor recounted another incident three months earlier when Cinco was arrested near the Mission Beach boardwalk for having a .357 magnum revolver tucked in his waistband while riding a bicycle. In the June 17, 1984, incident, Cinco attempted to escape from two officers who chased him. Cinco pointed the gun at one of them before he was arrested, Neely said. Cinco gave the officers his brother’s name and was charged with a misdemeanor but failed to appear in court.

On the night before the shootings, Cinco was at his brother’s Mira Mesa home wearing the shoulder holster and 9-millimeter pistol that he used to kill and wound the officers, Neely added.

On Monday, the first prosecution witness gave a wrenching description of Tonahill’s killing. Ronald White, a burly San Diego Transit bus driver, broke down twice as he described Tonahill’s death.

White and a neighbor were in the park on the night of the shooting, walking White’s dog. He testified that he watched as Ruopp gave Cinco and Casillas misdemeanor citations for giving liquor to the two teen-age girls, and then saw Tonahill drive up. Ruopp had put the girls, Gina Hensel, who was 16 at the time, and Dana Andreasen, who was 15 then, in the back seat of his patrol car.

The two officers conferred briefly before Tonahill walked over to Cinco, who was standing near the trunk of Casillas’ Mustang convertible. Cinco extended his arms above his head while Tonahill frisked him. Before Tonahill could finish searching him, Cinco abruptly turned around and hit the policewoman with his right arm, White testified.

Tonahill momentarily lost her balance but managed to push Cinco to the ground, White said, where he landed in a crouch and came up with a gun in his right hand. Then he began firing at Tonahill, White said.

“The gun just kept going off. It was a continuous muzzle flash. . . . As the bullets kept hitting her, she kept jerking . . . he kept firing at (Tonahill on) the ground as she was going down,” White said as his eyes moistened. When he regained his composure, White added:

“When the bullets were hitting her, she was backing up. She was trying to get away but had nowhere to go. I didn’t want to see anymore.”

White’s eyes moistened again.

Different Version

Hensel gave a different version of the shootings in an interview with The Times just days after the 1984 incident. According to Hensel’s version of the killings, Cinco leaned into the back seat of the car and came out with a handgun, which he fired four times at Tonahill at point-blank range. Police said that Cinco then turned in an instant and fired at Ruopp.

In his opening statement, Cotsirilos told the jurors that they would hear testimony from some of Cinco’s acquaintances, who told police about several incriminating statements allegedly made by Cinco.

But Cotsirilos asked the jurors to “listen to the circumstances under which these statements were made and judge them accordingly.”

Neely alluded to one comment allegedly made by Cinco, when he told Raymond Perez that he was not afraid to kill a police officer.

“On several occasions he told Perez that he wouldn’t hesitate to shoot a cop,” Neely said. The prosecutor said that Cinco told Perez:

“I don’t want to go to jail. (But) if I go to jail it will be for something worthwhile, not warrants.”

Arrest Warrants

Cotsirilos admitted that Cinco “had a bad habit” of not appearing in court for several traffic violations. At the time of the killings, Cinco had several arrest warrants outstanding.

Before the months that preceded the killings, Cinco had “sampled” drugs but had not used them “extensively,” Cotsirilos said. But in the spring and summer of 1984, Cinco’s life was affected by a series of personal and financial setbacks that led to a life of drug use and narcotics dealing, which contributed to the shootings, the attorney said.

According to Cotsirilos, Cinco’s life began to unravel when his stepfather and mother separated, forcing Cinco, his wife, Gloria, and the couple’s two sons to move in with his mother. Though he was working as a mechanic at the Montgomery Ward department store in Mission Valley, Cinco began to face mounting financial pressures that forced him to associate with a drug dealer who had a large gun collection, Cotsirilos said.

‘Succumbed to Temptation’

He identified the drug dealer as John Wayne Cruz, who moved in with Cinco’s family. Eventually, Cinco “succumbed to temptation,” became a middleman for Cruz and fantasized about making a lot of money, Cotsirilos said.

It was at this time that Cinco began carrying guns that belonged to Cruz as a “deterrent” and “for the excitement of it,” the defense attorney said.

“Mr. Cinco was not somebody that you (jurors) would like . . . He had become a big-talking tough guy,” Cotsirilos said.

Cinco began using cocaine daily and occasionally mixed the drug with methamphetamines, resulting in “a very destructive” effect. Cotsirilos said that Cinco’s extensive drug use made him paranoid and did not permit him much sleep.

Cinco “began seeing evil where evil doesn’t exist,” Cotsirilos said.

The trial will resume today with two more prosecution witnesses to the shooting. Hensel and Mitrovich are expected to testify on Wednesday and Thursday.