Dubose Killing Justifiable, D.A. Inquiry Finds

The fatal police shooting of Tommie C. Dubose in his home last March has been deemed justifiable by the San Diego County district attorney’s office, but the prosecutors did find some problems in the way police executed a search warrant and burst through the victim’s door, sources said Monday.

After three months of investigation, the district attorney’s office sent a 51-page report Friday to the San Diego Police Department, discussing in detail its findings in the slaying.

Police had intended to release the report Monday. But, because of the document’s size, police spent the day studying the conclusions and decided not to issue the report until today or Wednesday.

Three sources who read the report said the slaying of the 56-year-old Dubose was ruled justified, noting that otherwise no report would have been sent to the Police Department and, instead, criminal charges would have been filed.

However, the sources said the district attorney did raise several problems with the manner in which the undercover police officers served the search warrant, the number of times they knocked on the front door, how they announced themselves and how soon they burst through the door.

Dubose, a naval base instructor who was known in his Southeast San Diego community as a vocal opponent of drug abuse, was shot the night of March 12.

At that time, undercover narcotics officers were enforcing a number of search warrants in an effort to curtail drug abuse, primarily in Hispanic and black communities.

According to the search warrant obtained by police to enter the Dubose home, an informant had purchased illegal drugs at the residence. The home was portrayed by police as a known dope house, and one of the victim’s sons, Charles Dubose, was characterized by them as a suspected drug offender.

A week after the shooting, police gave this account: Several officers dressed in yellow police jackets announced their arrival and knocked on the door at 50th Street and Federal Boulevard. They looked through a window and saw Tommie Dubose running for a back bedroom. In that room, police later found, was an array of guns the victim used for hunting.

When police saw Dubose make that move, they forced open the door. Police said Dubose then attacked one of the officers and, while wrestling over the officer’s gun, was shot by a second officer.

An autopsy showed that Dubose was shot five times--four times in the back--by Officer Carlos Garcia. Previously, Garcia had been involved in two shootings that left one man dead and two others wounded. Each of Garcia’s shootings has been ruled justifiable.

The death of Dubose, who was black, has drawn the ire of many leaders in the black community, who contend that Dubose was an innocent victim.

Earlier this year, the county grand jury declined to investigate the case, but minority leaders now hope the grand jury that convenes next month will review it.