Prosecutors Won’t Charge Deputies in Brutality Case

San Bernardino County prosecutors will not file criminal charges against four Sheriff’s Department deputies who allegedly used excessive force against five undocumented aliens during an altercation in Victorville that was recorded by an onlooker with a video camera.

Latino leaders on Tuesday angrily denounced the decision, which they predicted will worsen already strained relations between the Sheriff’s Department and Latinos residing in the high desert area.

San Bernardino County Dist. Atty. Dennis Kottmeier said in a statement that a review of the June 30 incident based on information from the FBI, the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department and a local civil rights group, the Institute for Social Justice, failed to turn up “proof beyond a reasonable doubt of criminal wrongdoing.”

Instead, Kottmeier said, the investigation revealed “conflicting descriptions of the incident given by independent witnesses . . . the refusal to cooperate in the investigation by witnesses who voluntarily left the United States, and the fact that the videotape focuses on a single segment of the incident that results in an inaccurate portrayal of the entire encounter.”

Armando Navarro, a spokesman for the Institute for Social Justice, which brought the videotape to public attention, called the decision “a slap in the face of the Latino community.”

“I was optimistic in the sense that, my God, you have a three-minute videotape of the incident made by witnesses who caught these guys in the act,” Navarro said. “But some people warned me that you can’t expect the district attorney to take action against the Sheriff’s Department. It’s like putting the fox in charge of the hens.”

‘Feeling of . . . Disgust’

Felix Diaz, president of the Victor Valley High School District Board of Trustees, said, “The feeling among Latinos in the Victorville area is one of disappointment and disgust.”

“I teach a class on citizenship and amnesty for people from countries including Nicaragua, El Salvador, Panama and Ecuador who came to this country seeking freedom and protection of human rights,” Diaz said. “The class begins Jan. 11 and I know some of these people will ask about this case. I’m not sure what to tell them.”

Kottmeier was unavailable for comment Tuesday and Assistant Dist. Atty. Betty Kennedy declined to comment.

San Bernardino County Sheriff Floyd Tidwell, however, said he “welcomed the decision, which just conforms with what my department has said from the beginning: There was no criminal action on the part of the deputies.”

Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Justice is conducting its own investigation of the case. “The FBI has conducted a civil rights investigation, the results of which were forwarded to the Department of Justice civil rights section,” said Fred Reagan, spokesman for the FBI office in Los Angeles. “Whether or not there will be further activity on this matter is unknown at this point.”

Tidwell’s conclusion that his deputies did not use excessive force in a scuffle with loud party-goers at a house on 5th Street in Victorville has been disputed by Latino leaders who have talked to witnesses, including the five men.

According to reports filed by deputies, the incident began shortly after they responded to a neighbor’s complaint of a loud party at the house where men were urinating and throwing beer cans into an adjacent yard.

Describes Altercation

In an earlier interview, Tidwell said that before the video was turned on, one of the men “shoved a deputy in the chest” and they both “went down to the ground” in a scuffle. The same deputy felt someone trying to grab his gun and “it was an adversarial situation from that point on,” Tidwell said.

Latino leaders maintain that the videotape shows a deputy striking a handcuffed man without provocation. But Tidwell said that an analysis of the videotape showed the deputy striking the man “with the back of his hand . . . between the shoulder blades” in an effort to break his grip on a porch railing.

According to the Latino leaders, the videotape also shows a deputy striking the man in the legs three times with a baton as they dragged him away from the house by his feet. Tidwell argued that while the deputy did swing at the man three times, two of the strikes missed their mark.

Only one of the men, Jose Serrano, 27, who rented the house, was charged with a crime: resisting arrest and possession of a small amount of cocaine, authorities said. Two of the men were deported to Mexico and two others were arrested and later released.

On Tuesday, Latino leaders criticized Kottmeier’s conclusion and methodology. For example, Navarro denied Kottmeier’s assertion that the Institute for Social Justice provided information to investigators.

“Two weeks after the incident, we made it very clear that we were available for support in terms of providing information,” Navarro said. “Beyond that, there has been no contact between his office and the Institute for Social Justice or any of the leadership of the Hispanic community of the high desert.”

Navarro added that “at no time did Kottmeier or anyone from his office meet with the victims. How could the district attorney conduct a thorough investigation when the victims were not interviewed?”

Navarro also said Kottmeier was wrong to suggest that certain witnesses failed to cooperate in the investigation by voluntarily leaving the United States.

Navarro said he believes that Kottmeier was referring to the five men involved in the incident.

“He is talking about people who never left the area of the high desert until a few weeks ago when they left for Mexico,” Navarro said. “The new amnesty program enabled them to visit with relatives in Mexico for Christmas. They are coming back.”

Carlos Juarez, an attorney representing the five men in a $75-million lawsuit against the county, Tidwell and the deputies, agreed and said, “The district attorney’s investigation was a whitewash.

“I can’t remember the last time the district attorney’s office prosecuted police involved in police brutality,” Juarez said. “It is unfortunate that citizens of this community have to resort to civil action to obtain justice.”