S.D. Sheriff Off the Hook in Jail Probe

The San Diego County Sheriff’s Department was cleared Tuesday of any criminal wrongdoing in an FBI investigation of 70 cases of alleged civil rights violations stemming from beatings and deaths suffered by inmates in the county jails.

However, U.S. Atty. William Braniff said that his office and FBI investigators are still reviewing two cases to determine if criminal prosecution of deputies or other jail personnel is warranted. Braniff refused to identify the two cases.

Sheriff John Duffy was out of town and not available for comment, but department officials said that they felt vindicated by the FBI investigation.

‘We’re Very Pleased’

“Obviously, we’re very pleased by the outcome of the FBI investigation. It’s extremely reassuring . . . I can’t stress that strongly enough,” said Sheriff’s Department spokesman Lt. Alan Fulmer. “ . . . In my estimation, the fact that the FBI has completed its investigation and released these findings helps us considerably. . . . We’ve been the target of finger-pointing and unwarranted criticism for far too long, so, yes, we feel vindicated.”

But Braniff was careful to say that the findings do not necessarily mean that prosecutors felt that prosecution was unwarranted in every case. Some cases were borderline and could have gone either way, he said.

“We can only make our judgment based on evidence. . . . If the evidence is not sufficient, we must make that judgment. I’m sure you could find cases that were closer to the border than others,” Braniff said. Sometimes the decision whether to prosecute or not “came down to credibility issues,” he said.

Declined Comment

He declined to elaborate further or comment on individual cases that were investigated. The decision not to prosecute in the 70 cases was made by Braniff and the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department.

The announcement by Braniff drew an immediate complaint from Roberto Martinez, co-chairman of the Coalition for Law and Justice, a community organization that looks into allegations of police brutality. He called the investigation’s results shocking.

“They’re saying that these people (jail personnel) are doing nothing wrong and all of these deaths and injuries were justified,” said Martinez.

FBI agents began the investigation in May, after numerous complaints from alleged victims and critics who charged that deputies at the jails were beating inmates without cause. During the summer, a host of former inmates, many of them middle class with no criminal records, testified at a Board of Supervisors hearing about beatings they said they received while in custody.

Because of the statute of limitations for criminal prosecutions, Braniff said that agents only investigated cases filed in the last five years. The incidents investigated were alleged to have occurred at the county jails in Vista, Santee, El Cajon, downtown and the women’s jail at Las Colinas.

Some inmate deaths have been attributed to beatings suffered at the hands of jailers. Braniff acknowledged that some of the cases investigated by the FBI included several deaths.

Braniff declined to say whether deputies were cleared in the death of Albert Manuel Varela. Varela, 28, died Jan. 21, 1988, after an altercation with four deputies while he was being booked for violating a restraining order. The deputies were exonerated by the district attorney’s office; a coroner’s report said Varela was a homicide victim but said the controversial choke hold applied by Deputy Roy Devault was not the direct cause of Varela’s death.

The findings of the investigation will be forwarded to the San Diego County Grand Jury, which is conducting a review of the county jail system. Grand Jury Foreman Armistead B. Smith Jr. declined to comment. However, Smith said that the Grand Jury’s findings of its investigation of brutality at the jails will be released about March 15.