Suspect’s Strip Upsets Merchants

Two owners and an employee of a Gaslamp clothing store said Wednesday that they plan to file complaints with the San Diego Police Department charging that the search of a man arrested last week on suspicion of heroin possession was done in poor taste because the man was standing partly nude on a public street.

“If I was able to see this, I’m sure other people could,” said Chris Bates, who works at The Catwalk, a retail clothing shop in the 700 block of G Street.

The police, he added, “should think about the other people around who don’t want to see that sort of thing going on.”

The incident occurred on the afternoon of July 11, when two police officers stopped a car for following another vehicle too closely near 6th Avenue and G Street. After officers questioned the man and the woman in the car, it was discovered that they were parolees, and a search of the man was authorized by a parole agent.

Police Officer Phil Stanley, who was involved in the incident, said he never asked the man to strip in the street because searches are usually done in the privacy of a police station or jail. Stanley said the man apparently thought the search was going to be done immediately because his parole agent had authorized it.

“He thought we wanted a search right there, so he pulled his pants down and we told him, ‘No, not right here on the street.’ So we pulled them back up and put him in the car,” Stanley said.

Once inside the car, Stanley said, the man was found to be carrying a bag of 19 heroin balloons. In a routine pat-down search of the woman in the car, 240 heroin balloons were found in her possession and more than $1,000 in cash was found in her purse, said police spokesman Bill Robinson.

William Rayon, 22, has been charged with transporting a controlled substance, and DeAnna Rocha, 24, has been charged with selling a controlled substance, jail officials said. Rayon and Rocha, who had been living in a National City hotel, are being held on $75,000 bail.

Bates, along with Ray Campbell and Jeanne Machold, owners of The Catwalk, said they will file citizen complaints with the Police Department within the next few days.

Bates said the man lowered his pants for about a minute during the police search. He also said the police did not fully shield the man’s privacy.

“I don’t think they were really trying to guard, because they were standing more off to the side,” Bates said.

Campbell said the incident disrupted his business. “It’s gross that it happened right out in front of the store,” he said. “It deters people from coming into the business.”

But Laura Sinclair, who works at Ace Uniforms & Accessories in the 700 block of 6th Avenue, said there was nothing tasteless about the incident.

“You couldn’t really see anything because (the police) concealed it so well. They were very professional about it,” Sinclair said.