Picnic Held to Show Support for Officer Charged in Killings : Police: Prosecutors are making an example of Alfred Skiles Jr., accused in on-duty shootings, critics say.

Scores of Compton police officers and their families ate barbecued chicken and ducked water balloons Saturday to show support for Officer Alfred Skiles Jr.--the first Los Angeles County lawman in nearly a decade to face criminal charges in an on-duty shooting.

Skiles is accused of shooting two unarmed Samoan-American brothers a total of 19 times during a Feb. 12 fight at their home. Some of the rounds, according to authorities, were fired while the brothers were on the ground.

He has pleaded not guilty to the charges, contending that he fired in self-defense after Pouvi Tualaulelei, 34, and Itali Tualaulelei, 22, tried to disarm him as he investigated a family dispute.

“This is the first time in months I’ve been able to relax,” Skiles, 44, told the crowd as his wife and four children stood behind him. “It’s been such a horrible, traumatic situation.

“I feel like I’m in a Freddy Krueger movie. When I wake up I’m hoping Freddy will pop out and say it’s only a dream.”

Skiles faces a preliminary hearing Nov. 27 in Los Angeles Superior Court on two counts of voluntary manslaughter. If convicted, he faces a minimum three-year prison sentence and a maximum of 13 years. He is free on $35,000 bail posted by fellow officers through the Compton Police Officers Assn.

About 250 people attended the picnic at Gonzales Park. Many wore bright yellow T-shirts bearing a drawing of Skiles in his police uniform flashing a thumbs up.

“Any one of us could be in this situation,” said co-worker Sgt. Danny Sneed. “We have 10 seconds to make a hard decision, and then other people sit back eight months to decide whether you’re right or wrong.”

Sneed and others suggested that prosecutors are making an example of Skiles as part of the fallout from the scandal over the police beating of Rodney G. King.

The Compton police officers’ group sold ballpoint pens, pencils, buttons and key chains reading “We Support Alfred Skiles” during the six-hour picnic. The money will be donated to Skiles’ family.

The picnic angered some, however.

“What they do is their own business,” said Carson resident Arieta Meni, the Tualauleleis’ aunt. “But as far as our family is concerned, two lives are lost. It takes 19 bullets for two boys? I don’t believe it.”

San Francisco lawyer Kevin McLean, who with partner Melvin Belli has filed a $100-million civil lawsuit against Skiles and police on behalf of the Tualaulelei family, suggested that there were “more appropriate ways to show support.”

“From the Samoan community standpoint,” he said, “I’m sure it will be considered in bad taste. But they’ve had to endure police brutality for a good many years.”

Compton Police Chief Terry Ebert said the shooting was an isolated incident for a department that “has always gotten along well with the Samoan community.”

Since the shooting, Ebert said, Compton officials have used a mediation service provided by the U.S. Justice Department during meetings with Samoan leaders.

More such dialogue is needed, said picnic-goer Manny Correa, a Compton school board member who served 32 years on the city’s police force before retiring.

“There’s been too much ‘we,’ ‘they’ and ‘them,’ ” Correa said. “The community has to get together and talk this thing out, no matter which way the trial goes. We’ve got to do it together.”

Michael Sean Markey, president of the police officers’ group, said he is confident that Skiles will be found innocent.

“It’s a tragic situation. But there’s a third victim--the officer,” he said.