Prosecutor Assails Self-Defense Claim in Slaying of Officer

A deputy district attorney prosecuting a 22-year-old Los Angeles man accused of killing a police officer in Sylmar said in closing arguments Monday that the man’s claim that the shooting was in self-defense is “patently unbelievable.”

Louis Belvin Jr. “is a predator” who “will inflict gratuitous violence on anyone who challenges his authority,” prosecutor Susan Speer told a San Fernando Superior Court jury.

Defense attorney Marvin L. Part is expected to say in his closing arguments today that Belvin should not be found guilty of murder because he did not know that the man he shot on June 22, 1987, was a police officer.

Belvin testified during the three-week trial that he shot Officer James H. Pagliotti, 28, only after the officer had shot him once in the back. Belvin said he believed that Pagliotti, who was dressed in shorts and a print shirt and driving a small white car, was a disgruntled drug customer who had come back for revenge.

Under cross-examination from Speer last week, Belvin, who was 17 at the time, said he shot at Pagliotti “to protect myself. I didn’t know he was a police officer.”

Pagliotti was among several undercover officers who were watching a burglary suspect in the area. Belvin and a friend, Thomas Lee Mixon, 23, also of Los Angeles, had been selling small quantities of rock cocaine in Sylmar that night. Earlier that night, Belvin and Mixon had beat up a customer who had complained of the poor quality of the cocaine and had demanded his money back.

As one of the undercover officers drove by Astoria Street and Bromont Avenue, he saw Belvin holding a gun.

The officer put out a radio call in the belief that the men were about to commit a robbery. Belvin testified that Pagliotti approached him as he sat on a concrete wall of a nearby house. He said Pagliotti got out of his car and fired a shot at him as he walked away, hitting him once in the back. Belvin said Pagliotti never identified himself as a police officer.

Belvin said he then fired three shots at Pagliotti and ran down the street. Belvin was arrested a short distance away after he slumped to the ground from his wound.

Several police officers, however, contradicted Belvin’s testimony during the trial, saying that they had heard Pagliotti identify himself as a police officer and that it was Belvin who fired first at Pagliotti.

Belvin is also charged with selling cocaine and assault in connection with the attack on the disgruntled customer who had demanded his money back. Part told the jury Monday that Belvin is guilty of those charges.

But Part said Belvin is not guilty of another--unrelated--charge, the attempted murder of a friend who Belvin shot during a disagreement over ownership of an audiotape. Part said that shooting, a month before Pagliotti’s death, was an accident.

In a plea agreement in May, Mixon pleaded guilty to charges of assault and selling cocaine in exchange for the prosecutor dropping a murder charge against him. He faces a maximum of eight years and four months in prison. He will not be sentenced until a verdict is rendered in Belvin’s case.