Deputies’ Role in 1987 Beating Probed by U.S. : Law enforcement: Four Norwalk Station officers may be indicted for alleged civil rights violations.

Four Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies are targets of a federal civil rights investigation into the 1987 beating and kicking of a truck driver who later received a $150,000 lawsuit settlement from the county, The Times has learned.

Federal prosecutors and FBI agents have been questioning witnesses who say they saw deputies batter Coy Blane Willbanks with nightsticks and flashlights after his truck was found blocking parking spaces at a south Whittier mini-market.

Willbanks’ face was kicked “like a football” while deputies pinned him to the ground, bystanders said. Half-dollar-sized chunks of flesh were also torn from his legs with clubs and flashlights, Willbanks said, causing what he described as permanent circulatory damage.

The four Norwalk Station deputies involved have said that Willbanks was subdued because he was belligerent and resisted arrest. They remain on duty.

But sources close to the investigation told The Times that the officers have been called to appear before a federal grand jury and have been informed by prosecutors that they may be indicted.

The deputies--Sam Ferri, Joseph Lomonaco, Everett Maldonado and Bruce Prewett--could not be reached for comment.

Richard Shinee, chief attorney for the Assn. for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs, said his organization would assist them in any legal proceedings.

“We’re aware of this investigation, and we have been in contact with the deputies,” Shinee said. “We have no further comment as to the merits of the allegations against them.”

Asked about the investigation, the Sheriff’s Department issued a terse statement. “It is our understanding that the federal government is looking into a 5-year-old incident,” said a spokesman, Deputy Patrick Hunter.

If an indictment is returned in the case, it would mark the first time that local sheriff’s deputies have been charged with civil rights violations since the Justice Department announced a sweeping nationwide review of police brutality in the wake of the Rodney G. King beating last March.

However, the Willbanks investigation is a separate inquiry from the agency’s broader-based review of thousands of excessive-force cases in Los Angeles and other cities, said Amy Casner of the department’s civil rights division in Washington. “This is an open matter under review by the department,” said the spokeswoman.

Karen Gardner, an FBI spokeswoman in Los Angeles, confirmed only that her agency is engaged in “a pending investigation into possible civil rights violations involving Mr. Willbanks as the victim.” Results of the inquiry will be forwarded to government lawyers to determine whether prosecutions will follow.

The Willbanks investigation comes as the Sheriff’s Department undergoes an unprecedented review by an independent counsel hired by the Board of Supervisors. That inquiry, headed by retired Superior Court Judge James Kolts, will examine excessive-force allegations against deputies and other alleged misconduct that has cost the county $34 million in awards and settlements the past four years.

“Had there been a man with a videotape there it would have been very much like Rodney King, even worse,” said attorney Peter Scalisi, who represented Willbanks against a subsequent charge of resisting arrest and assaulting a police officer.

Willbanks, 31, said he recently was interviewed by the FBI at his home in Beulah, Mo., and in St. Louis, but he declined to comment Friday on the civil rights investigation.

The incident occurred in February, 1987, when Willbanks, then 26, stopped his tractor-trailer rig in the parking lot of the Whittier mini-market to get some sleep. Willbanks testified in court that he was exhausted and groggy after driving nonstop for nearly 36 hours.

When deputies found the illegally parked truck, they awakened Willbanks and told him to move his rig. Willbanks, who is 6-feet-4 and weighed 275 pounds, replied that he was too tired to move and directed them to go ahead and tow his truck, as they had threatened to do.

According to the trucker’s version, a deputy began pulling on his leg and hit it with a flashlight. Willbanks said he responded by kicking at the officer.

Bystanders and Willbanks said two deputies then entered the cab and beat him with batons. Willbanks said the officers continued to strike him when he fell from the cab onto the pavement. The officers said Willbanks tried to strike them with a club inside the cab, then kept flailing at them with his feet.

As an angry crowd of 25 to 30 people watched, Willbanks was pummeled on the head with flashlights and nightsticks, according to witnesses who testified at his criminal trial.

Ferri--the first deputy at the scene--testified that when he pulled Willbanks from the cab, they both landed on their feet. The deputy said that when Willbanks stepped toward him, he was forced to smash Willbanks in the face with a flashlight.

Four witnesses, however, said they saw the trucker drop out of the cab and immediately collapse onto the pavement, where he was beaten by deputies. Other officers arrived, witnesses said, but stood by and watched.

Willbanks was hospitalized for three days and required 25 stitches for his head cuts. Willbanks also said leg injuries from the beating led to circulatory problems that prevented him from driving his truck.

Willbanks was put on trial for resisting arrest and assaulting an officer, but it took a jury less than 30 minutes to acquit him.

In 1988, Willbanks won a $150,000 settlement after the county’s attorney concluded that six witnesses, who were at a nearby service station, supported Willbanks’ version.

Willbanks’ lawsuit was one of 151 excessive-force actions examined by The Times in a series of articles in 1990 that reported that the Sheriff’s Department paid $8.5 million in awards and settlements of such cases.

One witness said he was interviewed recently by federal agents who asked about the deputies’ actions.

“They were basically asking me did I know who had control out there,” said Rick Newton about his meeting with an FBI agent and a federal prosecutor. “I said no one had control there. All they did was just keep beating the guy.”

Another witness, Larry Rossi, who works with Newton at a nearby automotive store, said he told FBI agents the beating was unwarranted.

“If one of us had done that to a guy, and we’d been caught, there’s no question we’d be doing jail time,” he said.

The deputies involved in the incident are all veteran officers. Prewett has been with the department 16 years; Ferri, 14 years; Maldonado, 10 years, and Lomonaco, 10 years.