Claim Filed for Girl Hit by Unmarked Police Car

A couple filed a $1-million claim Wednesday against the city of Long Beach and its Police Department, saying two officers speeding away from a corner where rioting had occurred the night before struck their 16-year-old daughter with an unmarked police car.

Danna and Vernon Hardgraves said the officers did not stop to help the teen-ager, who suffered a fractured ankle, a neck injury and numerous bruises when she was hit as she stood talking with friends in a parking lot near 52nd Street and Atlantic Avenue.

Police acknowledged that Sgt. Bob Gillissie and Officer Bill Valles struck the teen-ager April 30, but denied it was a hit-and-run. Officers are not required to remain at a scene if their lives are endangered, police said.

“The two officers were in fear for their lives,” said Sgt. Charles Higley, a department spokesman, because a crowd across the street seemed threatening. What he call a “mob” was heading toward the officers. “They knew they had struck the young girl. They went down and called for backup and called for paramedics. They called for a field supervisor. They reported it. As soon as the paramedics arrived, they returned to the scene.”

But the Hardgraveses argue that the police abandoned their daughter. “I hit a dog once and I pulled over,” said Vernon Hardgraves. “And the police officer said if I hadn’t pulled over, he would have arrested me. And that was a dog.”

Added Danna Hardgraves: “They didn’t even know if she was alive.”

The Hardgraveses said they have yet to hear from Long Beach police. In fact, the Hardgraveses said they learned that it was a police car that struck their daughter after a witness followed the car and wrote down the license number and a private investigator followed up on the incident.

The corner where Clarabell Hardgraves was injured was one of the earliest spots hit by looters in north Long Beach when rioting broke out after the April 29 not guilty verdicts for four police officers charged in the beating of motorist Rodney G. King.

Crowds lingered there throughout the next day, and police reported sniper fire from the nearby Carmelitos Housing Project that night.

Clarabell, a sophomore at Jordan High School, said she was passing through the area on April 30 with two friends when she saw another friend and stopped to chat. The teen-agers went to a nearby McDonald’s but found it closed due to the turmoil. Clarabell said she did not feel threatened by a crowd across the street and that the people seemed only to be hanging around.

She spotted two men in a car, one of them using a video camera.

“We were waving at the camera,” Clarabell said. “I thought they were news people. We thought we would be in the news.”

When the teen-agers waved at the officer’s camera, about 20 people across the street realized it was an undercover car, police said. What happened next is hazy to Clarabell. She said she only remembers turning around and hearing the screeching of tires. She said she next remembers paramedics placing her in an ambulance.

Paramedics took her to Long Beach Memorial Medical Center, where she was treated and released.

The police said officers Gillissie and Valles parked their gray Thunderbird at the northwest corner of the intersection and took videotapes of people loitering across the street. When the crowd spotted the officers around 3:30 p.m., the policemen sped away, striking the teen-ager, police said.

Gillissie, 49, a 25-year veteran of the department, and Valles, 44, a Long Beach officer for 18 years, could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

Paul Chastain, president of the Police Officers Assn., described the officers’ actions as “just common sense.”

“In Long Beach, we usually go to a scene, not leave it,” Chastain said. “(But) if I’m completely surrounded, I would get out of there if I thought I’m going to get killed.”

Lt. Mike Hill, a member of Police Chief William Ellis’ staff, said that for the officers to assist the girl, they had to ensure their own safety first.

By comparison, in Los Angeles the Police Department policy regarding officer-involved accidents requires officers to stay at the scene, seek medical assistance and call a supervisor and traffic officers, said spokesman John Dunkin.

“Any deviation from that policy would be investigated,” he said. Officers who had left a scene because they felt their lives endangered could explain their circumstances during an investigation.

To the Hardgraveses, the officers’ action was tantamount to negligence.

“They said they feared for their lives. How about my daughter? They could have killed her,” said Danna Hardgraves.

Calvin Butler, the investigator working with the Hardgraveses’ attorney, said: “What about her life? What’s her life worth? Is the life of a police officer worth more than a 16-year-old?”

While her family pursues a claim, which is a precursor to a lawsuit, the teen-ager said the accident has greatly altered her life. “I can’t go to school,” she said, explaining that a tutor will help her with classes. “I can’t go anywhere. I’m in pain. I can’t go to the prom. I don’t think they should have hit me and kept on going.”

Times staff writer Penelope McMillan contributed to this story.