PASADENA : Police Acted in Self-Defense in Fatal Shooting, D.A. Finds
Pasadena police were not at fault when a man was fatally wounded last year while seeking refuge in an apartment during a shootout between officers and alleged gang members, the district attorney’s office has determined.
The investigation concluded that police officers who fired more than 100 rounds on May 2 near North Los Robles Avenue and Claremont Street were acting “in reasonable exercise of self-defense” at the time that Howard Eugene Martin was killed, Deputy City Atty. Lawrence Newberry said in reporting the findings to the City Council this week.
Martin, 22, was one of more than 50 people killed during the disturbances that followed the not guilty verdicts in the trial of four Los Angeles police officers accused of beating Altadena motorist Rodney G. King.
Martin was hit in the head by a bullet that came through the wall of an apartment, killing him instantly.
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