Family Files Suit in Drug Raid Death
Survivors of a reclusive millionaire shot dead in a drug raid last fall in Ventura County have filed a federal wrongful death and civil rights lawsuit, alleging that drug agents killed Donald P. Scott after conspiring to seize his $5-million ranch.
Led by Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies, a multi-agency drug task force descended on Scott’s 200-acre Ventura County ranch near Malibu in the early morning of Oct. 2 after using false information to secure a search warrant, according to the suit.
Scott, 61, heir to a chemicals fortune, was killed when a sheriff’s deputy shot him twice after breaking into the main house at Scott’s Trail’s End Ranch.
No drugs were found on the property.
The new lawsuit, the second in the case by Scott’s heirs, was filed on behalf of Scott’s widow, Frances, and his four children.
The lawsuit names as defendants the Sheriff’s Department and Los Angeles Police Department, the city and county of Los Angeles, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, Border Patrol, National Park Service and Forest Service, the state National Guard, Department of Fish and Game, Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement and the California Coastal Commission.
Sheriff Sherman Block has said his preliminary inquiry into the raid found that deputies acted in good faith, did not raid the ranch to seize it and shot Scott in self-defense.
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