Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : U. S. Inquiry of Transient’s Killing Closed

The Justice Department’s civil rights division announced Monday that an investigation of a 1989 case in which a transient died after being shot 18 times by Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies has been closed without any action.

The inquiry, which involved a federal grand jury, examined whether the shooting death of Betty Jean Aborn, a black woman, by three sheriff’s deputies violated federal civil rights law. The incident prompted calls by civil rights groups for a probe into alleged police brutality.

The Justice Department did not provide additional details. Spokeswomen for the Sheriff’s Department and the U. S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles said they did not have further information.

The Aborn case aroused considerable outrage five years ago. It was one of three shootings in Lancaster within an eight-month period that prompted accusations by the NAACP and others that sheriff’s deputies deployed excessive force against minorities.

On April 11, 1989, six deputies confronted the 50-year-old Aborn at a Carl’s Jr. in a suburban strip of fast-food restaurants and strip malls near the Avenue K exit of the Antelope Valley Freeway. Authorities were responding to an armed robbery call at a nearby business when they confronted Aborn, who was wielding a butcher knife.

When Aborn lunged at them, three deputies opened fire, authorities said. A subsequent investigation by the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office found that Deputies William Phelton, James Vetrovec and Tony Ortiz acted “within the bounds of reasonable self-defense.”

“The evidence indicates that the deputies showed considerable restraint” until Aborn, who was a suspect in the nearby robbery, lunged at the deputies with the knife, the district attorney’s special investigations division report said.

A lawyer working with relatives of the Antelope Valley shooting victims said the ruling showed that the district attorney’s office was unwilling to prosecute police officers accused of misconduct.

“They could have used nightsticks to knock the knife out of her hands,” said David Lynn of the Coalition for Police Accountability. “We’re talking about an indigent, frail, elderly black woman.”