Prosecutors Seek Death Penalty for Tuffree : Courts: They told the grand jury that the suspect in the slaying of a Simi Valley officer had a longstanding grudge against police after a raid on his home in 1992.

Prosecutors will try to send accused cop killer Daniel Allan Tuffree to Death Row, Ventura County Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury announced Tuesday.

Tuffree, 48, is accused of killing Simi Valley Police Officer Michael F. Clark, 28, after a five-hour standoff with police at his Simi Valley home Aug. 4.

Although prosecutors would not comment on the case Tuesday, they told the Ventura County grand jury that Tuffree harbored a longstanding grudge with Simi Valley police after several officers raided his home in 1992 and seized a semiautomatic handgun, transcripts show.

During the grand jury hearings last month, prosecutors Peter D. Kossoris and Patricia M. Murphy successfully urged the panel to indict Tuffree on a premeditated murder charge with the special allegation of killing a police officer.

“It is very, very clear that Mr. Tuffree intended to kill Officer Clark,” Murphy told the grand jury Sept. 21.

But Tuffree’s attorneys have maintained that Clark fired first and Tuffree only returned fire in self-defense.

“He was in his own house, not committing any crimes when police responded,” defense attorney Richard Holly said Tuesday. Holly said he visited Tuffree in jail to tell him that the death penalty would be sought.

“He is in shock,” Holly said.

Holly further maintains that Simi Valley police botched the call, incorrectly handling a delicate situation with someone who they knew was mentally unstable.

Prosecutors told the grand jury that Tuffree’s grudge began in 1992 after police received reports that the San Fernando Valley schoolteacher had fired a .40-caliber Glock handgun at a passing motorist. Officers seized the handgun, but ballistic tests proved inconclusive, and Tuffree was never charged with a crime.

The confiscated gun was later returned to him, and investigators say that same gun was used to kill Clark.

After Clark’s killing, investigators searched Tuffree’s home and found a rambling 19-page letter addressed to U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein detailing his still-simmering dissatisfaction with the Simi Valley Police Department over the 1992 incident.

In the letter, Tuffree accuses the Police Department of harassment because officials refused to return his gun for more than six months.

The letter was never mailed. But Murphy argued that it is proof Tuffree has “got a dislike and distrust for [the] Simi Valley [Police Department] that bordered on [the] obsessed,” the grand jury transcripts showed.

Murphy and Kossoris called 23 witnesses during a weeklong hearing last month before the grand jury, which indicted Tuffree on the murder charge and a count each of attempted murder and assault for firing at Officer Michael Pierce, who was with Clark.

*

Sgt. Anthony Anzilotti, who participated in the 1992 raid of Tuffree’s house, also accompanied Clark after a mental health worker asked police to check on Tuffree.

According to the grand jury transcripts, Tuffree had become upset when a pharmacy refused to renew his prescription for Valium.

He called his health insurance carrier to complain. Concerned about his demeanor, a company official called a mental health worker, who was unable to make contact with Tuffree on the telephone. The mental health worker in turn called police.

Grand jury testimony shows that Tuffree refused to open his door for Clark and his two colleagues when they arrived at his house. Pierce and Anzilotti testified that the trio crept into Tuffree’s back yard, where Clark made eye contact with Tuffree through the kitchen window.

During their brief conversation, Clark repeatedly asked to see Tuffree’s hand, Pierce and Anzilotti testified. Soon after, Pierce testified that Clark yelled “He’s got a gun!” before the officer was shot in the back and collapsed in Tuffree’s back yard.

While Anzilotti said he does not know who fired first, Pierce testified that he heard the first shots fired from inside Tuffree’s house.

Tuffree told investigators during a 3 1/2-hour interrogation immediately after the shooting that Clark fired first. He told investigators that Clark stood in his back yard and yelled through the window at Tuffree to show both his hands.

*

Tuffree said he placed his hands on a kitchen counter and laid the gun under his left hand, at which point Clark backed up and pointed his weapon at Tuffree, according to the grand jury transcripts.

Prosecutors dispute Tuffree’s claim that Clark fired first. But Murphy told the grand jury that even if Clark did fire first, he was justified by Tuffree’s actions.

“Officer Clark had the right to fire,” Murphy told the grand jury. “It is not a question of who shot first.”

Tuffree’s two children and ex-wife also testified before the grand jury.

Susan Tuffree, who divorced Tuffree in 1988, and son Daniel Tuffree Jr. testified that Tuffree was hospitalized “for significant amounts of time” for a mental illness several times in the past four years.

Tuffree is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday in Ventura County Superior Court.