Slain Man’s Family Discounts Cocaine Report

Relatives of Hong Il Kim, the Orange man killed by police in a televised Valentine’s Day shooting, reacted in disbelief Wednesday to press reports that the 27-year-old man was on cocaine at the time of the chase.

Press reports quoting law enforcement officials said significant levels of cocaine were detected in Kim’s bloodstream.

“I don’t believe any of that is true,” said brother Hong Ki Kim. “I don’t understand why it was publicly released and no one told the family about it.”

But Angela Oh, the family’s attorney, said she knew of the results prior to the release of the information.

“I wasn’t surprised by it,” Oh said. “There had to be some explanation for his erratic behavior.”

Investigators said the test results were not supposed to be released to the press.

“I’m pretty chagrined that somehow it got out,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Christopher John Evans, who is supervising the investigation. “It’s confidential information for a good reason.

“It’s critical that people we intend to interview don’t get information from sources other than what they saw or sensed,” he said. “We won’t know if, for instance, they say they saw him coked up, that that was really what they saw. Or whether that was what they read in the paper. . . . It’s a real unfortunate situation.”

Despite the drug findings, Oh said the evidence does not justify the fatal shooting.

“The police didn’t have any knowledge of this at the time of the shooting, so it’s irrelevant. They had no idea of his immigration status, criminal history or his drug use,” she added.

“We must focus on what happened at the time of the incident,” Oh said. “This information only serves as an attempt to make people feel a little better about what happened.”

While the investigation is ongoing, Hong Il Kim’s relatives are expected to file a wrongful-death claim today against Orange County and the three police agencies involved in the shooting.

Kim, a South Korean national whose family lives in Orange, was killed Feb. 14 after leading Orange and Westminster police, as well as California Highway Patrol officers, on a 30-mile pursuit.

What started as a reluctant chase for reckless driving ended in the parking lot of an Orange mini-mall. Patrol cars boxed in Kim’s vehicle in a parking space, leaving him no way out, and police officers opened fire when his vehicle advanced on two plainclothes detectives who had stationed themselves, with weapons drawn, directly in front of his Toyota 4-Runner.

At least 20 rounds were fired at the vehicle, and Kim died at the scene of multiple gunshot wounds.