Jury Urged to Acquit and Send Message About LAPD Tactics

A defense attorney asked a Ventura County jury Wednesday to acquit his client of murder and in doing so send a strong message to Los Angeles police to disband a controversial surveillance unit.

“Stop them from what they are doing,” Deputy Public Defender Gary Windom said of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Special Investigations Section during closing arguments in the seven-week trial. “They provoked this deadly confrontation.”

Windom’s client, Robert Wayne Cunningham of Reseda, is facing murder charges because police shot his partner to death after watching the pair rob a liquor store in Newbury Park last year.

Applying an unusual legal theory, prosecutors contend that Cunningham, 27, should be held responsible for Daniel Soly’s death on the grounds that he intentionally provoked the gunfight with police.

But throughout Cunningham’s trial, Windom and his defense team have argued that officers in the Special Investigations Section initiated the gunfight--not Cunningham.

The controversial squad, which was formed in 1965, has drawn criticism over the years for following violent criminals, watching them commit robberies or other offenses, but not arresting them until they attempt to flee the crime scene.

During the Cunningham trial, one of the officers testified that the unit’s detectives have killed 19 people and wounded many others during their surveillance operations.

After reviewing the unit’s activities, police officials implemented a department-wide policy in 1989 that instructs officers to protect potential crime victims even if it means jeopardizing an undercover investigation.

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But defense attorneys say that did not happen in Cunningham’s case.

The 19-member police team was called last year to investigate 40 armed robberies that had occurred in the San Fernando Valley. Soly, a 26-year-old parolee from West Hills, was linked to the crimes and was under surveillance.

According to court testimony, 13 officers followed Soly and Cunningham into Ventura County on June 26, 1995, with the intent to watch them commit a robbery.

Sitting in unmarked cars, they watched Cunningham and Soly rob the South West Liquor and Deli in Newbury Park at gunpoint.

It is at this point, however, that the defense and prosecution stories differ.

Defense attorneys say the robbers got into their car and the officers, who never identified themselves as police, unloaded a barrage of gunfire that left Soly dead with 27 bullet wounds to the back and head.

“They came into Ventura County with that L.A. mentality,” Windom told the jury. “The intent was to cause a provocation.”

But Windom’s version of how the gunfight started stands in stark contrast to the prosecution’s position.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Don Glynn said Cunningham started the shooting by popping out of the car’s sunroof and firing four shots at the undercover officers.

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He acknowledges that the police officers did not identify themselves and were not wearing uniforms or badges. But he suggests that Cunningham was aware that the men were police officers.

“Yes, the officers were undercover,” Glynn said. “But do you think there was any question in Soly and Cunningham’s minds as to who these guys were?

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he continued, “you didn’t get told to leave your common sense out on the doorstep.”

With regard to the tactics of the Special Investigations Section--tactics challenged in a federal civil rights lawsuit filed last month--Glynn told jurors that they are not to let their opinions cloud judgment on the murder charge.

“You may disagree with this approach,” he said. “But you are not going to see anything in the jury instructions that if you don’t like the way the police did this you can vote anyway you want. You have to apply the law to the facts in the case.”

As Hollywood screenwriter and producer Abby Mann and his wife sat in the courtroom Wednesday, observing the proceedings for a possible movie project, the attorneys reviewed the key trial testimony.

Cunningham is charged with murder, two robberies and three counts of attempted murder for shooting at police officers during the gunfight. He has admitted to committing the Newbury Park robbery, but had denied the other charges.

During the trial, five police officers testified that Cunningham started the gunfight, but he testified to the contrary.

At one point on the witness stand, Cunningham told the jury that a man he later learned was an officer walked up to the car and allegedly fired a single execution-style shot to Soly’s head.

Glynn told jurors that Cunningham’s version of the shooting was “preposterous,” and said it was an incredible claim to suggest that police officers lied.

But over and over again during his closing statement, Windom urged the jury not to believe the officers’ testimony simply because they are figures of authority.

“They are no different than you or I,” he said, “and their credibility should not be judged any differently than you or I.”

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Windom also made an oblique reference to money--$2,700 taken from the liquor store--most of which was stolen from the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department’s evidence room after the shooting.

“We hear about police officers stealing drugs,” he said, “and stealing money.”

Authorities suspect that the cash was taken by a civilian employee who formerly worked for the Sheriff’s Department, not a deputy.

The murder case is expected to go to the jury for deliberations today.