Pair Strike Plea Bargain in Death at Alcohol Clinic

Two members of a North Hollywood alcohol rehabilitation center accused of tying up patients and force-feeding them alcohol to cure them of their addiction entered no contest pleas Friday to charges of involuntary manslaughter for a May death at the unlicensed clinic.

In exchange for their plea, Alberto Saguache and Armando Sakaquil will be sentenced later this month to a maximum of one year in jail and three years probation.

The plea deal was reached days after a coroner’s report revealed that Enrique Bravo died of chronic liver disease and had no alcohol in his system when he died. But Los Angeles County Coroner Lakshmanan Sathyavagiswaran, in an occasionally heated exchange with defense lawyers, testified Friday that he believes Bravo’s death was a homicide.

The report also indicated that the unconventional methods used at Grupo Liberacion y Fortaleza played a role in the death.

Assistant Public Defender Dror Toister, who represents Sakaquil, said he does not think prosecutors could have proved manslaughter but does think his client would probably have been convicted of false imprisonment, punishable by up to four years in prison.

“He’s accepting responsibility even though we think that the case really proves another charge. Pragmatically speaking, at least as far as a sentence goes, this is the best possible outcome,” he said.

The victim’s family said they were unhappy with the sentence.

“They need more time. Life if possible,” said Erica Ramirez, 18, Bravo’s niece. “They killed someone.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Craig Renetzky defended the offer.

“I think it was a fair deal. We’re not talking about intentional murder. We’re not talking about people with long histories of robbery,” Renetzky said. “But someone died at the hands of these four individuals. I think it was a fair deal.”

Two other men charged in the crime, Dante Barrera and Jose Rodriguez, faced some of their accusers in court Friday at a preliminary hearing to determine whether there is enough evidence against the men to proceed to trial.

Testifying Friday, the coroner said ligature marks on the man’s wrists and his malnourished state bolstered police statements by the defendants and a witness that Bravo was bound and gagged and had not been given food or water. He said such unconventional treatment for withdrawal could lead to asphyxia. Even though the body did not show signs of asphyxia, Sathyavagiswaran said he could not rule it out.

Defense attorneys Frank Di Sabatino and Curtis Leftwich hammered the coroner with questions in an attempt to show that the only fatal condition the body revealed was liver disease and that he based much of his conclusion on police reports.

Sathyavagiswaran agreed that binding might have no bearing on the death, that there are signs of asphyxia that Bravo did not show and that police reports were key in putting the case together. But he did not budge from his opinion that Bravo did not die of natural causes.

Los Angeles County supervisors called for a crackdown on unlicensed alcohol rehabilitation clinics in June, after the number of suspicious deaths linked to the facilities rose to 11 and allegations surfaced of beatings and whippings at some clinics.

Health department officials said eight clinics suspected of running 24-hour live-in facilities where patients may have been held against their will have closed since June, half of them after receiving cease-and-desist orders.

Some patients who say they have recovered from alcohol addiction at the clinics have said their stay was voluntary and that they were given the option of drinking alcohol to help them through withdrawal.

However, authorities allege three men at a Los Angeles clinic killed a man by force-feeding him alcohol, then hog-tying him, gagging him and leaving him face down. Faustino Arenas, 30; Victorio Lonbera, 26, and Albert Garcia, 26, are scheduled to stand trial within a month on murder charges. Deputy Dist. Atty. Steven Katz said Ariel Prado died Nov. 23 from “positional asphyxia” at the Grupo Vida Nueva Alcoholicos Anonimos on Maple Avenue in Los Angeles.

In Bravo’s case, police began an investigation after another patient at the North Hollywood clinic called authorities and told them the man had been carried out of the building onto the sidewalk when it appeared he was dead or dying. He said other patients who had witnessed the actions were bound and gagged and moved to another building when police came to investigate.

According to a police report, the defendants admitted tying up the defendant and feeding him alcohol as part of their program.

All were recovering alcoholics who had themselves been through the program. Toister, the deputy public defender, said his client had been there only six months before Bravo died.