Witness Credibility Key in Ex-Officer’s Trial

Arguments ended Friday in the trial of a former Los Angeles police officer accused of robbing $722,000 from a bank, with a prosecutor and a defense lawyer clashing over the credibility of two witnesses who identified him as the bandit.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Stephen G. Wolfe said the two witnesses plus bank surveillance photos pin the robbery on David Anthony Mack, 37, a nine-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department. He said Mack turned from enforcing the law to breaking it because of mounting financial problems, including troubles with the Internal Revenue Service.

But Donald Re, Mack’s attorney, said witnesses are mistaken and picked his client’s picture from photo lineups stacked against Mack.

The jury will begin deliberating Tuesday. Mack faces a maximum of 40 years in prison.

On Nov. 6, 1997, two armed men walked into the Bank of America branch near USC and took the cash. The second man is still at large. Police believe that a former girlfriend of Mack who worked in the bank may have been an accomplice. She will be tried later.

At the time of the robbery, police say, Mack was deep in debt. He had used most of his credit cards to their maximums, borrowed from another officer and owed the IRS about $20,000, testimony showed.

Wolfe argued that immediately after the robbery, Mack started paying off some of those debts and went on a spending spree. The defendant bought a sport utility vehicle, leather furniture, expensive car stereo equipment and other items, according to testimony, and deposited $8,000 into his checking account.

Countering defense arguments that the money came from Mack’s years of moonlighting, Wolfe said, “He wasn’t spending money like he had saved it. He was spending it like a drunken sailor.”

The prosecutor said Mack has been identified by Laportia Davis, an assistant bank manager, and Rhea Edwards, a co-worker.

Also, police found at Mack’s home a menacing-looking semiautomatic pistol outfitted with a metal barrel extender and a shoulder strap rigged with a long spring connecting the strap to the gun, the prosecution said. At one point, Wolfe removed his coat, shouldered the weapon and put his coat back on to demonstrate how a robber could have hidden, then wielded, the gun.

But Re said no witnesses identified that gun or another like it as the one used by the robber, and he strongly rejected Wolfe’s contention that the bank surveillance photos depicted Mack. Re said nobody in the Police Department, including those who knew Mack, said those pictures were of the officer. The robber was wearing dark glasses and a cap.

Re said that in both photo displays from which the two witnesses identified Mack, his picture was dramatically different from the others, making it stand out. And he said the descriptions the two witnesses gave police immediately after the robbery were of a man who was at least 20 pounds heavier and five to 10 years older than Mack.

Calling the prosecution’s contention that Mack is the robber “preposterous,” Re said the thief made many mistakes that no one with law enforcement training would commit.

“Would he walk in front of the surveillance camera like that knowing that it would be shown to police officers who would know him?” Re asked.