Endless Versions of Fatal Raid

How many more episodes of “recovered memory” are El Monte police going to have in the fatal shooting of Mario Paz in a botched raid in August? The incident happened at the Compton home of the Paz family, where the unarmed man was shot twice in the back, allegedly by El Monte Police Sgt. George Hopkins.

The killing came in a dramatic shoot-the-locks-off-the-doors raid by El Monte’s SWAT team, following the arrests of two suspected drug dealers, one of whom had a slight connection to the Paz family. Police said they suspected that the Paz home had been used to store drugs.

The operation was riddled with problems. No drugs were found at the home, and El Monte police later admitted they had no evidence tying the family to drug trafficking. Initially, police said Paz was shot because officers thought he was armed. Later they said they thought Paz was reaching for a gun. Next came the explanation that Paz had begun to reach for a drawer where, police say, weapons were later found. Version No. 4 came Wednesday, after an autopsy report showed that Paz’s body had been found in a kneeling position against his bed. This time, officers cited Paz’s “furtive movements” and said that his wife, Maria Luisa, had “tackled” Sgt. Hopkins. What version will El Monte police come up with next?

This tragedy is another reason why every municipal police force in Los Angeles County, not just the LAPD, should be required to call the L.A. County district attorney’s office “roll-out teams,” now being restored to duty, to the scenes of officer-involved shootings. The teams are composed of investigators, prosecutors and others.

There are other questions in this case. Just how motivated were El Monte police to seize forfeiture assets in this case? The police took $11,000 from the Paz home with no evidence that it was tied to drug profits. Police can go wherever a crime leads them, but what was this force doing roaming from Compton to Riverside to San Bernardino to San Diego? And what’s a small municipal police force doing with a SWAT team?

With the FBI, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and the U.S. Civil Rights Commission looking into the matter, the spotlight is where it should be and should remain until all questions have been answered.