Ex-Officers Enter Pleas of Not Guilty in 1997 Beating

Two former Los Angeles Police Department officers pleaded not guilty Tuesday to charges stemming from an alleged on-duty assault on a homeless man in 1997.

David Cochrane, 34, and Christopher Coppock, 28, are accused of terrorizing Delton Bowen by throwing him in the back of their squad car and taking him to the Los Angeles River, where he allegedly was threatened with a handgun and beaten, authorities said.

The key witness in the case is another former LAPD officer who testified before the county grand jury last month that she witnessed the Oct. 23, 1997, incident.

That former officer, Sandra Salazar, came forward with her allegations two years ago at an LAPD disciplinary hearing at which two other officers were accused of beating Bowen. She said those two officers, one of whom was her boyfriend, had no involvement in the assault.

Salazar said she was working with Coppock and Cochrane on the night Bowen was allegedly beaten. The officers allegedly assaulted Bowen because he called one of them a derogatory name, she said.

Attorney Ira Salzman, who represents Cochrane, said the LAPD, in disciplinary hearings, found his client and Coppock not guilty of beating Bowen.

“Both officers were exonerated at their Board of Rights, which is no small feat,” Salzman said. “We believe the board reached the correct conclusion.” He said Coppock and Cochrane are “disappointed that this wasn’t left the way it was.”

Salzman added prosecutors have the wrong two officers. “If anybody did it, it was someone other than Coppock and Cochrane.”

The two former officers are due back in court for a pretrial conference Jan. 19, Salzman said.

Coppock’s attorney, Barry Levin, declined to comment.

Coppock and Cochrane, formerly of the LAPD’s Central Division, were indicted last month on charges of kidnapping, false imprisonment by violence and assault under color of authority. Cochrane was also charged with using a handgun to commit the crimes.

The two men left the LAPD last year after unrelated allegations of misconduct, including framing suspects.