Perez to Pay Full Restitution to Victims

In a federal plea agreement that sends him back to prison for two more years, ex-Los Angeles Police Officer Rafael Perez has agreed to pay full restitution to all the victims of the Rampart corruption scandal and forward any money he receives from telling his story in a book, movie or elsewhere to government entities, including the city of Los Angeles.

Perez, the man whose allegations of police misconduct launched the massive corruption probe, “agrees that he will in no way profit from any of the crimes he has admitted participating in or from selling any part of his life story,” according to a prepared statement from the U.S. attorney’s office.

Under terms of the agreement, the proceeds of any media deals would go to Los Angeles, which has already paid out at least $40 million in settlements for Rampart victims; the Sheriff’s Department; and the state Department of Corrections, according to Thom Mrozek, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney.

Any other income generated by Perez--from a job, for example--would go to the victims. Perez’s sentencing judge and the probation department would ultimately decide what constitutes full restitution to the victims.

The additional details of the federal plea agreement were disclosed in court papers filed Thursday.

Under the terms of the deal, Perez, 34, will plead guilty to federal civil rights violations related to the cover-up of the shooting of an unarmed man who was subsequently framed and convicted of attacking police. He is expected to be arraigned Dec. 17.

According to court papers, Perez admitted that he and his then-partner Nino Durden “entered into a scheme to fabricate and falsify evidence, file police reports containing false information, make false statements and testify falsely in court under oath to cause Javier Francisco Ovando to be unlawfully arrested, convicted and incarcerated.”

In exchange for his guilty plea, Perez will serve two years in federal custody. After his release, he will be placed on three years of supervised probation.

Perez’s agreement with federal prosecutors comes just four months after he was released from state prison, where he served three years for stealing cocaine from Los Angeles Police Department evidence lockers.

Federal authorities likely never would have known about Perez’s cover-up in the Ovando shooting were it not for his own incriminating statements. He made them as part of a separate plea agreement with local prosecutors in his cocaine case.

Although Perez received immunity from state prosecution in the Ovando case, officials in the U.S. attorney’s office insisted that that agreement did not bind them.

As a result, federal prosecutors have spent more than a year building a case against Perez. Faced with the prospect of up to 15 more years behind bars if he fought the charges in court and lost, Perez cut his second plea deal, this one with the U.S. attorney.

Perez’s lawyer, Winston Kevin McKesson, brushed aside criticism that he should have protected Perez from potential federal prosecution when he negotiated his client’s plea with local prosecutors in 1999.

“Our position is that that agreement was a good agreement,” McKesson said.

“Mr. Perez has been through a lot. I believe he wanted to end this thing as soon as possible.”

In his arraignment next month, Perez will face two federal charges. The first alleges that he conspired to violate the civil rights of Ovando, and the other claims that he possessed a firearm with an obliterated serial number. The plea deal is expected to be entered during the arraignment.

Deal Not to Charge Him Has Limits

Under the deal, federal prosecutors agreed not to charge Perez with a host of other crimes he admitted to the district attorney’s office and the LAPD. However, the agreement does not bar federal prosecutors from bringing charges related to any past crimes that Perez has not disclosed in his numerous debriefings with authorities.

In those interviews, he has implicated about 70 officers in misconduct. Eight of them, all assigned to the Rampart division, have been criminally charged. Additionally, as a result of Perez’s information, more than 100 criminal convictions have been overturned.

Perhaps the most notable one that was thrown out was Ovando’s. An 18-year-old gang member nicknamed Sniper, he was shot Oct. 12, 1996, in a vacant apartment building west of downtown.

At the time, Durden and Perez stated in their police reports that the young gang member burst through a door and pointed an assault rifle at them. They shot him multiple times in self-defense, they wrote.

Perez and Durden have since admitted that Ovando was unarmed, and that they planted a gun on him to justify the shooting.

According to the federal agreement filed Thursday, Perez conspired with “others” to violate the civil rights of Ovando, who has since received $15 million to settle a lawsuit against the city.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Mary Carter Andrues, the lead prosecutor in the case, declined to comment on whether there were unnamed conspirators in addition to Perez and Durden.

Andrues confirmed, however, that the plural “others” was accurately printed in the court papers. At least two other Rampart officers have been called before a federal grand jury to testify about the Ovando case.

Of the plea deal, Andrues said simply: “I think it’s important that Rafael Perez is being held accountable.”

Others suggested that there is more to come.

“We haven’t given the Police Department a clean bill of health. This investigation continues,” FBI spokesman Matthew McLaughlin said. “But this case is a significant step in the right direction of restoring the public’s confidence in the LAPD.”