Ex-Rampart Officer Says He Lied Due to Fear of Reprisals

A former Los Angeles police officer in the Rampart Division testified Thursday that his fear of retaliation and other concerns prevented him from telling supervisors that he and other officers lied in official reports to allegedly cover up the beating of a suspect in 1998.

“I was covering my butt, and everyone else’s that was there,” Shawn Gomez, 29, said while testifying at a preliminary hearing in Los Angeles Superior Court in the misconduct case of former LAPD Officer Ethan Cohan.

“You are afraid of retaliation, of being snubbed by your co-workers,” he said when asked by Deputy Dist. Atty. Ron Goudy why he filed a false report.

Cohan is charged with assault with a deadly weapon, perjury, filing a false police report and conspiracy in connection with the arrest and beating of alleged gang member Gabriel Aguirre on March 26, 1998.

After the hearing, which will resume Feb. 19, Judge William R. Chidsey Jr. will decide whether prosecutors have enough evidence to send the case to trial.

He also will rule on a motion by Cohan’s defense attorney Harland Braun to exclude Gomez’s testimony because he had access to statements Cohan was compelled to give during a police disciplinary investigation.

In his testimony Thursday, Gomez, who is testifying as part of a plea bargain arrangement with prosecutors, said he lied because he was afraid fellow officers would not respond to his calls for backup help if he ever got into a dangerous situation. “They can make life miserable for you,” Gomez said.

Gomez was one of two officers Thursday who contradicted assertions in official reports that he, Cohan and other officers filed saying the suspect was hurt when he fell while running down fire escape steps and while resisting arrest.

The case arose as part of the Rampart scandal, which surfaced when former Officer Rafael Perez revealed widespread corruption in that division’s anti-gang unit in exchange for a plea arrangement on drug charges.

In one of his allegations, Perez said he, Cohan, 31; Gomez; and Officers Manuel Chavez, 31; and Camerino Mesina took part in an attack on Aguirre when they arrested him in a vacant apartment on Witmer Street on charges of assault with a deadly weapon.

Their reports of the arrest said Aguirre began to “swing his arms and fists and kick at the officers in an attempt to escape.” The reports said Aguirre punched Gomez and Chavez and kicked Mesina, Cohan and Perez. They also said Aguirre got a bloody nose when they “guided the defendant against the wall so as to control him.”

Gomez testified that Perez pushed Aguirre hard against the wall while he was handcuffed.

He and Chavez testified that Aguirre peacefully submitted to the arrest, that neither of them were punched and that they did not see Aguirre kick the other three officers.

But both said they left the apartment building after the arrest to get their patrol car and did not see Cohan or anyone else beat Aguirre.

Gomez, who has pleaded no contest to a charge of filing a false report, is testifying as part of plea bargain in which prosecutors agreed not to oppose reducing the charges to a misdemeanor, to recommend that he be put on probation and made to perform community service.

Chavez also is cooperating with prosecutors as part of a plea bargain in which he pleaded no contest to assault under color of authority. The district attorney’s office has agreed not to oppose reducing the charge to a misdemeanor and to recommend that he serve not more than a year in jail.

Perez served three years in state prison for the drug charges and is now serving a two-year federal term for civil rights violations related to the cover-up of a shooting of an unarmed man who was subsequently framed and convicted of attacking police.