Evidence of Cocaine Found in Toddler Killed by LAPD

A 19-month-old girl held hostage by her father during a gun battle with police had evidence of cocaine in her system when she was accidentally killed by a SWAT officer, a coroner’s report released Thursday showed.

Toxicology tests found a trace amount of benzoylecgonine in Suzie Marie Pena’s urine, coroner’s officials said. The substance is produced when cocaine metabolizes in the body.

The tests showed that the child was exposed to the drug at least the day before her death, said Dr. James K. Ribe, who conducted the autopsy.

Officials said they did not know how the drug entered the child’s body. Among the possibilities are that she was in a room where someone was using cocaine, that she ate food that had been contaminated with small amounts of the drug or that she swallowed it in breast milk while nursing, Ribe said.

Police say her father, Jose Raul Pena, 34, who also was killed in the July 10 shootout, had cocaine and a partly empty bottle of tequila in his auto dealership office in Watts during the three-hour standoff.

The girl’s death in the gun battle attracted considerable controversy, with some area residents criticizing police for moving in on the auto dealership, rather than continuing to negotiate, as her father continued to fire on officers.

Pena’s mother, Lorena Lopez, has said she was breastfeeding Suzie in the days before the child’s shooting death. But Lopez’s attorney denied she was the source of the drug.

“I can guarantee neither the mother nor the baby used the cocaine,” attorney Luis Carrillo said.

Edward Newton, associate professor of clinical emergency medicine at USC’s Keck School of Medicine, said the cocaine was most likely ingested accidentally, rather than administered.

He said the drug probably would have entered the child’s system up to four days before her death.

“It had to be in the child’s system for several hours or more,” Norton said.

Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton said police would ask child welfare authorities to investigate who was responsible for the cocaine in the girl’s body. The county Department of Children and Family Services was notified of the cocaine finding by Ribe on Tuesday.

“What we will probably end up having to do is notifying the appropriate authorities of that and interview the other children in that family to make a determination of how that occurred,” Bratton said in remarks outside Parker Center.

Stuart Riskin, a spokesman for the children’s department, said he could not discuss the Pena case. In general, a report that a child has ingested drugs triggers an immediate investigation, especially when other children are in the home.

Police, under fire by Pena, rescued Lopez’s 16-year-old daughter from the auto dealership before the final shootout. She has since returned home.

“We are not making an assumption. We’re assessing,” Riskin said.

Officers opened fire on the toddler’s father after cornering him in a small office inside his business after a chaotic, 2 1/2 -hour confrontation marked by exchanges of gunfire.

Bratton accused Pena of using the toddler as a shield as he sprayed the neighborhood and officers with gunfire.

Suzie was shot in the head by a high-velocity bullet fired by a SWAT team member. She also suffered a gunshot wound in the leg.

One officer was wounded during the final burst of gunfire. Bratton has said it will be impossible to determine which SWAT officer fired the shot that killed Suzie.

Bratton said the discovery of cocaine in the child made no difference in evaluating the overall incident, which is under investigation by the LAPD Force Investigation Division, the district attorney’s office and the LAPD inspector general’s office.

“It is what it is,” Bratton said.

The chief has said the shooting was a tragedy but one that could have been avoided if Pena had not opened fire with a child in his arms.

Toxicology reports on Pena are not yet in, said Craig Harvey, a coroner’s spokesman.