Family seeks clues to Lazo's death in his wounds: Latino Man Collapses after Beating by Suffolk County Police

The bruises and cuts on Kenny Lazo's face were barely visible as he lay in his open coffin at a Bay Shore funeral home.

But beneath the makeup, there are dark bruises and cuts, worse than the ones his family said they saw in a photo of the right side of his face when they went to identify his body at the medical examiner's office.

A photo his girlfriend took of him Wednesday before the funeral shows the other side of his face, a purple bruise under his left eye and a thick scratch on his cheek. "The photograph says everything," Lazo's father, Alfonso Lazo, said at Rose's Funeral Home, where the image was passed around.

What role these wounds played in the 24-year-old man's death is at the heart of the family's struggle for answers, and one of the questions investigators are probing.

According to Suffolk police, Lazo was selling drugs in West Islip and struggled with three officers who tried to arrest him. He allegedly tried to grab an officer's gun, prompting them to beat him with flashlights. He collapsed about 30 minutes after his arrival at the Third Precinct, was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead, police said.

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Lawyer Wants Special prosecutor in case of Latino Man who died in custody - Beaten with Flashlights by Suffolk County Police

 
24 year old kid mysteriously killed in precinct (Kenny Lazo) [YOUTUBE]
As Kenny Lazo's family prepared for his wake Wednesday, a lawyer hired by the mother of his son called on Suffolk District Attorney Thomas Spota to request a special prosecutor to investigate his death while in police custody last weekend.

Lazo, 24, died after collapsing in the Third Precinct in Bay Shore on Saturday after what police said was a violent struggle with three officers who were attempting to arrest him by the side of the Southern State Parkway. Police have admitted to beating him with flashlights after he reached for one of the officer's guns.

The medical examiner's preliminary autopsy indicates none of Lazo's injuries caused his death and that he had an enlarged heart and cocaine in his system when he died, said a police source who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The source said Lazo had bruising to the back of his neck from being struck with the flashlight and cuts on his face from being tackled. When he was seated with Third Precinct detectives in an interview room, he apologized for having put up a fight, the source said.

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Ohio State Trooper Involved in KKK "Prank" had History of Racial Incidents - Still has Job

One of the Ohio State Highway Patrol troopers involved in a KKK prank said he is not a racist, but admitted he was "counseled previously for racial gestures or slurs." Trooper Eric E. Wlodarsky admitted he snapped a photo of Trooper Craig T. Franklin, who was wearing KKK-like garb, while both were on duty at the Sandusky post Jan. 20 -- just one day before Martin Luther King Day. Wlodarsky then forwarded the photo, which he took with a cell phone camera, to Sgt. Jason P. Demuth. Wlodarsky and Franklin were both recommended for termination by Henry Guzman, the state's director of public safety, but remain on the job because of a collective bargaining agreement. Franklin received a five-day unpaid suspension and was ordered to seek diversity awareness training. Demuth was suspended for one day. Wlodarsky estimated the pay cut will cost him about $12,000 a year. Wlodarsky's counseling stemmed from an administrative investigation conducted by the patrol last summer after another trooper made several allegations about the patrol.

The trooper claimed that in November 2006 Wlodarsky failed to respond for back-up on a traffic stop of a car carrying a group of black males -- and instead went to deliver Cleveland Browns tickets to an off-duty trooper. The trooper said that when he phoned Wlodarsky to ask why he did not respond, Wlodarsky told him: "We can't send an officer to back up another every time we stop a carload of niggers. What would the motoring public think?" Wlodarsky made a similar comment to a dispatcher, but did not use the n-word, the dispatcher said. During an administrative investigation in July 2007, Wlodarsky admitted making the comment to a dispatcher, but said he did not use the n-word. "He said used the word 'blacks' and is very conscious to use not to use the other word, although he does say it. [MORE]

Sean Bell Case Ending: Defense says NYPD shot at Unarmed Black Man 50 Times out of fear he, his friends were armed

AP -NEW YORK - The surviving victims of a police shooting that left a groom-to-be dead in New York City were portrayed as lying thugs and the three officers as trigger-happy cowboys in closing arguments.

In a three-hour dissection of the shooting, prosecutor Charles Testagrossa noted Monday that undercover detective Michael Oliver fired 31 of the 50 total shots — even pausing to reload — at a car carrying the three men.

Groom Sean Bell, 23, was killed Nov. 25, 2006 — which would have been his wedding day — outside a bar where he had a bachelor party. Two friends with him in a car — Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield — were wounded.

Oliver "was taking his time," Testagrossa said before he broke the silence in a packed courtroom by mimicking gunshots — "Bam! Bam! Bam!"

He continued: "Thirty-one shots. Thirty-one separate pulls of the trigger. ... Thirty-one separate decisions to use deadly force. Thirty-one opportunities to pause and reassess whether continuing firing was necessary.

"Thirty-one opportunities to save an innocent life," he said.

Bell "had everything in the world to live for," Testagrossa added.

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Reporter Sues LAPD Over Injuries Suffered At Immigration Rally

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― A Los Angeles television reporter has sued the city and LAPD, claiming officers struck her with batons and knocked her to the ground during an immigration rally last year.  KTTV reporter Christina Gonzalez claims that police used excessive force during the May 1 rally in MacArthur Park, even though she was wearing press credentials and was accompanied by a camerawoman.  The lawsuit says Gonzalez suffered injuries to her body, "shock to her nervous system" and "severe emotional distress."  She also claims police targeted her because she is Hispanic and a member of the news media. The suit seeks punitive damages.  Gonzalez's colleague, camerawoman Patti Ballaz, filed a similar lawsuit in September. [MORE]

State, Federal Investigators to Meet On South Carolina Highway Patrol Investigation- Tapes show Officers Kicking, Beating Blacks

The U.S. Attorney's Office for South Carolina confirms there will be a meeting this week to discuss investigations into the South Carolina Highway Patrol, but Nancy Wicker, chief of the criminal division, said she could not confirm who would be at the meeting or its details.

The U.S. Attorney's Office, the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, the FBI and the State Law Enforcement Division confirmed last month they were investigating cases of trooper misconduct that were caught on the troopers' dash camera videotapes.

In one case from May 2006, troopers and local law enforcement were chasing a dump truck on I-95 that had refused to pull over. The driver crashed through road signs and didn't stop when police shot at his truck.

When the driver finally did stop in Sumter County, as he was lying on the ground, Highway Patrol Lance Corporal John Sawyer ran up and started kicking him in the head. He resigned from the patrol two months later, and says he simply lost his cool after the danger of the high-speed chase.

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Frank Jude Found Guilty of Battery

OSHKOSH, Wis. (AP) - The victim in a Milwaukee police beating case that led to convictions of 7 officers has been found guilty of battery for beating his wife.

The jury in Winnebago County Circuit Court convicted 29-year-old Frank Jude, Junior, today in the incident last September after his wife, Maria, testified of being beaten and begging for mercy.

Their 7-year-old son also testified, saying his dad was beating up his mom, and he brought her a knife to defend herself. She told the jury she pushed the knife away and didn't use it.

But Jude testified she attacked him with the knife and he only tried to grab her and restrain her.

After the verdict, Jude's sentencing was scheduled May 28th. Jude's probation from a previous conviction had been revoked after his arrest and he was returned to prison.

In October 2004, Jude was severely beaten in Milwaukee as he and three friends left a home where off-duty police officers were having a party. Three former officers were convicted on federal charges in the beating last July, and four others pleaded guilty to federal charges in the case. [MORE]

Latino Family Awarded $4.5 Million in Bell Gardens Police Beating Case

BELL GARDENS - Two members of a Bell Gardens family who said police beat them at a Halloween costume party in 2005 have been awarded a $4.5 million civil rights judgment, their attorneys said in remarks published today.

Gerardo Cazares, 30, and his father-in-law, Manuel Moreno, 46, had alleged that Bell Gardens officers who responded to a complaint of loud music at the party beat them without provocation, shot them with pepper spray and fired a beanbag gun at such close range that the older man was left with a permanent chest scar, the Los Angeles Times reported.

"Mr. Cazares was repeatedly kicked, punched, hit with batons and then shot in the back with a beanbag gun," attorney Glen T. Jonas told The Times. "Mr. Moreno comes outside ... they grabbed his arms like a crucifixion and shot him in the chest with the beanbag gun. He drops to the ground thinking he has been really executed. Then he realizes he is alive because he is being beaten by batons."

At the conclusion of a federal civil rights trial Friday, jurors ordered the Bell Gardens Police Department and five officers to pay the men $3.2 million in general damages and $1.3 million in punitive damages.

Neither Bell Gardens police officials nor attorneys on the case returned the newspaper's telephone calls seeking comment.

The incident occurred Oct. 30, 2005, as police tried to shut down a Halloween party in the 5700 block of Cecelia Street, according to Times. The city insisted that police officers acted appropriately and that the two men attacked officers. [MORE]

Unarmed 16 Year Old Latino boy Shot Dead by Kern County Officer after Chase

Mary Millan is struggling to understand why her 16-year-old son Manuel Ayon wound up being shot to death by a Kern County Sheriff''s deputy.

"They didn't have to kill my son. They shot him a lot of times and they even shot him in the face," said Millan.

The Delano teen allegedly rammed his car into a K-9 handler and struck the deputy in the leg of Deputy Doug Jauch. Jauch fired his weapon hitting the car. Ayon drove away for one more block. According to witnesses, another deputy Joe Weiss rear-ended Ayon's car and spun it around into a fence at 14th and Belmont in Delano.

Sheriff's investigators say Ayon reached into the floorboard area near the passenger side. Weiss feared for his safety and fired several times at Ayon.

"If there's reason to believe they may be armed and they reach into an area that their mannerisms in the area is consistent with going for a weapon, in certain circumstances than it's reasonable to use deadly force to stop that threat," said Kern County Sheriff Sgt. Ed Komin.

But Ayon's mother disputes the official version. "They say he was reaching for something like a gun, there's no gun in there," said Millan.

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Unarmed Black Man Killed in Scuffle With Dundee Police - Caught Shoplifting at Supermarket

A 31-year-old Dundee man who was accused of a theft at a shopping center was shot and killed Thursday night after a scuffle with a Dundee police officer, according to the Sheriff's Office.

At 11:30 p.m. Officer Nicholas "Nick" Burns and his supervisor, Corp. Ralph Marshall, responded to a reported theft at Winn Dixie, 28047 U.S. 27, at Dundee Road. When they arrived, they encountered Tyrone Hawkins, of 218 Shepard Ave., in the parking lot, according to a Polk County Sheriff's Office report.

Hawkins got into an altercation with Burns, causing Burns to discharge his handgun, killing Hawkins, the report stated.

Hawkins died of multiple gunshot wounds, according to the Polk County Medical Examiner's Office.

The Medical Examiner's Officer and the Polk County Sheriff's Office would not say how many times Hawkins was shot.

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