By GREG RISLING
Associated Press Writer
SAN BERNARDINO, Calif.- The sheriff’s department sent results of an investigation into the videotaped shooting of an unarmed Air Force security officer to prosecutors Friday, without a recommendation on whether to file charges against the deputy involved.
Sheriff Gary Penrod said the videotape “arouses a lot of suspicion” about what occurred, but he also said the tape is fuzzy and has gaps, so the complete chain of events is unclear.
Prosecutors will review the report and decide whether to charge Deputy Ivory J. Webb, district attorney’s spokeswoman Susan Mickey said.
Webb, 45, shot Senior Airman Elio Carrion, 21, three times on Jan. 29 while Carrion was rising from a prone position.
Carrion had been a passenger in a Corvette that was involved in a high-speed, nighttime chase before crashing into a wall in Chino, about 35 miles east of Los Angeles. A resident, Jose Luis Valdes, videotaped the shadowy scene that followed.
On the tape, Carrion can be seen on the ground just outside the car’s passenger door. Webb is standing nearby, pointing at gun at the airman, and a voice sounds as if it commands Carrion to get up. When the airman begins to rise, the deputy shoots him three times.
Carrion, who had recently returned from duty in Iraq, was wounded but has been released from a hospital.
“I’ve seen the video and I can only imagine the shock the family felt when they saw ... this video over and over,” the sheriff said at a news conference. “He (Carrion) has our sympathy and we wish him a speedy recovery.”
Since 2000, the San Bernardino District Attorney’s Office has investigated about 120 officer- or deputy-involved shootings but hasn’t charged an officer or deputy in a duty-related shooting, Mickey said.
“The only thing the family wants is justice and so far that hasn’t happened in San Bernardino County,” said Carrion’s attorney Luis Carrillo.
The FBI has opened a civil rights investigation of the shooting.
Also Friday, the man who made the videotape surrendered to Florida authorities on an outstanding warrant charging him with assault almost a decade ago.
Court documents show that Valdes, 38, was charged with aggravated assault with a firearm and aggravated assault against the elderly for allegedly pointing a gun at an elderly woman and a man during a dispute involving a vandalized car in 1997. The documents say Valdes threatened to kill both.
Valdes faces an April 24 trial. Valdes, a native of Cuba, denied the allegations and said he wasn’t aware of the warrant until he tried to renew his alien registration card last week in California.