Police Board Upholds Firing of Officer

A board of senior police officers on Friday recommended that the Los Angeles Police Department reject a former policeman’s efforts to be rehired nearly two years after he was terminated for allegedly lying about shooting a Cuban refugee in the back.

The three-member Board of Rights ruled that “false and misleading statements” offered by former Officer Rodney W. Kelley following the shooting of Miguel Angel Herrera, 30, in October, 1984, were significant enough to deny Kelley’s plea that he be returned to the force.

Acting Chief Robert L. Vernon is expected to make a final ruling on the recommendation next week.

Chief Daryl F. Gates, who is on vacation, fired Kelley in November, 1985, after the board determined that Kelley, then 26, had “unnecessarily discharged” his service revolver at Herrera and lied afterward.

Kelley was accused of shooting Herrera after he seized Kelley’s baton and struck the officer with it on a street in South-Central Los Angeles. The officer argued that he fired in self-defense, but witnesses to the incident, including Kelley’s partner, told investigators that Herrera, a career criminal, was fleeing when he was fatally wounded by one of three shots fired by Kelley.

Kelley appealed his termination to Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Warren H. Deering, who ruled in March that evidence failed to prove that Kelley had acted rashly in shooting Herrera. Deering ordered that the Police Department reconsider its decision to fire Kelley based solely on the allegations of lying.

On Friday, the board upheld its earlier decision to fire Kelley.