Freed Man Says Police Treated Him Like Animal

By K. CONNIE KANG

July 17, 1996 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

BEVERLY HILLS — Young Ho Choi likened his arrest in the killing of a highway patrol officer and the events afterward as being “in a mental hospital.”

“I hope this incident will be a lesson to the police so that this will never happen to another person,” Choi, 32, said Tuesday.

At an interview arranged by the Korea Times for The Times in a Beverly Hills hotel, Choi related in a mix of Korean and English what he had been through since police arrested him Sunday in Anaheim.

And he hoped his father, who is in a San Jose hospital with a heart problem, will not learn about it.

“It’ll kill him,” he said.

Choi said his “arms still hurt” from when four officers held him down and twisted an arm after he refused to submit to a blood test.

“They treated me like an animal,” Choi said. “They would not even let me go to the bathroom, make a phone call or get an attorney.”

There was no Korean-speaking police officer or a translator on hand, he said. And several times, he said, a particular deputy would say to Choi, “Cop killer boom!” and simulate a gun with his finger.

Until his release on Monday, Choi said, no one told him why he was arrested.

Choi said he has always had a special respect for police officers because his father had been one in Korea. The family immigrated to the United States when Choi was 17 and had only finished junior high school. As the eldest son in an immigrant family, he had to work almost immediately after their arrival here, and never got an American education.

“That is my big regret,” he said.

He is fluent in neither Korean nor English.

“Sometimes I have to think in Korean--sometimes in English,” he said.

On Saturday night, he said, he was preoccupied with seeing his two young sons on the following morning at the church his family attends in the city of Orange.

Since he and his wife separated three weeks ago, he had found work in a motel in Palm Springs and he hadn’t seen his boys, ages 5 and 2.

So, after finishing his work on Saturday, he got a $150 advance from his boss and took a Greyhound bus to Anaheim, he said.

There, he checked into a motel.

On the following morning his aunt, who lived in Anaheim, would give him a ride to the church, where his wife played the piano, he said.

That evening, after washing up at the motel, he decided to take a city bus to his old apartment in Buena Park to check his mail.

After waiting more than an hour for the bus, he began to walk, trying to hitch a ride.

“I kept walking,” he said, looking behind to see if someone might stop.

When he got to the corner of Lincoln Avenue and Euclid Street in Anaheim, he noticed a person who looked “Hispanic or white” was running behind him, Choi said.

“He was sweating,” he said.

Suddenly, officers appeared and arrested Choi, he said.

Choi said he was held in a California Highway Patrol car and asked to step out “at least 10 different times” for witnesses to look at him.

“They brought out the other guy only three or four times,” Choi said.

Police said the second man was later released, and the investigation zeroed in on Choi as witnesses said he appeared to be the gunman. Police have not released any information about the second man.

Choi said he fears the arrest has irreparably harmed his hoped-for reconciliation with his wife. But it has not cost him his job as a maintenance supervisor at the motel, he said. His boss has told him job is waiting.

Choi said he believes he has been the victim of police discrimination “because of my race.”

“If I spoke better English, perhaps, I would have been treated differently,” he said.

“I thought America was a safe country.”