Probe of Jail Beating Flawed, Prosecutors Say

Already under FBI investigation for allegations of jailhouse brutality, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department now has been accused by prosecutors of conducting a fatally flawed probe of a 1999 inmate beating.

The Orange County district attorney’s office, in a March 14 letter, criticized the Sheriff’s Department for, among other things, allowing one of the accused deputies to help with the internal investigation in its early stages.

The stinging rebuke, rarely seen in the district attorney’s office’s congenial relationship with the Sheriff’s Department, suggested that there may be merit to accusations by inmate Leonel Vega that four deputies attacked him.

The letter, obtained under the Public Records Act, noted that deputies failed to interview potential witnesses. Jail staff also hampered the probe by giving conflicting statements about the incident and refusing to cooperate with prosecutors, the letter said.

The beating triggered a grand jury investigation and marked the closest prosecutors have come in years to charging jailhouse deputies accused of brutality. Prosecutors announced in March that they would not charge the officers.

“You should not conclude from our filing decision that we necessarily believe that Mr. Vega’s allegations are without merit,� Supervising Assistant Dist. Atty. Douglas Woodsmall wrote in the March 14 letter. “The initial investigation of this incident by sheriff’s personnel was fatally flawed.�

The criticism comes as county officials fight more than a dozen lawsuits alleging mistreatment of inmates, two of which are under investigation by the FBI. In recent months, sheriff’s officials have responded to the claims by insisting they thoroughly review every jailhouse incident.

But since receiving the letter, sheriff’s officials said they have launched an internal inquiry into the Vega case. Officials conceded that mistakes were made in the initial investigation and vowed to take steps to make sure that they are not repeated.

“We take this very, very seriously, and we want to do the right thing,� Assistant Sheriff Rocky Hewitt said. “If the district attorney is right, we want to . . . change policies to make sure it doesn’t happen again.�

Vega’s defense attorney, Deputy Public Defender Dennis Gaughan, welcomed the prosecutors’ findings, saying he had always harbored doubts about whether deputies would seriously investigate his client’s allegations of abuse.

“They made it look like they were doing something about it, but they obviously weren’t,� Gaughan said Thursday. “It’s refreshing to know that [prosecutors] weren’t pleased with it as well.�

Vega, 21, suffered bruises and cuts to his groin in a Dec. 29, 1999, beating while he was housed in the Men’s Central Jail in Santa Ana. His injuries were so severe that they required hospital treatment, Gaughan said.

But who exactly inflicted the injuries remains unclear. In his letter, Woodsmall acknowledged that prosecutors were unable to prove or disprove Vega’s accusation that deputies were responsible.

Nevertheless, the letter drew fire from supporters of the accused deputies, who called the criticism misdirected.

Officials with the Assn. of Orange County Sheriff’s Deputies said the deputies cooperated fully with grand jurors, and they maintained that Vega was beaten by fellow inmates--not guards.

In fact, two deputies were even able to prove they were in different areas of the jail during the assault, said Robert MacLeod, general manager of the Assn. of Orange County Sheriff’s Deputies.

In the letter, the district attorney’s office accused union officials of advising deputies not to talk to them, which MacLeod said unfairly implied that the association organized a cover-up.

“I resent the implication that there’s a code of silence,� MacLeod said. “The claims of this inmate were preposterous and not supported by the evidence.�

Prosecutors routinely send official notification letters to law enforcement agencies detailing their findings in investigations that involve officers.

But the harsh tone and pointed criticism in the letter about the Vega case makes it stand out among all of the correspondence that the district attorney’s office has sent to the Sheriff’s Department over the past two years.

Critics contend that the problems prosecutors singled out with the Vega investigation are not unique, and raise serious questions about the Sheriff’s Department’s ability to investigate itself in incidents at the jail.

Vega was booked into Orange County jail on Aug. 4, 1999, after he was arrested during a police raid at a friend’s Mission Viejo home. A unit of sheriff’s and probation deputies said they saw Vega in the house trying to hide 10 grams of heroin--a charge the inmate denied. He was later convicted of drug possession, however.

Then 19, Vega had already spent time behind bars as a juvenile. Three years earlier, he accused one of the arresting deputies of using excessive force during a previous arrest, according to court records.

While Vega awaited trial, his attorney filed a court motion asking to review complaints filed against the arresting deputies. The evening before a court hearing on the motion, Vega phoned Gaughan’s investigator and said he had been beaten. Four deputies, Vega said, had taken him to a secluded area of the jail. There, two held him down while the others kicked and punched him.

The incident was investigated by jail deputies, and Vega was interviewed by one of the guards he had accused of beating him.

Eventually, jail officials called in the sheriff’s homicide unit, which investigates all allegations of criminal misconduct by deputies.