From the WRAL news site on December 11, 2013:
(Durham Police Chief Jose) Lopez said that Officer Samuel Duncan picked up (Jesus) Huerta early on Nov. 19 in response to a call about a runaway and learned that he had a warrant out for his arrest on a second-degree trespassing charge.
By 2 a.m., according to police, Huerta was dead – his hands still cuffed behind him, slumped over in the back seat of the car outside the Durham Police Department – and a handgun was found in the floorboard of the patrol car.
The family has been upset with the lack of information forthcoming about the details of the November 19 death of the 17 year old. Huerta's mother had called the Durham, NC Police Department. This is what was known the day after the shooting, from the family:
Huerta’s mother, Sylvia Fernandez, said Wednesday that her son ran away from the family apartment on Washington Street, and she wanted police to help. Fernandez, who doesn’t speak English, asked her daughter to call police.
In a recording of the 911 call, the sister told the call-taker they were worried because the teen was using drugs and once tried to take his own life. But the family said Wednesday Huerta never tried to kill himself.
Chief Lopez compounded the sensitive nature of this shooting by releasing few, if any, actual details other than the following:
1. Officer Samuel Duncan picked up the juvenile around 2 a.m., searched him and placed him in the back of a patrol car with his hands cuffed behind his back.
2. Once Officer Duncan arrived at the precinct parking lot, he heard a gunshot at close range, so he jumped out of the car while it was moving. (The car rolled into a van.)
3. The officer reported shots fired (plural) and requested medical assistance.
4. The officer radioed "gunshot wound. Approximately 18-year-old male, not breathing."
5. The officer's weapon had not been fired and the shot came from inside the vehicle.
Chief Lopez called a news conference and restated the above, and then refused to answer any questions, citing "an ongoing investigation, pending results from an autopsy." This did not sit well with the family and the civil rights hustlers in Durham, so a march was called and some vandalism occurred. The family produced a petition with more than 18,000 signatures demanding an FBI investigation. There was one single fact known to the police at the time of the shooting, but for some reason, Chief Lopez wanted to keep it a secret: a handgun was found in the floorboard of the cop car. Had Lopez release this tiny bit of information, perhaps all of the drama could have been avoided.
After the results of the autopsy were released, the Police Chief issued a statement, basically saying that the kid, accidentally or on purpose, shot himself. (See:
http://www.wral.com/asset/news/local/2013/12/11/13206609/lopezstatement.pdf)
Well now. The Durham Civil Rights hustlers are still going to make a big deal about this.
When the results were released, the Chief, for the first time, made public the important fact that there was a gun in the back seat of the car. One can rightfully speculate that Officer Duncan either failed to properly search Huerta, or he failed to search him at all. Apparently, Chief Lopez was trying to protect his officer and the department by not speaking to the public initially about Huerta's handgun.
For some reason, Durham's Police Chief decided that the public did not need to know about the hand gun from the date of the shooting, November 19, to the day the statement was released, December 11. This being said, anyone with the slightest bit of knowledge regarding police procedures could have come to the conclusion that the kid was not properly searched and shot himself in the head. After all, Lopez stated that the shot came from inside the vehicle and the officers weapon had not discharged. Lopez just couldn't bring himself to let the public know that a hand gun was found in the back floorboard of the patrol car.
I would speculate that the Huerta family secures the services of a big time trial attorney to sue the Durham Police Department for failure to properly execute search procedures resulting in the death of the troubled 17 year old. And once again, the Durham taxpayers shell out to pay or defend for the incompetence of its police department.
Is there a more messed up place in North Carolina than Durham?
