More fallout from cops shooting guy at Halloween party

Posted by Tim Elliott from 24.41.0.151 on October 31, 2000 at 13:24:31:

The story gets worse (for the cops) as the details come out.
Here's the latest:

L.A. police under fire after killing actor at party
RTR
Oct 30 2000 8:25PM
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The scandal-plagued Los Angeles
Police Department was under fire again Monday as angry
questions swirled over an officer''s shooting to death an actor
who pointed a replica of a Magnum .357 [they mean .357
magnum] at him during a noisy Halloween party.

As friends of actor Anthony Dwain Lee, 39, charged that
patrolman Tarriel Hopper, a 27-year-old with three years police
experience, overreacted when he fired nine shots at the actor
early Saturday morning, Los Angeles Police Chief Bernard Parks
offered a spirited defense of the officer.

Showing reporters the replica of the semi-automatic that Lee
brandished, Parks said that the gun look real and that Lee had
no chance to respond differently because if it looked real, he had
to act as if it was.

Parks also dismissed any idea of a racial motive in the shooting.
He said that while Lee was black, so was the officer who shot
him, and that things happened so quickly the officer had no
option but to fire.

"Officer Hopper responded to what he observed. He had no time
to give a warning. He responded to a weapon drawn at him," the
chief said.

Parks added, "The officer thought it was a real gun. I don''t think
you would want an officer to die because he took an extra
second to see it was a plastic gun or a metal gun."

Lee, 39, a practicing Buddhist who appeared in the 1997 Jim
carrey movie "Liar Liar" and on such TV shows as "NYPD Blue,"
was shot nine times by Hopper, 27, who fired through a glass
door from an exterior hallway at a mansion just north of Beverly
Hills.

Friends of Lee reacted angrily Monday, saying police failed to
issue any warnings before the shooting.

The shooting was the latest in a series of controversies to hit the
Los Angeles Police Department this year. More than 30 officers
have lost their jobs and more than 100 convictions have been
overturned because of a corruption and brutality scandal
involving officers of the police''s anti-gang squad at the inner-city
Rampart Division. Police there have been accused of framing
and beating suspects.

City leaders are now considering a proposal in which the U.S.
Department of Justice would oversee the force. The department
has never fully recovered from the damage its reputation
suffered when the beating of black motorist Rodney King by four
white officers in 1991 was captured on videotape and became a
national symbol for police brutality.

"I think this was a horrible tragedy," said Steve Sims, a
27-year-old nurse who attended the party dressed as a "night
stand" and had a lampshade tied to his head as he tried to help
Lee moments after he was shot. He said he had to argue with
police to let him help his friend, but it was too late.

GUESTS ALL IN COSTUME

Police said the incident took place about 1 a.m. at a party
attended by about 200 guests mostly in their 20s and 30s, all
dressed in costumes. Many of the guests were actors and
entertainment industry professionals, who had come to the
five-story house known as "the Castle" for its spires and stained
glass. They had been treated to music by a professional deejay
and drinks from a professional bartender arranged by
roommates who rented the house. The guests were preparing to
board shuttle buses and depart when the police arrived.

Police said Hopper and his partner, Natalie Humphreys, 25,
looked for the owner of the house before heading toward the
rear, where they peered through the glass door into a small
room and spotted three people, including Lee, whom Hopper
thought pulled out a real gun.

Witnesses told reporters that Lee, who was standing in a
bedroom with friends, saw a light shining through the window.
Thinking it was a joke, he joked back, pointing his fake gun at the
light.

"SOUNDED LIKE FIRECRACKERS"

"All of a sudden you hear what sounded like firecrackers. People
started yelling, ''Oh my God, there''s shooting!'' I looked and I saw
bullet holes in the glass and then I smelled smoke in the air and
I saw Anthony laying on the ground. He was just dead," said Erik
Quisling, who witnessed the shooting.

"He had been shot multiple times at fairly close range. Bullets
went through the glass, through him and through a back wall,"
said Quisling, a filmmaker dressed as Dracula.

Witness Sims said he wanted to use his nursing background to
try to help Lee. "It was surreal," Sims said.

"I look in there and I see a man laying on the floor, one leg up on
the bed, his back on the ground, his arms kind of spread out, a
gun just out of reach of his hand on the floor, and I didn''t know
whether this was a hoax or a grand finale to the party ... And then
I realize that (it''s real)," Sims added.

"I said to the officer, ''We''ve got to check to see if he''s alive,"''
Sims said. "I said, ''Go in there, kick the gun out of the way, see if
there''s a pulse.'' He said, ''No, the ambulance is on the way''. I
said, ''No, we have to check now."'' Sims said.

Hopper, Sims said, "was saying, ''Why did he have to pull out that
gun?"''

Reuters/Variety

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