RESOURCES |
| Precinct 1 officers have been involved in six shootings in the past five years, based on news releases, Houston Chronicle reports and public records: • Nov. 13, 1999 — Deputy Constable Matthew McCord wounded Martin Gonzalez, 22, after a traffic stop escalated into a physical confrontation. • Oct. 27, 2000 — Deputy Constable Matthew Haynes wounded Juan Cabazos, 22; after Haynes tried to pull him over for erratic driving, Cabazos is alleged to have backed his car toward the officer and was shot. • Sept. 24, 2001 — Deputy Constable Tammy Alfred, who was off duty, fatally shot Timothy Terry, 21, who tried to attack her and had been attempting to burglarize her home. • July 11, 2002 — Deputy Constable McCord fatally shot Melvin Romero, 20, after pulling him over for speeding. McCord said Romero appeared to be reaching for a gun at the time. • Jan. 26, 2004 — Deputy Constables Andy Reyna and C. Jaris were called to subdue Tairon Gray, a mental patient wielding a knife. Gray grabbed an officer's gun and was fatally shot. • June 27, 2004 — Deputy Constable Brian Kirsch fatally shot Francisco Garza, 30, after pulling him over for an expired inspection sticker. |
"It was a throw-down gun," said Randall Kallinen, an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who is representing man's common-law wife and child in a civil suit pending in federal court in Houston.
But the Harris County assistant district attorney who handled the grand jury inquiry in 2002 into the shooting of Melvin Romero scoffed at Kallinen's conclusions. He said there was no reason to believe the gun was planted and witnesses' accounts supported the officer.
Romero, 20, was fatally shot after being stopped for speeding on North Shepherd on July 11, 2002, a few days after the birth of his first child.
ACLU lawyers called a news conference Friday to announce their theory. They note investigators could not trace the gun's ownership and found no fingerprints on it, although the officer has stated that both he and Romero handled the weapon.
That information comes from an investigative report released by the Houston Police Department as part of the lawsuit.
J.C. Mosier, administrative chief of the Precinct 1 Constable's office, said no one from the office could comment because of the pending lawsuit.
Officers from Precinct 1 have been involved in six shootings in the past five years — more than in the previous 20 years combined.
The officer who shot Romero, Matthew McCord, has been involved in two shootings, both after traffic stops. In the second case, he wounded a man on Nov. 13, 1999. Separate grand juries returned no bills in the standard review process of both incidents.
ACLU lawyers contend McCord has lied about what happened after he pulled Romero over for speeding at 9:25 p.m. July 11, 2002, in the 900 block of North Shepherd.
McCord said Romero, 20, appeared very agitated. Romero repeatedly shouted "licencia" — license in Spanish — and kept reaching into his pocket, according to an HPD investigative report obtained by the Chronicle.
Romero had been drinking, according to an autopsy report, and did not understand much, if any, English, Kallinen said.
McCord said he put Romero's hands on his squad car. He then patted Romero down and felt a gun in his right-front pocket. Then, McCord said, he thought he saw Romero touch the gun handle. McCord fired three times and Romero went down. McCord told HPD investigators he then removed the weapon from Romero's pocket.
But Kallinen, the ACLU lawyer, said he thinks McCord felt only a cell phone or another object in Romero's pocket because Romero did not own a gun. When McCord realized his mistake, Kallinen contends the deputy may have planted an untraceable "throw-down gun" and emptied Romero's pockets of other items, including his cell phone.
No witnesses at the scene said they saw McCord plant a gun, nor did any say they saw Romero handling a weapon, according to the HPD report obtained by the Chronicle.
But Ed Porter, the assistant district attorney who handled the November 2002 grand jury inquiry, said several witnesses supported a key part of the officer's version of events: that Romero repeatedly reached for his pocket.
Porter said he does not believe the gun found at the scene had been planted.
Several witnesses who worked at a store nearby saw the shooting, according to the homicide report.
One woman, Cynthia Valles, said she heard Romero ask the officer in Spanish if he wanted him to lay down and that the officer fired when Romero moved.
Other witnesses said Romero moved his hand or made a motion toward his pocket before the officer fired, the report says.