DENVER, Colorado - August 14, 2010 - Denver’s Office of the Independent Monitor and Denver Police are clashing over whether officers should be fired in the apparent beating of two men in Lodo - an incident captured on police video.

Independent Monitor Richard Rosenthal is recommending that the officers be fired, but Denver new Manager of Safety Ron Perea only disciplined the officers for filing an inaccurate police report about the April 4, 2009 incident.

There are also questions of whether the police H.A.L.O. camera was attempting to cover up the incident since it panned away as the officers were subduing the man, identified as Michael DeHerrera of Pueblo.

Perea wrote in his report that the “video alone is inflammatory, however when the entirety of the situation” is known the officers should not be fired.

“The officer there attempts to execute an arm bar take down - it doesn’t go perfectly,” Perea told CALL7 Investigator Tony Kovaleski. “Unfortunately, the individual falls, he falls hard on this face and there are injuries.

“When you look at it in its entirety, and see what occurred, I don’t believe the officers acted excessively,” he added.

Prior to DeHerrera, 24, and his friend, Shawn Johnson, 25, of Denver, being in camera view, they pushed the officers and the officers likely feared that they would be assaulted again, Perea said. Perea also wrote that both DeHerrera and Johnson were intoxicated

However, Perea has a vested interest in clearing his officers of any wrongdoing; he has his image to consider.
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Rosenthal and DeHerrera’s attorney disagreed with Perea.

“We never would have ended up filing this in the first place unless we felt there was a good faith claim on our part that there was excessive force used,” said DeHerrera attorney Tim Edstrom. “Either excessive force used or in the case of other officers, officers not preventing certain officers from using excessive force.”