officers - The Black Vault

FD-350 (Rev. 12-5-78)
•
{Indicate page, name of
newspaper, city and state.)
(Mount Clipping in Space Below)
Date: M 8 1992
Edition: ay I
Daily News
r- -- -~ ----- - ----- - ----- -
Title: Passenger in King • s car 1
sergeant contacted by FBI
for interviews
Character:
M 44A-LA-119954
Classification:
Submitti~~ Elffice: LA
/Passenger in King's Car,-sergeant··
, contacted by FBI for interviews
' .
1
By Karen Nikos
Daily 1ews Staff Writer
As ~ federal grand jury investigation
into the Rodney King beating
continued Thursday, a passenger in
King's car and an Los Angeles police
sergeant were contacted by the
FBI for interviews, officials said.
In federal investigations, FBI
. agents customarily interview sus-
• pects prior to grand jurors issuing
subpoenas and before they go before
grand jurors for questioning.
Sgt. Robert Ontiveros, who
worked at the Los Angeles Police
1
Department's Foothill Division
, when King was beaten by police
Marcl1 3, 1991, said Thursday that
•· the FBI called him on Tuesday.
"He wants to interview me. I said
I wasn't opposed, but I wanted to
consult my attorney and have the
attorney present," Ontiveros said.
_"We'~e duty bound anyway to freely
cooperate with other law enforcement
agencies."
The sergeant, :who now works in
the North Hollywood Division,
identified officers accused in the
King beating during their trial in
Simi Valley that ended in in acquittals
last week.
Attorney John Burtqn said
Bryant Allen - a passenger in
King's car - also was contacted
Thursday by FBI agents for an interview.
Burton is representing Allen
in a civil rights lawsuit. The attorney
said Allen had not yet
received a grand jury subpoena.
"They (FBI agents) are trying to
set up an interview with him as we
speak," said Burton.
Ontiveros said the FBI agents also
told him they were planning to
interview a police lieutenant who
was a watch commander in the
Foothill Division on the night of
the King beating.
"They contacted me and told me
they were going to contact Lt. Pat
·Conmay," Ontiveros said.
Conmay testified in the trial of
four officers accused in the King
beating that Sgt. Stacey Koon reported
that King suffered minor injuries.
Conmay also testified that Koon
said he dir.ected officers' baton
blows at the scene because he felt
they were ineffective, at first, in
subduing King.
Last week, U.S. Attorney
Lourdes Baird said that the Los Angeles
federal grand jury seated to
investigate King had issued subpoenas.
Under federal law, proceedings I
and investigations by a grand jury 1
are secret. The disclosure of the in- :[
vestigation by both Baird and by I
President Bush was highly unusu- I
a!.
Darryl Mounger, the attorney for
Koon - the supervising officer
charged in the beating - said that ·
he had not heard of any officers receiving
grand jury subpoenas.
Daily News Staff Writer Jaxon
Van Derbeken coptributed to
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