![]() Police have also said that Sanchez started shooting less than four seconds after French struck him.Ĭory Brente, a lawyer for the city of Los Angeles, sought to cast all the blame on Sanchez, saying he was acting as a private citizen, not a police officer. Police documents made public in 2019 showed that Sanchez was at least 20 feet from the French family when he opened fire. Sanchez’s lawyers have previously said the officer believed that French had a gun. He said Sanchez was “knocked to the floor” during his encounter with Kenneth French and “thought he’d been shot” when he decided to use his gun. The day of the shooting, Hubert said, Sanchez had worked a morning police shift in Los Angeles before driving home to Riverside and picking up his wife and baby son for a trip to Costco. “Even if he’s off duty, he’s still in the course and scope of his employment,” Hubert told the jury. Sanchez’s lawyer, seeking to limit the former officer's financial responsibility for the shooting, echoed the argument that the former officer used the gun as part of his job. The city doesn’t want to pay these people a dime.” That’s really what this comes down to, is money. “Sanchez should be held accountable,” he added, “but so should they. “Make no mistake about it, if Officer Sanchez at the time had not had that weapon by virtue of his LAPD police officer status, this wouldn’t have happened. “They hired him, they trained him, they gave him permission to have that gun,” Galipo told the jury in his closing statement. It would have been up to the jury to decide whether Sanchez used excessive and unreasonable force, but Bernal ruled Tuesday that the evidence was so clear that the jury did not need to consider the question.īut jurors were asked to determine whether Sanchez was serving in his capacity as an officer of the Los Angeles Police Department when he drew his gun and fired at the French family, and they found unanimously that he was. ![]() Sanchez was not in the courtroom Wednesday for closing statements or the verdict. Mike Feuer, said, "We will review all our options including appeal." ![]() “They’re hoping that now that they’ve received some justice on behalf of Kenneth, they can start the healing and closure process,” he said. Galipo, the couple's attorney, who often represents victims of police shootings and their families. The damages award was unusually high for a police shooting case, said Dale K. The suit was filed against Sanchez and the city by Kenneth French's parents, Russell and Paola French. That finding effectively made the city of Los Angeles liable for damages. Police Commission found that he violated department policy in the shooting of French and his parents, who were seriously wounded.Īfter four hours of deliberations Wednesday at the federal courthouse in Riverside, the jury of six women and two men found that Sanchez acted within the scope of his LAPD employment when he fired 10 shots at the French family. Sanchez, who was fired last year, is awaiting trial on manslaughter and assault charges filed by the California attorney general’s office after a Riverside County grand jury declined to indict him a few months after the killing. The shooting followed a brief confrontation between the two men in line to sample sausages. Bernal found that Officer Salvador Sanchez used excessive and unreasonable force in June 2019 when he shot and killed 32-year-old Kenneth French. (Mel Melcon/Los Angeles Times)Ī federal jury awarded $17 million in damages on Wednesday to the family of a mentally disabled man who was fatally shot by an off-duty Los Angeles police officer inside a Costco in Corona. ![]() The photo at left shows Kenneth French in 2014 with his parents, who were also shot by Sanchez. Russell French, right, announces in August 2019 that he and his wife, Paola, who is seated, were suing the city of Los Angeles and former LAPD Officer Salvador Sanchez over Sanchez's fatal shooting of their son, Kenneth French, inside a Costco in Corona.
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