CSLEA Legal Defense Fund Attorneys Secure Acquittal of San Bernardino Deputy Sheriff
Deputy Prosecuted for Video Taped Shooting of Military Policeman

Source: Kasey Christopher Clark, General Manager/Chief Counsel
Date: 7/17/2007

The Law Firm of Silver, Hadden, Silver, Wexler & Levine is a CSLEA Legal Defense Fund Panel Law Firm. The Silver firm is also on the PORAC LDF Panel and in that capacity attorneys William Hadden and Michael Schwartz represented San Bernardino Deputy Sheriff Ivory Webb. In a case that received national publicity, Deputy Webb was prosecuted for attempted voluntary manslaughter of an intoxicated military policeman. The incident, which many readers have seen, was captured on video tape. The following is an article written by Mr. Hadden and published with the firm's consent, which details the criminal trial.

Deputy Webb Exonerated in Videotaped Shooting
By Bill Hadden
Silver, Hadden, Silver, Wexler and Levine

On June 28, 2007, after deliberating for only about three hours, a San Bernardino County jury exonerated former San Bernardino Deputy Sheriff Ivory John Webb, Jr., of charges of attempted voluntary manslaughter and assault with a firearm in regard to his on-duty shooting of an intoxicated military policeman named Elio Carrion. The case had received international attention as the events immediately leading up to and including the shooting were captured by a neighbor on a grainy video, which the prosecution claimed showed Deputy Webb callously firing upon Mr. Carrion after telling him to get up off the ground.

Throughout the 18-month ordeal, Deputy Webb was represented by Michael Schwartz and Bill Hadden of Silver, Hadden, Silver, Wexler & Levine.

Back on January 29, 2006, Deputy Webb was on patrol near the end of his shift, anticipating the start of a two week vacation. He was patrolling the Chino Hills area, when he heard a broadcast from fellow Deputy Charles Carter, who announced he was in pursuit of a Corvette at speeds in excess of 100 mph in a residential area. A nine year veteran of the Department, Deputy Webb continued to monitor the pursuit, and staged his vehicle so as to assist if necessary. The Corvette at one point spun out and stopped a few feet from the front of Carter’s unit, before again jetting away in a manner that would threaten the lives of motorists, pedestrians and deputies, not to mention the two occupants of the Corvette. Deputy Carter’s Crown Victoria could not safely keep pace with the Corvette, which proceeded to zip past Deputy Webb.

Sensing that the safety of the public was in jeopardy, Deputy Webb initiated his own pursuit to stop the suspects’ vehicle, also reaching speeds over 100 mph in an effort to at least obtain a license plate number. As he did so, he could not help but wonder what other crimes the suspects might be running from, or how soon it might be before their antics killed someone.

His opportunity for reflection was brief, as the suspects’ vehicle pulled away from him. In Deputy Webb’s mind, it appeared that the suspects would stop at nothing to avoid arrest. The Corvette then raced near Deputy Webb and swerved out of control. He braced himself for a collision that never came, as the suspect vehicle crashed against a cinder block wall, now facing in the same westbound direction as the Sheriff’s unit.

Deputy Webb’s first instinct was to call out his location and obtain backup, something he had been unable to do as the pursuit unfolded. Just as he reached for his radio to try again, the passenger, Elio Carrion, got out of the car, while the driver, Luis Escobedo, sought feverishly but unsuccessfully to exit the vehicle from his side. Unbeknownst to Deputy Webb at the time, the two suspects had been drinking all day at Carrion’s home at a party Carrion threw for himself to celebrate his recent return from Iraq.

Although Carrion could easily have turned to run westbound, he instead moved eastbound in the direction of Deputy Webb, who had drawn his firearm and ordered him to the ground. Carrion stepped back slightly towards the Corvette, but did not comply with the directive. At the same time, both Carrion and Escobedo began a non-stop barrage of verbal distractions for Deputy Webb, who was now in close proximity to suspects he could only presume were armed, without any sense when or if backup would arrive. It was at this point that the video footage showed the chain of events leading to and including the weapon discharge.

Undoubtedly due to the profanity used by all parties at the scene, the mainstream media has never played the video and audio for the general public, nor has the media even had access to the multiple versions of expertly enhanced versions that gave improved perspectives on the behavior of the suspects. Contrary to the claims of the prosecution, the videos showed that Deputy Webb’s actions were not “out of control,” but instead remarkably restrained.

As the video began, Deputy Webb told Carrion, who was partially standing inside the door of the Corvette, to cross his ankles. Carrion failed to do so, while at the same time Escobedo profanely stated that the suspects did nothing wrong. The tape showed that the 6’1, 240 pound former University of Iowa football star told the ranting suspects at gunpoint at least seven times to “shut up” so that he could begin to control the situation. Sometimes he yelled, sometimes he used profanity, but still neither of the suspects obeyed the commands, prompting fear in any reasonable officer that the suspects may be parolees or gang members working in tandem to formulate a plan of attack against him. Deputy Webb told Carrion numerous times to get to the ground, but Carrion did not do so on his own, as he continued to try to divert Webb’s attention. Deputy Webb was forced to use his foot to move Carrion to the ground.

Incredibly, Carrion, whose military and police training should have given him every reason to know the importance of following orders and being sensitive to officer safety concerns, next quickly thrust his left hand within inches of Deputy Webb’s gun. Showing amazing restraint, Deputy Webb refrained from firing as he yelled at Carrion to put his hand back on the ground, while still trying to monitor the movements of Escobedo in the darkened car. Carrion did so, but only briefly, when again his left hand reached towards the Deputy’s gun. A second time Deputy Webb showed restraint and withheld fire, again emphatically telling Carrion to put his hand on the ground. In between Escobedo’s protestations of innocence from behind the wheel and Carrion’s babbling about the incident all being “a misunderstanding”, Deputy Webb told the non-compliant Carrion four more times to put his hand on the ground, to no avail. Next, in a situation that had escalated to make Deputy Webb “the most scared I had ever been in my life”, Carrion audaciously lectured to Deputy Webb in a threatening tone, “I spent more time than you in the f’ing police, in the f’ing military, you f’ing believe me alright”, as he thrust his right hand in the middle of his jacket.

From Deputy Webb’s perspective, the hand appeared to go into the waistband area, which would have justified an immediate deadly force response by any officer. But as the hand entered the jacket, Deputy Webb gestured with his firearm seemingly for Carrion to get his hand up, while the audio suggests that the words “get up” may be among other inaudible words. Immediately thereafter, Carrion came up off the ground in his own words, “as quickly as I could”, even though he testified that the command that he heard to get up was one that he would never have given to a suspect himself, and which otherwise gave him “pause.” The rapid manner in which Carrion came up off the ground, in combination with Carrion’s hand movement and verbal challenges, in the context of everything that had happened previously, caused Deputy Webb to view Carrion’s movements as a threatening lunge towards him, and he fired his weapon three times in self-defense, consistent with his training.

As noted, the prosecution’s theory of the case was that Deputy Webb was somehow “out of control”, and that he had shot Carrion out of a heat of passion or unreasonable fear. The prosecution based its position on criticisms of Deputy Webb’s tactics, claiming that Deputy Webb:

1. Never should have gone in pursuit of the Corvette;

2. Should have known that the suspects were merely speeding and were not dangerous;

3. Should have known that Carrion’s hand movements towards the gun were those of a harmless drunk who was just talking with his hands; and

4. Should have known that Carrion could not realistically have had a firearm in his jacket.

In a brilliant and passionate closing argument, Michael Schwartz meticulously dissected every aspect of the prosecution’s case, leaving no doubt in the minds of the jurors as to Deputy Webb’s innocence. The prosecution’s “bad tactics” and “out of control” theories were ridiculous he said, as the evidence showed that Deputy Webb had shown amazing restraint and utilized all reasonable means to control suspects who showed disdain for the Deputy’s commands. It was similarly preposterous, he argued, for the prosecution to try to rewrite the law to claim that the case should be viewed through the bloodshot eyes of a resisting drunken suspect, rather than from the perspective of a reasonable officer trying to protect the community from two dangerous suspects while without backup.

Most of all, Michael Schwartz encouraged each juror to attempt to walk in Ivory Webb’s shoes before rendering any judgment, and to never forget that law enforcement officers are human beings who must have the authority to reasonably respond to the appearance of danger, so that they, like the rest of us, might go home to their families at the end of the day. In closing, he emotionally appealed to each and every juror to unlock the cage that had surrounded Ivory Webb since the D.A.’s office had rushed to file the charges against him last year, and to set Ivory Webb free at last.

A jury of eight men and four women agreed that under the perilous circumstances thrust on Deputy Webb by two drunk, defiant and non-compliant suspects, he had acted reasonably to defend himself. Shortly thereafter Judge Michael Smith announced the words Ivory Webb had longed to hear: “Mr. Webb, you are free to go.”

As jurors later told us, the dubious testimony of Mr. Carrion, and his even more suspect actions, were what caused the shooting. It was the suspects, they said, not the Deputy, that were out of control.

Having lived with this case with Michael Schwartz and our client Ivory Webb for the last one and one-half years, I feel uniquely qualified to make these final observations of indisputable truth:

1. Ivory Webb is absolutely innocent of the charges that were filed against him;

2. No law enforcement officer should be prosecuted for just trying to do his job; and

3. My co-counsel Michael Schwartz is one absolutely phenomenal trial lawyer