The Los Angeles Police Commission, the civilian panel that oversees the Los Angeles Police Department, has decided that three officers acted improperly last year in killing two people in separate shootings.
The commission found that officers Zackary Goldstein and Andrew Hacoupian violated department policy on deadly force when they fired at 46-year-old James Byrd in Van Nuys on October 3rd. Byrd had thrown a 40-ounce glass beer bottle through the rear window of a patrol car leading the officers inside to believe they were being shot at. The commission did not object to the first volley of gunfire ... but to the second.
In a separate case, the police commission faulted the higher-ranked of the two officers who fatally shot 37-year-old Norma Angelica Guzman last September. It is up to Chief Charlie Beck to take disciplinary steps — if any — against the officers who were determined to have violated policy.
