Deputies’ revised reports in SF beating prompt lawyer’s questions

A poster of Stanislav Petrov, 29, in a hospital bed is shown during a press conference, in Oakland, California, on Tuesday, March 29, 2016. Petrov was beaten in an alley on November 12, 2015 by Alameda County Sheriff deputies and his lawyers plan to file a federal civil rights lawsuit. less A poster of Stanislav Petrov, 29, in a hospital bed is shown during a press conference, in Oakland, California, on Tuesday, March 29, 2016. Petrov was beaten in an alley on November 12, 2015 by Alameda County ... more Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, Special To The Chronicle Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 25 Caption Close Deputies’ revised reports in SF beating prompt lawyer’s questions 1 / 25 Back to Gallery

New allegations in the case involving two Alameda County sheriff’s deputies filmed beating a defenseless man in a San Francisco alley are prompting questions about why the deputies were allowed to alter their original reports on the incident after they and their attorneys viewed the surveillance video.

An attorney representing the car-chase suspect who suffered broken bones and serious head injuries during the beating said he suspected the Sheriff’s Office of trying to cover up wrongdoing by Deputies Paul Wieber and Luis Santamaria.

Sheriff Greg Ahern confirmed that Wieber and Santamaria had been allowed to resubmit their reports after viewing the video footage, which showed them striking Stanislav Petrov numerous times with their batons in a Mission District alley. But he denied that there was any malicious intent in the decision by the deputies’ superiors to send the reports back for changes.

Santamaria and Wieber submitted their revised reports four days after the Nov. 12 incident. Petrov, 29, had led the deputies on a 38-minute chase from Castro Valley after ramming two patrol cruisers in a stolen car. He ended up at the corner of Clinton Park and Stevenson Street in the Mission around 2 a.m. after he crashed the car and fled on foot.

The surveillance-camera footage shows the deputies knocking Petrov to the ground, punching him and clubbing him with their batons, even after he appeared to surrender with his hands on his head. The San Francisco district attorney’s office is investigating whether to file criminal charges against the deputies, who are on paid administrative leave.

Threat to safety

In the revised incident reports, which were made public this month after being released to a civil rights watchdog group, the Center for Human Rights and Privacy, the two deputies said Petrov had posed a threat to their safety and had resisted their attempts to take him into custody.

At a news conference Tuesday, Ahern revealed that Santamaria and Wieber had submitted a “draft” version of their report to the lead investigator in the Sheriff’s Office before the end of their shift Nov. 12.

“They authored their report and submitted it to the lead investigator, who was going to take the case and present it to the district attorney,” Ahern said. “When the investigator reviewed the report, he found it lacked some of the documentation in regards to the injuries to Petrov.

“The deputies were not totally aware of all the injuries to Petrov, so they weren’t documented at that time,” Ahern said. “The investigator knew of those injuries, so he wanted further documentation in that regard and called them back in because of their days off.

‘Final version’ altered

“When they (Santamaria and Wieber) were called back in, they learned there was a video that got out to the media,” the sheriff added. “When they learned of the video, they contacted their representative, which is common in most serious critical events. With the assistance of their representative, they altered their final version of that report.”

Ahern said that practice was “very common.”

Sheriff’s Office spokesman Sgt. J.D. Nelson said Santamaria and Wieber had a right to have their attorneys present once the video was released — the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office made it public Nov. 13 — and the investigation evolved from one into a car chase into one of possible officer misconduct.

Nelson said he did not know whether the two deputies’ original reports still existed.

Michael Haddad, an attorney who has filed a claim against Alameda County on Petrov’s behalf, said Wednesday that he hadn’t been told about the changed reports and called the action questionable. He said he had asked the Sheriff’s Office to produce the deputies’ original reports to see if there were any inconsistencies that could point to a cover-up.

Not small fixes

New allegations emerged this week that another deputy in the Mission District alley stole a gold chain and money from Petrov and used them to bribe a homeless couple to keep quiet about the beating. The Chronicle has learned that the deputy under investigation is Shawn Osborne, who has been placed on paid administrative leave.

Alison Berry Wilkinson, an attorney for Osborne, called the theft and bribery allegations “absolutely outrageous. Certainly none of that happened, by any stretch of the imagination.”

Haddad said the allegations were all the more reason to question the decision to offer Wieber and Santamaria the chance to revise their reports.

“This was not fixing typos and crossing t’s — this was creating a whole new document and new facts to justify their uses of force,” Haddad said. “They completed their original report. They turned it in, and then a supervisor told them to ‘do it again after you meet with your lawyers again and watch the video.’

“In a situation like this, where there are serious injuries from the force and the initial report completely underreports that force, you don’t throw away those reports. They’re evidence,” Haddad said. “You let the officer write a supplement, but the judicial system deserves to know what the officer’s first version was, just like any other suspect.”

‘An official document’

Attorneys for Wieber and Santamaria did not immediately return calls for comment.

Roger Clark, a police procedures consultant and former lieutenant with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, said officers are taught from the time they go through police academy that “you don’t change the original report — it’s an official document.”

He added that the deputies “are not allowed to change the evidence, and they’re certainly not allowed to do it with their lawyers with them. This report should be straightforward. These officers have been trained, tested and they know what is required in the report. They cannot be excused for something like, ‘I forgot I used my baton.’”

Possible contradictions

San Francisco Public Defender Jeff Adachi said he found it odd that the revised reports did not explain possible contradictions between the deputies’ version of events and what was shown on the video.

“The first thing you should say is, ‘We reviewed the video and here is our explanation,’” Adachi said. “They make no attempt to explain what the video shows, and that should have been in the report. It’s like the video never existed.”

Investigators declined to comment on any possible criminal charges regarding filing a false police report. But Nelson reiterated the sheriff’s stance that he would punish any deputies found to have committed wrongdoing.

If reports were falsified, he added, “those people will have to answer for that, too.”