IF HE HAD BEEN BLACK, THE COPS WOULD HAVE FOUND A WAY TO ARREST HIM

I believe that in this case the victim’s relatives and friends have a right to be outraged over the fact that LAPD officers failed to arrest the man who caused a death while driving with a suspended license.

BOTTOM LINE: QUEST FOR JUSTICE AFTER BLACK POSTMAN IS KILLED IN EAST L.A.
By Betty Pleasant

Los Angeles Wave
March 14, 2012

Funeral services were held Monday for an industrious and vivacious young man who lost his life in an incident so tragically capricious that it takes your breath away.

Anthony Earl Dunn II, who was always called Tony, was a 31-year-old postal worker, more familiarly known as a mailman, who had been delivering mail in several communities for the U.S. Postal Service for five years. It was a job he took pride in and a job he loved doing.

Most recently, he had been assigned to a route in Boyle Heights, where his daily stops were well received by the residents who were grateful for the fact that Dunn often went out of his way to help them. One man commented that, “He would ring my mailbox bell when the mail arrived, which no other mail carrier did.”

Well, on Feb. 28, Dunn was conducting his usual route through Boyle Heights and he stopped his vehicle beside a curb in the 1100 block of Prado Street, so he could sort some more of the mail he had to deliver. While he was standing at the back of his little white truck, Felipe Soto, driving an SUV, slammed into him from behind and cut off both of Dunn’s legs. The mailman and his severed legs were rushed to LAC/USC Medical Center, where he died two hours later.

I told you it would take your breath away; and I’m not done yet:

Upon arrival at the scene, LAPD officers learned that Soto, the man who hit Dunn, was driving with a suspended license. They also found no evidence that Soto was under the influence of drugs or alcohol or had been speeding and they let him go. The fact that the LAPD did not detain Soto after such a gruesome event is a hard pill for Dunn’s family and his neighborhood customers to swallow and they’re still choking on it today.

I spoke with Cmdr. Andrew Smith, head of LAPD’s Media Relations and Community Affairs Group, who provided the following information: True, Soto was not arrested at the scene for lack of alcohol, drug and gross negligence evidence despite having a suspended license. While Soto roamed free, the police continued their investigation and put together a case to charge him with felony manslaughter. “We presented our case for felony manslaughter to the District Attorney’s office (Steve Cooley’s office) on March 6 and it was rejected,” Smith said. “The DA’s office told us our case did not meet their standard for felony filing and since there was no gross negligence, it was an accident,” Smith continued. “So we took the case to the City Attorney’s office (Carmen Trutanich’s office) and gave it to them to see if we could get a misdemeanor manslaughter charge filed. The city attorney is now waiting for the autopsy report to take the next step,” Smith said.

Dunn’s large family and wide circle of friends overflowed the Sky Rose Chapel at Rose Hills Memorial Park Monday to celebrate his life and reminisce about his love of the Lakers, Jay-Z and Kanye West and his cordon bleu-level status as a gourmet chef. Dunn, the eldest of three children, was born and raised in Bellflower and graduated from Bellflower High School with an impressive 3.8 grade point average. He continued his education at El Camino College, where he studied to become an X-ray technician. He married Janell Williams in 2008 and the childless couple resided in Lawndale.

While his father, Anthony Earl Dunn, predeceased him, Dunn is survived by his wife; his mother, Felicia Adrianne Smith; stepfather, Michael Evans; sister, Namesha Nicole Dunn; brother, Myquan Robert Evans; grandmother, Charlestine Smith and aunts, uncles, cousins and other assorted kin.

Even though Dunn’s grim death is hard enough for his family and friends to deal with, the aftermath has them absolutely apoplectic with rage. Charlene Mosley, a close friend, expressed the family’s fury when she commented: “If this had been one of us who did this, the cops would have found a way to arrest him.” Uh-huh.