Langley Park Latinos Air Grievances at Police Forum

At a town hall meeting last week, Latinos from the Langley Park area gathered before a panel of police officials from Montgomery and Prince George's counties to voice their pleas for more enforcement, more collaboration and more humane treatment in their community.

For three hours, Manuel de Jesus Espina Jacome sat silently on a bench in the back of the basement, listening. Finally, it was his turn to speak.

"What are you doing with assassin police officers?" he asked through a translator, looking directly at Lt. Col. Michael E. Blow, the Prince George's County representative on the panel. "I ask you this because a year ago, pardon me the word, a stupid police officer named Steven Jackson killed my father."

In August, Jackson, moonlighting in uniform as a security guard, fatally shot Espina Jacome's father, Manuel de Jesus Espina, 43, as he tried to arrest him for holding an open container of alcohol in the stairwell of a Langley Park apartment building. Espina Jacome, then 26, and two other witnesses have said his father was not resisting when he was beaten and shot. Police allege that the elder Espina was struggling violently with the officer. In the past, Jackson has declined to comment through police union representatives.

It is a case emblematic of the sometimes tense relations between law enforcement and Latin American immigrants in the area, and the community meeting marked the first time in months police have addressed it publicly.

"If this would've happened in Central America, in Guatemala, I would have taken the life of that officer at that moment," Espina Jacome told the 75 in attendance at CASA of Maryland's Prince George's Workers' Center.

Espina Jacome thanked God he is in America and said he respects the country's laws. He then took his seat next to his mother, who was dabbing her eyes with a napkin.

"It's an important case to the entire community," Blow responded. "I think you heard someone say earlier: 'When there's a police-involved shooting, there are no winners.' "

Espina Jacome was initially charged with assault in the case, but prosecutors dropped the charges. The Justice Department is investigating Jackson's actions in the shooting, said Alejandro Miyar, a Justice spokesman.

In another incident involving Latinos, an internal investigation of two other Prince George's police officers, John Wynkoop and Scott Wilson, has been completed, Maj. Andy Ellis, a police spokesman, said. Rafael A. Rodriguez, 30, was charged with assaulting the officers during a traffic stop. A videotape of the incident did not support the arresting officer's allegations; the charges were dropped, and the internal investigation was launched. The results of that investigation will be sent to the county's Citizen Complaint Oversight Panel, which will make recommendations to the chief. Criminal charges remain a possibility, Ellis said.

Ellis declined to say what police found in their investigations because the material is being reviewed by entities outside the department. The three officers remain on administrative duty pending completion of those reviews, he said.

That members of the Latin American community would speak candidly with police in the face of such incidents is a sign that trust is being rebuilt, Blow said. Another sign, Takoma Park Police Chief Ronald Ricucci said, is the fact that Hispanic day laborers volunteered information that helped his officers net a suspect in an April robbery.

Lt. Robert McCullagh, representing the Montgomery County police, joined them in answering questions about how to remain anonymous when calling for help, how to curb illegal alcohol sales and how police departments interact with immigration officials.

"I'm glad the community felt comfortable enough to ask those tough questions," Blow said after the meeting. "Everyone realizes there's a long way to go."

He said he understood why Espina Jacome might have spoken so forcefully earlier. "That's a very emotional thing to happen," he said.

Espina Jacome declined to elaborate on his public comments, saying through a translator that his attorneys had advised him not to talk to reporters.

"We are actively cooperating with the state's attorney's investigation," said Timothy F. Maloney, an attorney for the family. "It was an unprovoked shooting that occurred in cold blood."