New Charges and Evidence to Mark 2nd Trial of Penn

SAN DIEGO â€”  When jurors in the trial of accused police killer Sagon Penn filed from the courtroom last June to begin their deliberations on the difficult case, there was hope that a painful, divisive episode in the history of this city was drawing to a close.

For this was no ordinary trial. Charges that the young black man murdered one white police officer, attempted to kill another and wounded a woman passenger aggravated racial tensions and sent police relations with San Diego’s black community plummeting.

But now, eight months later, the traumatic, emotionally wrenching events are to again be replayed in court.

Penn was found innocent of first-degree murder and other major charges in the March, 1985, shooting death of Officer Thomas Riggs and the wounding of Officer Donovan Jacobs and Sarah Pina-Ruiz, a civilian observer riding in Riggs’ patrol car.

Jurors were deadlocked in favor of acquittal on four additional charges, ranging from assault with a deadly weapon to attempted murder.

Tuesday the tedious jury selection process for Penn’s second trial will enter its third week.

In some ways, the new trial will inescapably resemble its highly publicized predecessor, a dramatic affair that drew dozens of observers daily, spanned 12 weeks and saw nearly 150 witnesses take the stand.

Defense attorney Milton J. Silverman still maintains that his client was defending himself against deadly force when he shot Riggs and Jacobs. Numerous witnesses said Jacobs provoked Penn with racial slurs and a hail of blows with his police baton.

Much of the evidence that the attorneys will use to present their version of the deadly encounter will be familiar from the first trial.

Still, there are differences that will add a note of unpredictability this time around. The array of charges against Penn has changed, and the defense has won the right to use a document raising questions about Jacobs’ conduct as a police cadet, an addition Silverman considers invaluable to his case.

One factor that appears to remain constant is the level of interest in the case within both the black community and law enforcement circles. Police sources say the retrial, while welcomed by officers who want a conviction in the case, will reopen old wounds and revive searing memories of their colleague’s death--memories many would rather forget.

“This has been one of the most difficult, if not the most difficult incident in the history of the San Diego Police Department,� said Ty Reid, former president of the San Diego Police Officers Assn. “This (second) trial will rehash the whole thing. . . . And with the reduced charges, it will be even more tough, because the feeling of the . . . majority of officers is that Penn is literally getting away with murder.�

Moreover, many officers complain that it was Jacobs--and not Penn--whose behavior was under the spotlight in the first trial and will again be the basis for the defense. Reid said police believe that such a focus is unfair and ignores the fact that “Penn’s the one who did the shooting here. . . . If anyone’s been a victim, and is a continuing victim in all of this, it’s Donovan Jacobs.�

The shooting occurred after a routine traffic stop late in the afternoon March 31, 1985. According to numerous witnesses a scuffle erupted between Penn and Jacobs. The officer wrestled Penn to the ground and began beating him with his police baton. Officer Riggs arrived at the scene and joined the fray. Penn grabbed Jacobs’ gun and shot the two officers. He then turned the weapon on Pina-Ruiz, who was sitting in Riggs’ patrol car. Penn fled in Jacobs’ car, running over Jacobs as he drove off. Later, Penn surrendered at the main police station.

Civic leaders in predominantly black southeast San Diego view Penn as a symbol of lingering problems with police conduct in their neighborhoods.

“This trial is not just for Sagon, it’s for all of us,� said the Rev. Robert Ard, founder of the Christ Church in San Diego and a major figure in San Diego’s black community for more than a decade. “The case has come to be the pinnacle of a troubling pattern of what I might call selective law enforcement. And it’s in many ways a symbol of whether we can receive justice in this community.�

In addition, black leaders say they are outraged by the district attorney’s decision to retry the case despite the jury’s first verdict and votes that were heavily in favor of acquittal--11-1, 10-2, 10-2 and 8-4--on the final four charges.

“I was certainly hoping we would not go through the expense and pain and dissension of pulling our communities apart through another trial,� Ard said. “It will not help us resolve our differences with police and move toward a more harmonious relationship with them.�

Added Vernon Sukumu, executive director of the San Diego Black Federation: “If it was anybody else, this thing wouldn’t have gone to trial the first time and wouldn’t be going to trial again. . . . But here you’ve got a black boy who shot a white cop. There’s no way they’re going to let him get away with that in San Diego.�

In the retrial, Penn, 25, is charged with voluntary manslaughter in Riggs’ death; attempted murder in the shooting of Pina-Ruiz, and attempted voluntary manslaughter and assault with a deadly weapon in the wounding of Jacobs.

Silverman and prosecutor Michael G. Carpenter predicted in interviews last week that their strategies in will differ little from those displayed in the courtroom last year.

But Silverman believes that the document regarding Jacobs’ behavior as a police cadet will be an important new element. The document, an 11-page transcript ruled inadmissible in the first trial, has been described by Silverman as the pivotal piece of evidence in his defense of Penn. Deputy Dist. Atty. Carpenter disputes that but fought hard in pre-trial hearings to bar the document.

The 8-year-old transcript is of a tape-recorded counseling session three training officers had with Jacobs while he was a recruit at the Police Academy. During the session, Jacobs was upbraided for his willingness to use hostile behavior and racial slurs in police work.

Silverman says the document supports the contention of numerous witnesses that Jacobs used racial epithets while he beat Penn with his night stick during the deadly March 31, 1985, encounter. According to the witnesses, Jacobs told Penn: “You think you’re bad, nigger. . . . I’m going to beat your black ass.�

Jacobs’ conduct during the altercation is the heart of the defense, so the transcript enhances Silverman’s portrait of him as someone whose actions led Penn to believe his life was in danger.