Culver City Police are being sued by Adriana Medina under both wrongful death and civil rights statutes after her husband, Guillermo Medina was shot in the back and killed by CCPD in Dec. of 2022.
The CCPD has called this a domestic violence incident, but Medina said that she purposely avoided calling 911, and dialed the main number of the police station, in hopes of having a mental health intervention. She told police she did not believe her husband was going to hurt anyone, according to the lawsuit.
The Culver City Police press release states that the “officers responded to a call for service of a domestic violence incident…where the suspect was threatening the wife/victim with a handgun. “
According to U.S News and World Report, Adriana Medina filed her civil rights and wrongful death lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the fatal shooting of Guillermo Medina on Dec. 18. “There was no report of domestic violence,” DeSimone said. “There was no report that he was threatening her with a handgun. She never saw a gun.”
Attorney for the family V. James DeSimone said ‘“That cry for help became a death sentence.”
According to the Associated Press, Medina was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and hadn’t taken his medication in a couple of weeks when he showed up at his home and pounded on the windows, his wife said at a news conference. “The sudden loss of my husband has completely devastated my family and turned our life upside down,” Adriana Medina said he was a good father who coached their children in soccer and cooked for them.“I can’t believe he was taken away from us when what he really needed was help.”
The surveillance video showed Medina falling forward as he was shot. He slowly turned around on the ground, arms outstretched. Several officers carefully approached him and handcuffed him while seemingly looking for a weapon. It wasn’t until paramedics arrived a few minutes later that life-saving measures were taken.
He was eventually pronounced dead.
DeSimone said the video shows the officers “stood idly by for nearly a full minute without rendering medical aid, wasting critical time that could have made the difference between life and death.”
A representative from the CCPD would not comment on pending litigation.