The widow of a former Los Angeles Times ad executive and cartoonist fatally shot by Orange County sheriff’s deputies said Wednesday she hopes a $6 million verdict in federal court against the county will serve as a deterrent to excessive uses of force.
A jury in federal court in Los Angeles last Wednesday awarded the verdict in favor of Susan Peck stemming from the fatal shooting of her legally blind 65-year-old husband, Paul Mono, on Feb. 6, 2018, in the Laguna Woods retirement community.
“This doesn’t bring Paul back, but it does make me feel like there is some justice in this world,” Peck said. “I truly hope this verdict will act as deterrence and save others from the pain I’ve endured.”
Sheriff’s deputies were dispatched just before 1:15 p.m. that day to the couple’s four-unit, single story condo after contractor Dennis Metzler dialed 911 when he heard a threat from Mono.
Mono was unhappy with Metzler’s work, so the realtor who recommended him, Jennifer Heflin, offered to serve as an “intermediary,” according to appellate court justices, who ruled the deputies who shot Mono could not claim immunity.
Heflin went to the couple’s home to give them the floor plans from Metzler, who decided to remain outside and listen in on their conversation through an open line Heflin had on her cell phone because Metzler was concerned about her safety.
Mono grew angry because he believed the floor plans were the wrong ones, and as she left the home, Mono waved a gun around and threatened to shoot Metzler, the appellate justices wrote. She told him to put the gun down, which he did, but Metzler dialed 911 to report the threat, the justices said.
Sheriff’s deputies Anthony Montoya, Michael Johnson, Brent Lind, John Frey and Brad Carrington responded to the call.
Peck’s attorneys said Mono was diagnosed with a form of bipolar disorder and was in the midst of a mental health crisis due to his deteriorating vision.
As the deputies attempted to order Mono out of the home, Mono cursed, made obscene gestures, and at one point dropped his pants, mooned the deputies and dared them to shoot him. He also told the deputies, “What are you going to do, shoot a blind man?”
Montoya spotted a holstered revolver on a couch in the home, which escalated the standoff, but what happened next diverged from the deputies’ narrative and what some witnesses reported.
The deputies claimed Mono was moving toward the gun and grabbed it, prompting deputies to open fire.
Peck, however, said the gun was nowhere near his body and was found under a coffee table. A neighbor at the scene said he saw Mono moving away from the gun when deputies opened fire.
A ballistics expert for Peck contradicted the deputies’ account of what happened, attorney David Washington said.
“The big thing here is they didn’t conduct any real investigation of what happened,” Washington told City News Service. “They didn’t do any basic (crime scene investigation) stuff you’d expect from the fourth largest sheriff’s department in the country would do.”
At trial, the deputies testified they acted out of concern for Peck, Washington said.
“There was no real indicators of any risk to her,” Washington said.
The realtor “was standing outside with the contractor when officers arrived,” Washington said. “She was telling them Paul was harmless and he was experiencing a mental health crisis and was extremely visually impaired.”
The deputies never called Peck on the phone, Washington said.
“They ran up with guns drawn and started yelling at the windows and doors,” Washington said.
The deputies did not believe Mono’s claim of his disability despite having sunglasses on and a red-tipped cane blind people use, Washington said.
“They had specialized units on the way, but they didn’t wait for them,” Washington said. “So many things could have been done. They could have called into the house, talked to the people outside and used de-escalation tactics, but they didn’t do any of those things.”
The “core of the verdict” was a failure to follow their training, Washington said.
“A big travesty in this case is a total disinterest in what happened,” Washington said. “And we see this all too often with sheriff’s departments. They are meticulous when it comes to crimes in the community, but when there’s a use of force incident with their own officers and there’s an abundance of physical evidence that can be scrutinized, they just don’t do it.”