A $3.5 million wrongful death verdict in favor of the mother of a 19-year-old man fatally shot by Buena Park police has been overturned on appeal, according to court records obtained Thursday.
The Fourth District Court of Appeal reversed the verdict and remanded it back to the lower court on Tuesday because the judge that presided over the trial relied on the wrong legal standard.
Deanna Sullivan sued the city and police officers Bobby Colon and Jennifer Tran for the death of her son, David Patrick Sullivan, during an Aug. 19, 2019, traffic stop.
Jurors were instructed by Orange County Superior Court Judge Lee L. Gabriel “on legal standards applicable to a police officer’s use of deadly force that were not in effect in California until after the incident occurred,” according to the ruling. The case was originally heard in 2022 in federal court but it resulted in a mistrial because of a hung jury 5-1 for Sullivan and it was later assigned to state court.
The shooting was captured on Colon’s body-worn camera, the appellate justices said.
Colon pulled over the Range Rover Sullivan was driving and Sullivan told him he didn’t have his driver’s license on him and was borrowing his cousin’s vehicle. Colon said the car’s registration had expired and asked Sullivan to get out so he could scan the vehicle identification number.
Colon went back to his police car and conveyed the VIN to dispatchers who told him the car Range Rover was reported stolen, according to the appellate ruling.
When Colon and Tran told Sullivan to get out of the Range Rover, he put it in reverse, prompting the officers to order him out again, according to the ruling.
Sullivan accelerated, knocked over a palm tree, and slammed into a car, halting it as Colon approached with his weapon drawn, the justices said.
Sullivan bailed out of the vehicle and started running toward Colon and then toward a parking lot, the justices ruled. Colon opened fire on Sullivan as he ran away, and then as Sullivan turned around and ran at the officers they opened fire again, the justices said. One of the bullets ripped through his heart, killing him.
The officers turned the unarmed Sullivan over, handcuffed him and failed to pat him down, the justices said.
Jurors were instructed on a law that became effective in January 2020 that “substantially restricted a police officer’s use of deadly force by creating a standard that made use of deadly force unlawful unless it was `necessary’ and there were no feasible alternatives,” the justices wrote in the ruling.
The justices left it to the lower court to determine which legal standards should be applied in a retrial.
The jury assigned 58% of the fault for the shooting to Sullivan and 42% to the officers.