The Los Angeles Police Department has released video showing detention officers repeatedly using force on a 59-year-old man, including striking and restraining him face down on a bunk, before he was found unconscious and died inside a San Fernando Valley jail in July.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass on Friday responded to the release of the footage and a separate critical-incident video showing the fatal police shooting of a 33-year-old man in Harvard Heights on July 29, calling the videos “incredibly difficult to watch.”
“The tragic deaths of Jose Carlos Hoyos-Munoz and Alejandro Luis Garcia show what can happen when someone in a behavioral health crisis does not get the care they need, and law enforcement is called upon to respond,” Bass said.
Bass said she plans to issue an executive directive calling for an independent evaluation of deaths and severe injuries involving police, with particular attention to those involving people experiencing mental health crises.
Hoyos-Munoz had been arrested on July 13 on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon against family members after barricading himself for eight hours at a home on Delco Avenue in Chatsworth, the LAPD said.
“He has lost his mind. He’s gone crazy,” his mother said, as shown on police bodycam footage.
The security camera footage from the Van Nuys Regional Jail shows several physical encounters between officers and Hoyos-Munoz during the early morning hours of July 15 at the LAPD’s Valley Jail Section.
Around 3:40 a.m., detention officers removed Hoyos-Munoz from a holding cell to get his fingerprints. He became combative, spitting at and attempting to bite the officers, the LAPD captain narrating the video said. The footage shows Hoyos-Munoz struggling with officers as they attempt to restrain and handcuff him, with the officers using their body weight and knee strikes as multiple officers surround and hold him down.
The officers also put a mesh, spit-prevention hood over his head.
Hoyos-Munoz was placed in a five-point restraint chair and fingerprinted before being taken to a single-occupant cell, police said.
At another point in the footage, Hoyos-Munoz climbs onto the toilet in his cell. Officers return and move him onto a bunk, where several officers hold him down in a prone position. One officer can be seen placing a knee against Hoyos-Munoz’s upper back or shoulder area as the group restrains him and removes his handcuffs.
The footage shows Hoyos-Munoz lying face down on the bunk without pants, with the spit-prevention covering still over his head, and with his arms positioned behind his back, though he was uncuffed.
The encounters between Hoyos-Munoz and the officers at the jail were described in the video as a “non-categorical” use of force. That is a law enforcement term for a physical intervention that results in minor or no injuries, and does not involve deadly force, serious bodily injury, or hospital admission.
Police said detention officers continued checking on him afterward and observed that he appeared to be breathing and showed signs of life during the next 20 minutes.
When officers later entered the cell, they found Hoyos-Munoz unconscious and not breathing, according to LAPD. Jail and medical personnel attempted to revive him until Los Angeles Fire Department personnel took over his care, but he was pronounced dead.
Officers had been called to the Chatsworth home on July 13 after Hoyos-Munoz allegedly stabbed his mother and another relative, leaving them with minor injuries, according to police. When he refused to leave the home after the lengthy standoff, SWAT officers used “chemical agents” before entering and taking him into custody.
Hoyos-Munoz was found kneeling in front of a piano and striking the keys, according to the video released on Friday.
He was taken to a hospital and treated for exposure to the chemicals before being released and booked into the jail.
Three detention officers received contusions and minor cuts during their physical encounters with Hoyos-Munoz and were treated and released from a hospital, police said.
LAPD’s Force Investigation Division is investigating the death. The cause of death was not available Saturday.
Bass said the review she is ordering will examine potential systemic gaps, police policies and training and the mental health support provided to officers following critical incidents.
“We must also expand civilian crisis response and co-response models that can support individuals in crisis who have not exhibited violent behavior, reducing the need for armed officers,” Bass said. “Public safety cannot be achieved through law enforcement alone.”