ANTIOCH, CA - JUNE 23: Casandra Quinto-Collins has her photo taken in front of a mural of her son Angelo Quinto after a press conference at Antioch Police Department in Antioch, Calif., on Wednesday, June 23, 2021. Six months after his death in police custody, Quinto's family demands answers. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group)
MARTINEZ — The Contra Costa District Attorney’s office has declined to file criminal charges against any of the four officers who restrained a city resident during a mental health call, leading to his death.
The officers — identified as Nicholas Shipilov, Arturo Becerra, Daniel Hopwood and James Perkinson — all testified at an August 2021 inquest hearing that Quinto went unconscious while they were attempting to restrain him at his family’s home. A forensic pathologist contracted by Contra Costa County ruled Quinto died of “excited delirium,” a controversial diagnosis that at least two medical associations have rejected and is primarily used in cases involving police force.
The incident occurred on Dec. 23, 2020, but Antioch police never announced that Quinto died in police custody. The incident was only made public after this news organization discovered it through a public records request for a list of police-related deaths in Contra Costa.
A news release by the DA’s office says that the decision came down to a simple fact: Quinto’s autopsy revealed no damage to his larynx or trachea.
“While there are conflicting medical opinions as to the cause of death, the accounts of what transpired in the bedroom are consistent among all witnesses in that no police officer applied pressure to Quinto’s neck,” the DA news release says. “After reviewing the evidence, the method of restraining Angelo Quinto by Antioch Police officers on December 23rd was objectively reasonable under the totality of the circumstances.”
The DA’s ruling comes amidst an ongoing criminal investigation — led by the FBI and the DA — into alleged “crimes of moral turpitude” involving at least eight Antioch officers and three from Pittsburg. That investigation, announced last March, is said to involve potential civil rights abuses as well as illegal use of cocaine and steroids, according to multiple law enforcement sources.
Quinto’s family filed a federal lawsuit against the involved officers, alleging one put a knee on Quinto’s neck for several minutes while Quinto was face down until he became unresponsive. He never regained consciousness and died in a hospital three days later.
At an Aug. 20, 2021 inquest hearing, the four involved officers reiterated the department’s claims that an officer only pinned Quinto down for a few moments by his shoulder blades — a version of events disputed by the family and its attorneys, who say independent medical examinations concluded Quinto died due to restraint asphyxiation.
Civil rights attorney John Burris, who is representing Quinto’s family, said he was “disappointed, but not surprised” by the decision.
“I think this case would be an involuntary manslaughter type case. I do not view their conduct as intention, but I certainly view it as negligent,” Burris said. “It doesn’t affect our civil case; we’re going forward, and now we’re able to go forward more aggressively.”
A coroner’s inquest jury ruled Quinto’s death accidental after the pathologist, Dr. Ikechi Ogan, testified it was likely due to excited delirium. It is a diagnosis denounced by the American Medical Association as a charged phrase too frequently used to justify the excessive use of force by police officers, including in cases where people die or suffer serious injuries while being restrained. The American Psychiatric Association’s diagnostic handbook doesn’t list it as a condition and the organization conducted a study last year that says it is mostly cited in cases where the decedent was physically restrained by police.
The jury’s ruling carries no civil nor criminal liability.
One of the four involved officers, Shipilov, was identified by civil rights attorney Melissa Nold as one of the policeman who punched and restrained Antioch resident Miguel Minjares during an incident at his home. Police were called after Minjares asked his adult daughter to leave his home, and the officers are seen on video striking Minjares as his daughter screams for help.
Minjares received $180,000 in a settlement with the city that was finalized last January. Minjares viewed photos of Shipilov and said he was 99 percent sure it was the same officer.
“It’s disheartening,” Minjares said of the September 2019 incident. “I have three daughters, and my daughters are my world, and you’re going to do that in front of my daughters?”
Originally published at Nate Gartrell