No Information Whatsoever
Initial media reports said the two officers involved in the killing, Brian Sullivan and Eli Maile, were initially placed on leave. We called Sparks PD to find out more about this leave, and whether there had been any further internal discipline, but no one was immediately available to answer our questions. Recent records indicate Sullivan has had a rising compensation with Sparks PD, to over $200,000 in 2019, while Maile was last listed as a “Fire Prevention Inspector” for Sparks, according to Transparent Nevada.
Sullivan was also recently listed as part of the Sparks Police Protective Association, which describes itself as a non profit organization for active duty and retired police officers in the Truckee Meadows.
As is operating procedure for killings by Sparks police, such as the Miciah Lee tragedy this part January, the Reno Police Department and the Washoe County Sheriff's Office took over the investigation. As is also the case with Miciah Lee, there is still no public report or release of any body cam footage. There have been posts on social media indicating Sullivan might have been involved in Lee’s killing as well, based on overheard police call signals, but there has been even less transparency on that case, or open knowledge about the officers involved in the Black teenager’s death. We were unable to ask this question to Sparks PD since their Public Information Officer was not available for comment.
Peter Goldstein who is representing Brizuela’s wife says he is in the “dark as well.” He says delays in the case he finds “without explanation” are mounting.
The Lawyer Representing Brizuela Does Not Understand Delay
Peter Goldstein, who is representing the plaintiffs, says he has been told the report by the Reno police department has been completed and turned over to the Washoe County District Attorney’s office, and that the deputy district attorney on the case also completed his review. The investigation, he says, is now in the hands of Washoe County District Attorney Christopher Hicks for “his determination as to whether or not the officers are going to be charged. Now it's going to be almost two years years since this happened. And, we believe that they've had more than an adequate time to do these investigations and there certainly is no need for a continued delay,” Goldstein told us in a telephone call this week.
In April, the North Las Vegas City Council unanimously approved a $1 million settlement to the parents of Gonzalo Rico who was shot and killed by North Las Vegas police in 2018, in a case where Goldstein represented Rico’s parents in the federal lawsuit.
In the Brizuela case, however, there has been no movement. “Not one bit of information has been provided to us as to what would be the impediment to completing it,” Goldstein said. “We’re concerned about the body cam footage, and all the tests, ballistic investigations that they purportedly did.”
Delays, Goldstein explains, can cause problems to seek the truth.
“The longer it takes for them to produce it, the more difficult it is sometimes to locate witnesses and verify information. They took everything from the residence of Brizuelas that day. They took boxes of inventory, items from them, some of which they know what they took, some of which they don’t, that’s never been returned.”
The coroner’s autopsy report on Brizuela’s killing has also been blocked pending the release of the investigation.
New Hearing Next Week Related to Case
A hearing related to the case is scheduled for next week, with more delays being sought. Goldstein hopes the magistrate judge instead requests that the report, ballistics tests and body cam footage are quickly made available.
“I mean the body cam footage is going to be very, very telling,” Goldstein said. He said he understands a family’s and a community’s frustration in getting answers especially now with all the protests related to the George Floyd police killing in Minneapolis.
“It's kind of a breathtaking moment for this country, in terms of understanding the excessive force cases involving police and minorities and in fact, I mentioned that their motion, the fact that they're asking for more time even now, shows that they're completely oblivious to what's going on in this country and how we've been too deferential to police, investigations and prosecutors. So, if this was really a situation where the video cam the body cam from the officers showed that they had no reasonable belief that their lives were in danger, no bodily harm or death, they had no right to use deadly force. Now would the body cam show that of course. So why would that take two years? There’s never been an explanation for that.”