LAPD's False Info to Suspect Led to Murder of 16-Year-Old 'Witness'
A young woman was murdered in 2003 apparently because of a Los Angeles Police Department ruse to extract information from a suspect that backfired.
Seeking to find out more from suspect Jose Ledesma, 19, about the murder of another young man, two LAPD detectives told Ledesma that 16-year-old Martha Puebla had fingered him, reports the Los Angeles Times.
In fact, she hadn’t. But Ledesma took the bait–and placed a phone call from the jail, on a recorded line, ordering Puebla’s murder, the newspaper recounts. Five months later, before the call recording was checked and without any warning from police to Puebla that she had been identified to Ledesma as a “witness,” she was murdered. Her family has filed suit against the city and the police concerning her murder, which, like the killing of the young man in which Ledesma was suspected, appears to have been gang-related.
Earlier this month, after the Times reported the story behind Puebla’s killing, a detective involved in the interrogation was reassigned. Additionally, starting last week, detectives are being trained to consider the consequences to third parties of using such interrogation tactics.
Previously, according to LAPD Deputy Chief Charlie Beck, almost any ruse was permissible, so long as it didn’t seem likely to lead to a false confession by an innocent person. Now, he says, detectives are being told to weigh the benefit of the confession they hope to extract against the danger that a lie may create for others. They are also being trained that they have a duty to offer police protection to an individual they believe they have put at risk of retaliation.
