‘He Feels Very Bad’ : Officer in Shooting of Beach-Goer Identified

The Newport Beach police officer who mistook a portable stereo for a gun and shot and seriously wounded a beach-goer early Sunday was identified Tuesday as Derek Duncan, 25, a three-year veteran of the force with an additional year of experience with the Orange County Sheriff’s Department.

“I know personally that he feels very bad about it,” said Robert Oakley, a spokesman for the Newport Beach Police Department who confirmed the officer’s name after it was revealed by an attorney for the victim’s family. “This was a tragic situation, and I’m sure he realizes it.”

Duncan was one of several Newport Beach officers responding to a nighttime call about a man with a sawed-off shotgun on the beach. Although a number of details of the incident are in dispute, both police and the victim’s family agree that Duncan ran up to Sundaga Bryant, 26, mistook Bryant’s portable stereo for a shotgun and shot him.

Moments later, nearby, a 14-year-old boy with a pellet gun was detained by police.

At a news conference Tuesday at Fountain Valley Regional Hospital & Medical Center, where Bryant is in the intensive care unit in critical condition, his wife, Marlene Bryant, again disputed some details of the police account of her husband’s shooting.

At the same news conference, the attending surgeon who operated on Sundaga Bryant told reporters that he questioned the original police statement that Bryant was facing the officer when he was struck by the 12-gauge shotgun blast.

Dr. Santosh K. Mohanty said the BB-size double-ought pellets struck Bryant from the left side, breaking his left arm, passing through his stomach and exiting to his right arm. Surgeons worked for 11 hours to repair the damage, which included a severed artery in Bryant’s left arm. Surgeons also had to remove Bryant’s colon and parts of his stomach, Mohanty said.

Whether Bryant may lose his left arm remains “up in the air,” Mohanty said. “He’s doing reasonably well. He’s on the critical list and there may be some complications.” More surgery will be required, Mohanty added.

Oakley on Tuesday said that “it is entirely possible” that Bryant was actually shot in the side as he turned but that a final accounting will not be determined until after an investigation.

Marlene Bryant, 30, earlier this week had said her husband was shot in the back but deferred to Mohanty’s opinion on Tuesday.

The case is under investigation by the Orange County district attorney’s office, the city and the Police Department, routine procedure in officer-involved shootings, Newport police spokesman Oakley said. Duncan is also receiving counseling for the shooting and has been put into an administrative position, Oakley said.

Oakley said Duncan had never before been involved in a shooting incident. A sheriff’s spokesman said he could not release any personnel information on Duncan other than to confirm that he worked for the department from October, 1984, through June, 1985, when he resigned voluntarily. He then joined the Newport police, Oakley said.

Christian W. Keena, the attorney for the Bryant family, said Tuesday that he has not yet filed a lawsuit in the case. But among the charges the family may allege against the police are civil rights violations, excessive use of force and misconduct. He noted that the family faces the loss of Bryant’s income from his job as a cab driver and said that they might seek punitive damages.

“We feel very strongly the man is entitled to compensation,” Keena said.

Keena said that the Bryants are not raising allegations of racism but that the shooting reflected “poor judgment” by Duncan. Sundaga Bryant is black and his wife is white. Marlene Bryant has said she believed that the shooting might have been racially motivated.

Oakley called such allegations “absolutely not true.”

“You have to take into account the time of the day, darkness and the immediacy of the situation,” as the relevant factors, Oakley said.

Accounts by police and Marlene Bryant of the 2:50 a.m. shooting are essentially similar but vary somewhat on a couple of key points.

Police said Bryant resembled the description of a Latino man in his 20s who residents had reported was carrying a sawed-off shotgun in the area. An Asian youth, 14, was found carrying a paint-pellet gun nearby immediately after the shooting and was questioned by police, Oakley said. But the officers did not know this when they began combing the beach, Oakley said.

“This was a very serious call,” Oakley said. “Lives were at danger. People on the beach were possibly in jeopardy because someone has a shotgun.”

Bryant, standing near the beach bermline, “fit the general description in the darkness as far as (Duncan) could see,” Oakley said. Bryant spun towards the officer when ordered to freeze and Duncan fired when he saw a black object under Bryant’s arm, Oakley said.

Marlene Bryant said the couple were relaxing on a blanket about 40 feet from a lighted parking area north of the Balboa Pier when the sand lit up and they became confused. She saw flashlights, a helicopter hovering overhead with its searchlight playing over the area and she recognized the police, Bryant said.

“I thought they were just going to run us off the beach,” she said. The beach is generally closed after midnight, police said.

Suddenly, two police officers shined their lights on the couple and a third officer yelled “drop it,” firing a single shot that hit her husband, Bryant said. Police did not identify themselves or wait before firing, she said.

“My husband never moved,” she said. “He said, ‘What’s going on?’ ”

Her husband, who was standing, had a long, thin, black portable stereo high on a strap under his left arm, Bryant said. Asked if police could have mistaken the stereo in the 3 a.m. darkness for a shotgun, Bryant said, “Not in my opinion.”

Bryant said there “was plenty of light” in the area for police to see the couple clearly.

Saying he could not comment directly on the case, Oakely described what passes through a police officer’s mind when confronted with a similar encounter.

“It’s the type of situation where if you hesitate you may never, never get a chance again,” Oakley said. “It’s something where you have to process all the information you have and make your best judgment decision within a fraction of a second.”

Oakley said it is the police officer’s own choice whether to carry a shotgun when responding to reports of an armed suspect. According to department policy, lethal force is justified only in cases where the officer feels his life or another’s is threatened, Oakley said.

Sundaga Bryant’s wounds have left the family in a financial predicament, his wife said. Bryant came to the United States from his native Liberia in 1985. The couple were married in July, 1987, and have a total of four children, three by previous marriages. The family is without insurance, however, and her husband is their sole supporter, Marlene Bryant said.

A bank account to aid the family has been established. Donations can be sent to the family at their lawyer’s office at 23072 Lake Center Drive, Suite 204, El Toro, Calif. 92630.