Stanislaus County settles with teen pepper-sprayed, shot with bean bags while on LSD
Stanislaus County settled a lawsuit with a Patterson family in the amount of $237,500 for force used against a 17-year-old boy who was on the hallucinogenic drug LSD.
The plaintiff, Jedidiah Morelos, was pepper-sprayed, shot six times with a beanbag shot gun and hit multiple times with batons when deputies responded to his home in 2018 to assist firefighters with a medical call.
The lawsuit said Morelos was suffering a mental health crisis and needed help. The deputies involved – Brent Salyer, Chad Lewis and Derek Crowley – wrote in their reports that Morelos was extremely agitated and aggressively charged them with a wooden pencil in his hand.
Deputies left the home following the use of force and told firefighters also to leave without disclosing the force they had used.
Morelos’ parents took him to Emanuel Medical Center in Turlock. He was transferred to UC Davis Medical Center, where he spent several days being treated for injuries, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit was one of 11 cases since 2017, which were cited as an example of excessive force by the Sheriff’s Department in another lawsuit recently filed for the May fatal shooting of a 16-year-old driver Xander Mann.
Morelos’ mother, Nora Morelos, said the incident on March 4, 2018, began when her son woke her up around 3 a.m., told her he’d used LSD, that he was scared and he felt “like his soul was going to be taken away.”
Nora Morelos said in her deposition that she tried reading the bible with her son in an effort to calm him while her oldest daughter took two younger children outside. When Jedidiah Morelos started reading the bible louder and louder, Nora Morelos’ husband called 911.
Patterson firefighters responded to incident
Patterson Fire Department Captain Marty Greunke and firefighter Tony Anderson responded to the scene and found Morelos standing on his bed “yelling and praying into the ceiling fan” and sweating profusely, according to their depositions.
They tried to assess Morelos but he yelled at them to “get out.”
The firefighters left Morelos’ room and called for assistance from the Sheriff’s Department. When deputies Salyer and Lewis arrived, the firefighters followed them back into Morelos’ room. They were the only independent witnesses to how the use of force began but they quickly backed out and did not witness the rest.
Greunke said when they went back to Morelos’ room, he was standing on his bed, behaving erratically, saying “I want to be with Jesus” and holding a pencil to his chest.
Firefighter Anderson said Morelos was threatening to stab himself with the pencil and the situation quickly escalated. Morelos went from yelling at them to ‘get out’ to aggressively telling deputies to ‘come here.’
The deputies deployed pepper spray and the firefighters retreated, going back outside.
Deputy Lewis wrote in his report that he and Salyer “calmly and professionally” spoke to Morelos and tried to reason with him but he only became more agitated and aggressive.
“He stepped down from the bed and snarled his face at us,” Lewis wrote. “He bowed his chest at us began to pull the pencil back as if to prepare to stab either Deputy Salyer or myself. I was in extreme fear for both Deputy Salyer’s and my own life. I believed an attack with the pencil was imminent on one or both of us.”
Salyer deployed his pepper spray first, followed by Lewis, who first had to holster the firearm he’d been pointing at Morelos.
Both deputies noted that pepper spray seemed to have no effect. At around the same time, deputy Crowley arrived and with a less than lethal beanbag shotgun. He fired six rounds and noted in his report that each hit to the lower body was ineffective in gaining compliance.
“The bean bag rounds had little effect on Morelos, and even after being struck with six bean bag rounds, he still remained in the center of the room, facing deputies, and standing in an aggressive manner,” Crowley wrote in his report.
Stanislaus County deputies say Morelos charged at them
The deputies said Morelos then charged at them leading to Salyer to pull out his baton, followed by Lewis and then Crowley.
Salyer struck Morelos on his upper torso with his baton approximately five times, Lewis hit him several times in the legs and torso and Crowley hit him once in the knee, according to court documents.
Morelos ran back into his room and grabbed the pencil again, according to deputies’ reports.
“We had by now exhausted all less than lethal force options,” Lewis said. “I held Jedidiah at gunpoint until the decision was made to back out of the residence.”
Two other deputies had arrived at the scene along with a sergeant but none of them were involved in the force.
Sgt. Josh Sandoval ordered everyone to leave, including medical personnel. He said in his deposition he felt that had deputies stayed, the situation could have escalated to the point of lethal force being used.
When questioned by attorneys about why he didn’t inform medical personnel about the force that was used, Sandoval said he could hear Morelos moving around upstairs and felt that was an indication his injuries were not serious.
“Like, after all this, I kind of feel ... kind of bad because, you know, we would have checked him out,” Greunke said in his deposition. “But a lot of the times if the cops feel like it’s fine, we don’t. We go off what they feel.”
The deputies in this case, through a department spokesperson, declined to comment for the story. The Morelos family also declined to comment, their attorney said.
Stanislaus County Sheriff Jeff Dirkse referred The Bee to the County Counsel’s Office for inquires about whether any deputies were disciplined in relation to the any of the cases, including Morelos’. County Counsel had not provide the details nearly a month after The Bee first inquired.
In addition to the $237,500 paid to the Morelos family and their attorneys for the settlement last April, the county spent $282,258 defending the Sheriff’s Department.
