The Antelope Valley Times

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Criminal case dropped against mother in AV Hospital scuffle

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Maria Chiclana, 63, was originally charged with felony resisting an officer.

LANCASTER – The criminal case has been dropped against a 63-year-old woman whose son was beaten by Lancaster deputies at Antelope Valley Hospital last year.

Maria Chiclana had been charged with resisting an officer for her role in a violent altercation between her son, Marco Chiclana, and Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputies. The fight was caught on tape April 2, 2011 (view the video below).

Marco Chiclana, 35, called deputies to the hospital to assist him with his father, Damaso Chiclana, who was disoriented after surgery and trying to leave the hospital against doctors’ wishes. For reasons unclear by the parking lot security footage, Marco ended up in fight with six deputies in the hospital parking lot.

Marco, Maria, Damaso, and friend, Ibarra Deleon, were all arrested in connection with the incident.

Deputies claim Marco was the aggressor in the scuffle. Marco was charged with eight felony counts, including resisting arrest, battery on an officer and mayhem.

Damaso, Maria and Ibarra were each charged with felony resisting an officer. Damaso’s and Ibarra’s cases were dismissed last year. Maria’s charge was reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor during her preliminary hearing, according to her defense attorney Bradley Gage, who took on the case after the preliminary hearing.

Gage said Maria’s case was dismissed altogether on May 4, 2012, after he requested a probable cause hearing, and the district attorney was unable to present evidence demonstrating probable cause to charge Maria.

“He advised the court that he was unable to proceed,” Gage said, adding that, normally, when a DA is unable to proceed, it’s because the arresting officer is not present.

“The arresting officer was deputy Esswein, and deputy Esswein was in court that day…” Gage said. “The fact that the DA could not proceed further demonstrates there was no reason they should have brought these charges to begin with.”

“The District Attorney’s Office should be commended for doing the right thing and dismissing the charges against Maria,” Gage added.

Marco Chiclana’s criminal case is still pending.

Gage is not representing Marco in the criminal case, however, he is representing the Chiclana family in a civil lawsuit against the Sheriff’s Department in connection with the April 2, 2011 incident.

Read more on that lawsuit here.

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Filed Under: Crime/ Safety

56 comments for "Criminal case dropped against mother in AV Hospital scuffle"

  1. Whoever said we’ll be making this family rich was right. Maybe our local deputies would be less likely to throw the first punch if the cash came from the deputies pockets.

  2. @Darius White
    You are right, the article doesn’t say anything about hospital security telling them to call sheriffs. I was confused about that too. Then I clicked through to the previous story on the lawsuit. There it is! You have to click through to read more about the lawsuit to see where the hospital security told them to call 911.
    After watching the video several times I see that Marco did get a punch or two off. I am now on the fence on this one…

    • When you have someone pummeling your face, it’s almost impossible to keep yourself from trying to protect yourself. Try taking a couple of punches, while keeping your hands at your side. If nothing else, you’ll find yourself at the very least, putting your hands up trying to block the punches. It’s instinct.

  3. Wow, are we missing something here. Aren’t the Sheriff’s supposed to “protect and serve”?
    This man called the Sheriff’s department for help. I’m sure the entire family was stressed, dealing with an elderly person just out of surgery who is disoriented can be incredibly difficult as they are often a bit aggressive, and not in their right mind. It’s a high anxiety situation. The hospital staff was 100% in the right to instruct the family to call 911. They can not intervene when a patient tries to remove themselves, no matter how disoriented, against medical advice, but the police can if they determine that the patient is acting in a way that is a threat to themselves or others, or even if the patients condition rendered them incapable of removing themselves from the hospital, as the patient intended to do.
    Sheriff’s deputies are trained to deal with people in these kinds of situations, as all kinds of Domestic calls tend to be high anxiety calls, and in most areas, the sheriff’s successfully diffuse issues, they don’t beat the people asking for help to a bloody pulp.
    It’s “Protect and Serve”, not “We order, you obey”.
    People often wonder why, in cases where police or Sheriff’s departments (or even city halls)become rife with corruption, how it happens and why no one reports it, sometimes for years, and years. People do say things, there are even videos, but other people will jump up and defend even the most egregious cases of absuse and corruption by thinking its somehow “pro-cop” to do so.
    I guess what its going to take up here is a Fullerton style event to wake people up, where the sheriff’s beat someone to death in full view of a camera, before anything is done and people start taking this seriously.

  4. After watching the video, I have to agree that it appears to be a case of police brutality. Someone made the comment that since there was no sound we couldn’t hear what Marco had said to the officer. Are you serious? Those officers are supposed to be trained and should recognize why this son needed help with his father. Instead he was taken down to the ground, repeatedly kicked and hit. I say press charges against the cops. The Mother, on the other hand, really didn’t play a part other than showing concern for her son who was getting beat up by a gang of cops.I guess the Officers thought the best defense was an offense. Good luck Marco, I hope you and your family get rich off this brutal act committed upon you.

    • Really? I watched the video too, and it looks like a straightforward case of resisting arrest. Maybe he shouldn’t have been arrested in the first place, but if he would’ve complied during the process instead of fighting the cops, it wouldn’t have happened. It’s not like Rodney King where you see the cops just continue to wale on him after he’s down and restrained.

      • Althought the cop who comes around back of Marco at about 1:24 clearly looks like he’s sodomizing him!

        • J. Ripper, what are you talking about. What possible reason would the police have to arrest the person who was clearly standing next to the truck trying to keep the patient from driving away? Resisting arrest? Why were they arresting him to begin with. He CALLED THEM FOR HELP. Don’t you get it? You seem like the type of person who would say a cop is right just because they’re a cop. You sound like a fool once again.

          • It’s useless Sleepless. These folks can’t handle the truth.

            “A society whose citizens refuse to see and investigate the facts, who refuse to believe that their government and their media will routinely lie to them and fabricate a reality contrary to verifiable facts, is a society that chooses and deserves the Police State Dictatorship it’s going to get.”

            — Ian Williams Goddard

          • Yeah…we have a police state here. That’s why the AV is running amok! I love the idiots in this story, and most of the commenters. They call the cops, then think they are going to dictate to the cop what they are and aren’t going to do. Honestly people, calling the cops because your dad wants to leave? That is AV hospital security’s job, and if they can’t handle that incident maybe they should pack it up.

          • Damn! Again, someone who blesses us with their views without reading the story. SECURITY INSTRUCTED THEM TO CALL THE SHERIFFS! So if you believe what you wrote, tell it to AVH security.

          • Thanks Jackie, seems like some people are stuck on only calling the police if you need muscle and heads cracked and bad guys caught. This family was instructed by security to call them for safety reasons. I bet they won’t make that mistake again.

          • I hear you. Reading these comments, over and over we got these people insisting that they should of let security handle it, and it’s pointed out time after time that they did what the were told BY security.
            They were told to call the sheriffs. Thus, letting security “handle it.”
            Then they whine because the family did what they were told. By doing what these folks say they should of done. LET AVC SECURITY HANDLE IT! The way they handled it was have the family call.
            Really, why are the so slow figuring this out? To lazy to read the article?
            Then they whine that they called the sheriffs to handle their family’s very sick and confused father.
            I guess they should of just let dad drive away, die, and take some poor unsuspecting fellow driver with him.
            Then these same people would be here screaming to have the family arrested for letting their father leave.
            And I agree that the sheriffs are here to serve in situations of danger, to help protect the community.
            Exactly what the family needed. To help them protect the community from the dangers of allowing their father to leave.
            If the family had used force to stop their father from leaving, they would how been beaten and arrested for elder abuse.
            So I guess the outcome would of been the same.
            The real question is why there have been so many “resisting arrest” arrests, without any reasons for people to be arrested.
            Blind obedience to authority figures IS NOT the American way.
            I think most of these people telling everyone to unquestioningly follow police orders is the same mentality we fought in WWII.
            Maybe they would be happier in China?

          • As suggested by both “Jacky” and “Sleepless…”, I read the article several times, and I still do not read where “SECURITY INSTRUCTED THEM TO CALL THE SHERIFFS”. In any case, I tend to agree with “someone who knows” on this one.

          • You’re absolutely right. There was more than one article on this and most of us read all of them. You will find the statement saying the AVH security told them this;

            “Chiclana tried to persuade his father to return to the hospital, and sought help from hospital security who told him to call 911, according to the complaint.”

            4 articles in all.

            6th paragraph down. There, I did the work for you.
            “http://www.theavtimes.com/2011/12/21/man-sues-sheriffs-dept-over-hospital-beat-down/”

          • Let them do their own homework Jacki. They won’t believe any deputy guilty of wrong doing regardless.

          • Yes, Police Officers never do anything wrong, do they? They don’t commit murder, they don’t steal drugs from the evidence room, they don’t extort people, they don’t plant evidence, they don’t commit perjury…

    • SHAME ON THE LASD DEPUTIES THAT RESPONDED. You even went as far as to harass an old lady. Get a grip on your testosterone.

  5. What’d he expect? You resist a Cop and they’re going to bring all their friends. Hope the Deputy wasnt injured.

      • It wouldn’t be my family, because we listen when a police officer tells us to do something.

        • Resisting or fighting a police officer will get you one of three things. Arrested, shot or dead.

          • Agreed Jliv…I, and 99.999% of the people I know have managed to go our whole lives without ever being in a scuffle with a cop!

          • If the cops where in the right, THE CASE WOULDN’T OF BEEN DROPPED! Brain dead much?

          • Hey McFly, first of all the word is “were” not *where* second of all, the district attorney drops cases on people every day,even when the cops “are in the right” for various reasons. If mama and marco didn’t need the cops to wipe their a$$e$, I mean “control their elderly dad” this never would have happened!

          • OH BOY! A cop groupie. Get all a tingly when a sheriff walks by ya? Drool dripping?

            The old woman didn’t act like you when the sheriffs showed up. She didn’t have the time to fawn. Her son was having all the bones in his face broken, while her husband was in a medically induced delirium. So they pushed her around. And that’s what turns you on? Blame the victim. They not only had nothing on her, but because they played the bully, you and I will make this woman a millionaire.

            Why wouldn’t they take you on the force again. Psychologically unfit?
            Or just no need for any more punks then they already had? Towel boy.

            (Here. Since your only argument is spelling. Your an idiot {instead of you’re} knock yourself out.)

      • I support you mrs.chiclana. A high anxiety situation made worse by cops who would not listen to what the problem was, and why they were called. Did Mr.Chiclana get back into the hospital after all this and was there someone there to take care of him when the officers arrested all of you? I can imagine this only added to his pain and frustration. I would like to think that things will get better here in Lancaster, but my fear is it will not.

        • According to the article, the elder Mr. Chiclana, the one who just had the surgery, was arrested as well. Go figure…

    • Getreal, you mean the 5 cops that were holding the guy down who WAS NOT resisting? or the cop who knocked the older person down and didn’t bother to help them untill they decided to arrest them too. Probably for being a witness and they accused them of resisting arrest. Poor Mrs Chiclana.

      • Like I said, we will pay for the sheriffs response. Mrs. Chiclana. The AV’s next millionaire! Courtesy of LASD and the tax dollars LASD is burning through.

        • Sammy, unfortunately money lost in lawsuits seems to be the only thing that the LASD upper brass understands. If the pay out is large enough, this kind of behavior might stop.

  6. So you think the officer for absolutely no reason threw him up against the car then threw him on the ground?? The video has no sound so it is not evidence of anything. The man obviously said something and made a move toward the car, whatever he said the officer disagreed with and threw him up against the car. The officer was most likely giving him orders like put your hands behind your back, spread your legs etc. He decides he is better than the law and tries to overpower the cop then gets slammed to the ground and chaos insues. Why you would call the cops for help then not listen to what they have to say is not very bright. Law enforcement is there to uphold the law and to keep you safe. If you don’t do exactly what they tell you, when they tell you…then you get what you deserve! I’m so sick of the disrespect of police officers these days, yes there are a few bad ones but people really need to “man up” when you break the law and you get hauled off to jail it’s not the cops fault it’s yours! Take responsibility people!!

    • Amen! Too many people want to cry police brutality. It was 4 guys and just one cop. If you don’t do what a cop tells you what to do this is what happens. If people would respect law enforcement and do what they tell you stuff like this wouldn’t happen. The cop was there to help, not looking to arrest someone.

    • Never question the sheriffs? Yeah, the cops were probably “giving him orders like put your hands behind your back, spread your legs etc” while his ill post op dad needed to get back to his hospital bed. The whole reason they called. WHY ARE THE COPS HARASSING THIS FAMILY? The same sheriffs that roughed up a young woman for riding her bike while black. Sounds like these ARE the bad apples.

        • I was not aware that an adult leaving the hospital under his own free will was against the law. If he was mentally unable to make a sound decision, and his family was not able to intervene, his physician and hospital security officers should have committed him to the mental health unit (as they do with suicidal people). I guess I don’t get why the police were called in the first place, and I really don’t get why someone would call the police for help, then disregard the police’s orders.

          • There are many occassions when a patient will get dressed and leave the hospital without anyone stopping them. The hospital will tell them their insurance may not cover their stay if they leave against dr orders, but they will not stop the patient. Often, when an elderly person wakes up after surgury, they are disoriented and hallucinating. Ask any doctor or nurse. The man was going to drive himself away from the hospital, do you not get that? Everyone was on high stress level and the cops didn’t handle it properly. They acted like bullies and beat Marco up…did you not see the cop run up and kick him when the other 3 or 4 were laying on top of him? Come on, you have got to be kidding!!!

          • Do you not read? THEY WERE TOLD TO CALL THE SHERIFFS BY THE HOSPITAL SECURITY AND STAFF. Wow!
            It’s like you people create some alternative reality in your minds to keep your rosy mental picture of authority figures. This GOOD SON NEVER had a problem with the law before. Just a man who gets up, works, takes care of his family, and did what he was told to do in a situation that he had never found himself in before.
            But both the hospital and sheriffs HAD and have plenty of experience in these types of situations.
            Yet these are just like any other group of workers. Good, bad and douches)But because of people like many posting here, the douche men and women feel they are above both the law, and basic human civility. Cop or criminal.
            You that not just approve of, but cheer such LAWLESS brutality are the reason we are becoming a police state.
            Just because you all need and crave some sick bullying authority figure in your life, you enable the “bad apples”. Good cops don’t stand a chance in their workplace anymore. That’s why many are leaving to work anywhere but here. To bad we got so many new young bullies to take their place.
            This is how DICtatorships come to power. With flowers thrown at their feet by fools. (hopefully there’s a misspelled word or TO {how’s that?} in this for those same fools!)

          • Darius, excellent point. Unless the old man was climbing into a car to drive while under the influence, then why would they call the cops?? Tools like Sammy, and Sleepless, and many others across the US, want the cops to wipe their a$$es and hold their weenie$ when they pee nowadays. Then, when the cop shows up, they whine about the brand of toilet paper the cop is using! You called the cops because your dad was leaving the hospital? Really? Seriously? Good god people, handle your business! You always whine the cops aren’t out “getting the real criminals”, how can they when you call them to babysit your entire life? Sammy, if I’m a cop groupie because I support the cops, then you must be a parolee for your hatred of them?

          • Really? Damn, I’m done with you white boy, trying to play a female Hispanic.
            You truly believe booze could make someone more dangerous behind a wheel then anesthesia from open heart surgery? Good point?
            Your mama raised an idiot!
            Oh yeah, never been arrested. Enjoy your police state!

          • Nacho Momma, you sound really angry about something. I don’t understand your comment about somebody “needing someone to wipe their ass” etc. The police should have defused this situation instead of causing a big fight and having to makeup charges so they could arrest all the witnesses. You are a mixed up man or woman. Don’t drag me into your angry rants. Thank you.

    • “You get what you deserve”… When you say something (anything) to a cop. That seems a little too broad, let me narrow it down a little. I hope that means that they deserve a big settlement after a successful civil suit. By the way, that Maria sure looks like a real tough customer. She’s lucky they didn’t shoot her for carrying that deadly weapon she’s holding (in the picture above). She could’ve put someone’s eye out with that thing.
      Obviously, the responding officer didn’t or wasn’t capable of assessing the situation properly. He looks incompetent as well as being overweight. A more competent officer could have easily handled this situation to a positive outcome.

    • When an officer gets a call he is suspicious and doesn’t believe all he is suppose to believe. The do have ambushes set for cops, especially all those who hate cops. Anyway, dispatch gets the call, sends to officers, and they respond. Do you really think a cop rolls upon the scene and believes everything a stranger tells him?? They investigate, and based on visual they make the decision to handle it properly. The officer does not know these people, it could have been a car jacking for all he knew, not all people tell the truth. This Marco person could have been aggressive with the officer due to his stress over his father and the officer not knowing the full facts responded to protect himself. When you have several people gathered at an incident it can be deadly very quickly, so officers have to go slow and gather the information. The hospital security is to protect the hospital property and employees, not get involved in people wanting to leave. If the man could walk out of the hospital on his own then they can not stop him. Those who have posted negative comments regarding making the cops pay big for this probably have been in trouble with the law and hate anything legal. We folks, were not there, we do not know what was said and can not make a judgement call based on a video. The jury heard testimony and they made the decision that this man was in the wrong, and I am sure there were some LATINOS on the jury…

  7. Okay after reading the charges and seeing the video I do not see where anyone was the aggressor, except the police officer moving the man, and shoving him, the guy is swung around and the fight goes on.I see an old man lying on the floor and officers walk by, and not pay any attention, to him, I see a guy in a blue shirt a bystander be arrested and like 5-7 cops beating this guy up. Whatever he said to this officer when he was first talking to him really does not warrant this type of behavior from law enforcement. I see this was traumatic enough for this wife and mother to see her family being assaulted and treated like animals instead of compassion, for a family concerned for their loved ones health and welfare!!

    • Yes it does. If law enforcement gives you and order, you do it. How was the cop suppose to know the guy didn’t have a gun or knife? Plus it was 4 on 1 to start. You think the cop is going to go after the guy for no reason? Neither of us was there, so you have no right to say that any behavior was unacceptable. You’re just jumping to conclusions. The cop was there to HELP, not arrest or get into a fight with someone. It’s obvious the guy didn’t do what the cop told him to do. If you do stupid crap like that, well then there are consequences. So tired of people jumping on the band wagon and crying police brutality.

      • BS. If they are worried about being shot when called to help get a disoriented patient back to his bed, they need to be taken off the street. And in case you haven’t noticed, there was a video.
        If they are so blameless, why did they lie about the “2nd” video?
        The one they said they saw, and would show “what really happened”?
        They went from one publication to another, claiming the “2nd” video “showed” them being attacked! Guess what? Never existed. Guess that makes them liars on top of being brutal bully’s!
        And what the hell is wrong with you concerned? You want us to live in a police state? You sound like the sheriff spokesman, Whitmore”. “Do what the cops say, or expect to have bones in your face broken, and “look” forward to being blinded”!
        So the punishment for not being a puppet on a sheriff’s string is having the crap beat out of you??!!? No trial, no judge no jury. What’s the difference from a gang member stopping you in the street, telling you to “jump” and and cop stopping you in the street telling you to “jump”. Since they’ll both beat the shit out of you, or kill you if you don’t, what’s the difference?

        The difference is we call gangs “gangs”, and sheriff gangs “cliques.” The out come appears to be the same.

        http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/05/17/BAM41OJHJK.DTL

        ys!

      • I disagree the first Officer wasn’t capable of offering any help. He couldn’t even control a small group of people. He didn’t appear to know what he was doing. He seems scared, incompetent, and inadequate.

  9. Come on, seriously?! Resisting?? I watched the video and I don’t see the lady in it anywhere, unless she was the one sprawled on the ground towards the end. That was a trumped up charge for sure! Why was she fighting this for over a year??
    To be clear, I have never had a problem with deputies, and I hope I never do. This right here raises my eyebrows though.

    • Kind of scary to think this could happen to anyone who calls a cop for help. I have not had a problem with cops either, but this is not the first brutal video I have seen starring Lancaster’s finest.It’s making me go, hmmmmm.

    • yup, justice will be served, marco will probably end up in jail.. if something had happened to the man that wanted to leave after surgery, would the family have sued the hospital? of course!