Police Find No Support for Youths’ Assault Claim

A Torrance police investigation has not substantiated claims by two youths that they were assaulted by a group of teen-agers on Ocean Avenue March 29, a police lieutenant said Friday.

“We don’t see there being any chargeable offenses,” said Lt. Michael Hertica, traffic division commander. But results of the investigation, completed last week, will be submitted to the Torrance city prosecutor and the district attorney, Hertica said. The final investigation report has not been released.

Torrance police, meanwhile, have opened an internal affairs investigation into a complaint that Torrance police covered up facts about the incident. And a department official confirmed Friday that the son of a Torrance police officer--whom he would not name--was among the teen-agers in the area that night.

Dustin Lunde, 17, and John Urman, 18, said they crashed their pickup truck into a tree around midnight March 29 after a group of teen-agers pursued the truck and threatened them.

The two Harbor City youths said Torrance police officers who responded to the accident grew less interested in investigating it after the youths identified one of their pursuers as a police officer’s son.

An investigation by the department’s detective and traffic divisions found that the youths’ accounts contradicted a witness’ statement, said Hertica, who declined to give details.

Lunde said last week that one teen-ager ran behind the truck carrying some kind of metal object. Hertica said, however, that police have found no evidence of a weapon at the scene.

However, Lunde insisted Friday that the teen-agers attacked him and Urman.

“I think jumping on my car, breaking my antenna off and hanging onto my car is pretty much of an attack,” Lunde said.

Lunde’s mother, Shirlyn Pappas, has maintained that the police are covering up the matter because a police officer’s son was involved.

In an April 5 letter, Pappas notified the department that she wished to file a formal complaint against the two lead officers who investigated the accident that night. That letter prompted a separate internal affairs investigation, said Lt. Robert Armstrong, personnel division commander.

Pappas is the wife of Timothy Pappas, a former Torrance police officer who was dismissed with two other officers after he accidentally shot a construction worker who was stopped for questioning in 1988. Pappas pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor count of filing a false report.

Shirlyn Pappas has been critical of how the Torrance police handled the shooting, saying that the three officers were instructed to coordinate their stories about the incident.

Hertica referred to Timothy Pappas’ dismissal Friday, saying that Shirlyn Pappas has “got an ax to grind” in her criticism of the department’s handling of her son’s accident.

The police investigation of the Ocean Avenue accident “shows no evidence of any cover-up or attempt at any cover-up,” Hertica said. He called the accident “a very minor nickel-and-dime situation.”

Armstrong said, however, that the internal affairs investigation is far from being finished. “We have quite a few people to talk to,” he said.

Told that Hertica’s investigation found no evidence of a cover-up, Armstrong said: “I’m glad to hear that, but we’ll make our own determination of that.”