Officer Fired Over Kicking Incident Is Rehired : Brutality case: Daniel J. Lowrey of the Laguna Beach police, accused of lying during a probe, maintains that he was wrongly charged.

LAGUNA BEACH —  Police Officer Daniel J. Lowrey will get his job back, almost five months after he was dismissed over allegations that he lied to superiors during the investigation of the kicking of a homeless man by another officer.

City Manager Kenneth C. Frank announced Tuesday that Lowrey, 26, may return to work at 8 a.m. Monday and receive back pay and benefits retroactive to July 25.

Lowrey will, however, still lose a month’s pay. The 30 days after he was terminated June 26 will be treated as an unpaid suspension to punish the officer for having been “deficient in his observation of the incident in June of 1990” by claiming not to have seen Officer Keith R. Knotek kick a man only several feet in front of him, Frank said in a written statement. A resident had videotaped the incident. Knotek has since been fired.

Frank would not comment on the reasons for Lowrey’s reinstatement beyond what he wrote in a one-page statement announcing the rehiring, his secretary said Tuesday.

Lowrey said he was happy with Frank’s decision to rehire him but that he would reserve comment on the suspension until he discusses possible legal action with his attorneys, who were in court Tuesday.

“I’ll be glad to go back to work,” Lowrey said. “I was innocent and wrongly charged.”

Lowrey, who last week sought a court order to force Frank to rehire him, might amend his complaint to instead fight the suspension, said Susan M. Simpson, a legal assistant for Lowrey’s attorneys.

Police officers in Laguna Beach also were pleased that Lowrey will be returning to work, said Hilda Madrid, president of the Laguna Beach Police Employees Assn.

Madrid added that she disagrees with Frank’s suspension decision.

“I don’t think he should have have been disciplined for anything,” said Madrid, a senior police records clerk. “He didn’t do anything wrong. He didn’t have a reason to lie over this. . . .”

Lowrey’s problems with the city began in December after the videotape of the kicking incident surfaced and a $1-million police brutality claim was filed.

Kevin A. Dunbar, a homeless man, had turned over a videotape made by a South Laguna resident to the Orange County district attorney’s office and to a private attorney. The resident recorded Dunbar’s being kicked during an arrest outside a loud party. The tape shows former officer Knotek kicking at Dunbar at least three times as Dunbar struggles on the ground with two other officers. The tape shows Lowrey standing nearby watching the struggle to control Dunbar, who was being arrested on misdemeanor warrants for having failed to appear in court on charges of drinking in public and other minor offenses.

Police Chief Neil J. Purcell then called for an internal investigation, and the district attorney’s office and the Orange County Grand Jury investigated the matter as a criminal case. The criminal investigation ended with no charges being filed against Knotek.

But at the conclusion of the departmental investigation, Purcell fired Knotek, saying that Knotek had used excessive force, and fired Lowrey, alleging that Lowrey had lied to a police captain investigating the incident by saying he didn’t see Dunbar being kicked.

Both appealed their dismissals to the city Personnel Board, which held separate hearings to review the cases. The board upheld Knotek’s firing but recommended that Lowrey be rehired.

Lowrey has maintained that he did not lie about the incident. He said he told Capt. William Cavenaugh that he caught a glimpse out of the corner of his eye of Knotek making a “kicking motion” toward Dunbar but that he did not see whether the kicks landed.

Cavenaugh, however, said that Lowrey was evasive during questioning and that, in his opinion, Lowrey could not have avoided seeing the kicks.

Purcell said Tuesday that he would “work with” the city manager’s decision to rehire Lowrey, as he had pledged to do after the Personnel Board acted. “It does not change my thinking, and I think my decision to terminate was justified,” Purcell said. But he said he anticipated no problems working with Lowrey on the force.