Family sues Fontana police in shooting death of unarmed man in driveway
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It was around dinnertime at the family home in Fontana when one of Jaime Valdez’s loved ones called 911 to ask for help.
“I have a relative that’s not supposed to be here,” the unnamed caller told the dispatcher, according to a recording released by authorities. “He’s one of my cousins that’s been coming around, he’s on drugs and he’s threatening to kill us.”
Police arrived that evening on Nov. 11, 2023, and found Valdez, 33, unarmed and lying in the driveway of the residence, where his mother lived.
Exactly what happened next is under dispute — but Valdez ended up dead after being shot in the back of the head by a Fontana police officer.
In a case that revealed a string of racist text messages sent by Torrance police officers, former cops Cody Weldin and Christopher Tomsic pleaded no contest to charges linked to a 2021 incident in which they spray-painted a swastika inside a vehicle.
While authorities have claimed that Valdez tried to grab the officer’s gun and taser, his family alleges police unnecessarily escalated the confrontation, then misled them about the killing.
“[An] officer basically shot an unarmed person in the back of the head and then lied to the family about it for a year or more,” said Bradley Yourist, a lawyer for the Valdez family. “It’s pretty egregious.”
Valdez’s mother, Isabel, and his two daughters are now suing the Fontana Police Department in federal court, alleging excessive force.
“I want justice for my son,” Isabel Valdez said in Spanish in between sobs. “The officer who took his life [should pay] just like any other criminal would pay. Just because he’s a police officer he shouldn’t avoid jail.”
She claims the police stopped her from leaving her house after the shooting, preventing her from seeing her son’s body. The family alleges officers said they would take Valdez to the hospital — but the autopsy report states that he died within seconds of being shot. Valdez’s family didn’t learn of his death until the next morning, their lawsuit says.
The Fontana Police Department declined to comment, citing the ongoing investigation.
In a social media post more than eight months after the shooting, the department said the officer who fired the fatal shot, Alex Yanez, had been “violently assaulted” and maintained that he and other officers who responded to the scene did nothing wrong.
Yanez could be heard before the shooting yelling at Valdez to “Let go of my gun,” according to California Department of Justice investigative records. The department, which launched an investigation two days after the shooting, declined to comment because the probe is ongoing.
The L.A. County Sheriff’s Department used DNA testing kits for months without realizing they were faulty. An internal investigation has been launched.
Yanez told investigators that DNA testing would corroborate his claim that Valdez had “gotten ahold of” his gun after disobeying commands and getting into a struggle.
But the DNA results from Yanez’s weapon came back inconclusive, state Bureau of Forensic Services records show, and Valdez’s family contends that the edited version of body-worn camera video from the confrontation released by authorities leaves several questions unanswered.
Valdez’s family described him as a music lover and dedicated Los Angeles Dodgers and Dallas Cowboys fan. He had struggled with meth and heroin addiction, his family said in the lawsuit, which argues that when police found him lying in the driveway that evening he was unable “to follow commands because of his altered state from drugs and mental health problems.”
The edited body-cam video shows Yanez, who was hired by the Fontana Police Department in 2019, approaching Valdez, calling out repeatedly and receiving no response.
Eventually, Valdez becomes alert enough to tell the officer he wants to “go back inside.”
The officer replies, “You’re not supposed to be here though. … What’s up with you, dude?”
They go back and forth for a few moments before Valdez tells Yanez to “Go knock on the door, bro.”
“You’re gonna be put in [expletive] handcuffs if you keep talking to me like that,” Yanez responds, his words censored in the clip released by police.
Seconds later, Yanez orders Valdez to keep his hands out of his pockets, then tells him to “put your hands behind your back, dude.”
The video is then interrupted by an onscreen message from the Fontana Police Department: “The officer attempts to handcuff the suspect and he resists.”
When the clip resumes, Valdez is still on the ground and can be heard telling Yanez to “chill” as the officer tries to put him in handcuffs.
The video doesn’t provide a good view of Valdez at this point, but he can be heard saying “I’m not doing nothing to you, bro.” The sounds of a scuffle and a dog barking are audible before Valdez says, “You’re hurting me.”
Yanez then repeatedly yells “put your hands behind your back,” before using his taser.
“Put your hands behind your back,” Yanez yells twice more as Valdez screams in agony.
The video cuts to a message from the police: “The officer and the suspect begin to struggle over the officer’s handgun and an officer involved shooting occurs.”
Three gunshots can be heard back to back. “Send backup,” Yanez says over his radio. “I’m hurt.”
Valdez’s family members say the police made false statements about the shooting and his condition.
“They lied about everything,” his sister, Rita Brandon, told The Times. “They came and they told my mom that my brother was gonna be okay, that he’d been shot and he was on the way to the hospital, and the whole time he was outside in the driveway dead.”
The family’s lawsuit, filed in December in Los Angeles federal court, seeks damages for a list of alleged misdeeds, including denial of medical care, battery and negligence. The defense has filed a motion to stay the proceedings, with the next court hearing set for April 24.
Michael Carillo, a lawyer for the Valdez family, said that “what immediately jumped out about the video to me is the immediate escalation of force that was totally unnecessary and led to the unreasonable use of force.”
Carillo noted that Valdez was not physically imposing — only 5 foot 3 and 130 pounds. “Instead of de-escalating it, calling in a mental health unit or supervisor, the officer escalated and escalated and ultimately shot [him],” Carillo said.
The coroner’s report stated that one bullet hit Valdez in the back of his head and the other two hit his left shoulder.
Additional body-worn camera video reviewed by The Times depicts emergency personnel cutting Valdez’s clothing away as he lay in the driveway and performing chest compressions in an attempt to revive him before declaring him dead.
The state Department of Justice is still investigating the shooting, as required by law when a police shooting victim is unarmed.
Valdez’s teenage daughter — whose name The Times is withholding at the family’s request because she is a minor — said she sleeps every night with a digital picture frame that loops photos of him, along with a treasured video of the two of them playing when she was 4 years old.
The girl’s biological father left when she was very young, and Valdez — whom she refers to affectionately as Jime — got together with her mother when she was 2. A year later, she started calling him dad.
“I didn’t even know what a dad was until Jime came along. My sister didn’t come along until years later,” she said, referring to Valdez’s biological daughter as tears streamed down her face. “So it was always us two, so that was all I knew. Jime was my dad.”
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