LOS ANGELES : Drug Overdose Suspected in Death of Man in Custody
An 18-year-old Salvadoran immigrant whose death in Los Angeles police custody last week triggered allegations of police brutality probably succumbed to a drug overdose, a police official said Thursday.
Los Angeles Police Lt. William Hall, who headed the investigation into the death of Walter Recinos, said pathologists performing an autopsy discovered a plastic wrapping containing a substance suspected of being cocaine that Recinos apparently had swallowed as he was arrested. The official cause of death awaits the results of toxicological studies.
Police arrested Recinos on a drug count March 23. He became ill while in custody and died the next morning at White Memorial Hospital. The Central American Refugee Center, in the Pico-Union area, said witnesses complained that police beat Recinos. Hall said the body showed no signs of a beating.
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