BY MAIRE O’NEILL
maire@losalamosreporter.com
Two charges were filed Sept. 15 in Los Alamos Municipal Court against Ernest Dominic Abeyta, 39, of Manassa, Colorado, the driver of the vehicle involved in the March 15 incident that resulted in the death of pedestrian Brian Easton.
The new charges are Careless Driving (Accident) and Failure to Yield to Pedestrian (Accident). Abeyta is scheduled to appear Oct. 6 before Municipal Court Judge Elizabeth Allen.
Abeyta was originally charged in Los Alamos Magistrate Court on May 28 by Los Alamos Police Department Ofc. Jonathan Knoell and was arraigned June 23. The charges were dismissed Aug. 24. Easton’s family was notified by Police Chief Dino Sgambellone that the charges would be refiled in Municipal Court.
When the Los Alamos Reporter wrote about the charges June 8, the information had been obtained through an Inspection of Public Records Act request. The records provided by LAPD included incident reports but did not include a Crash Report on the March 15 incident.
The Reporter then began trying to determine whether a Crash Report existed.
LAPD Deputy Chief James Rodriguez responded to a text inquiry by saying, “There is a Crash Report. I believe you’ve already requested it, follow up to ensure all approved documents are provided.”
The Reporter subsequently submitted another IPRA request specifically seeking the Crash Report. In that request, she explained that she had received the incident reports but not the Crash Report. She also asked whether a statement of probable cause or a summons was included in the file.
The response stated that there was no additional Crash Report, no statement of probable cause and no summons in the case file.
On June 16, the Reporter forwarded the email correspondence with County Records to Chief Sgambellone and Deputy Chief Rodriguez, outlining what had transpired and noting that she still had not received the Crash Report.
She wrote, “It is very hard to understand why after working with LAPD for 10 years on news and publishing some 1,189 LAPD-related items, this is how things work these days. Surely there is a better way.”
Correspondence with Sgambellone requesting the Crash Report continued, with multiple emails alerting him that the report had not been received. To date, the Reporter has not received a Crash Report.
Members of Easton’s family also reportedly requested the report and, according to the family, have not received it.
In mid-August, sources told the Reporter that no completed Crash Report existed and that Easton’s family had contacted the District Attorney’s Office concerning the handling of the case.
Because the case had been filed by Ofc.Knoell in Magistrate Court, the District Attorney’s Office did not enter an appearance in the case. The office did, however, obtain copies of LAPD reports to review the matter and determine whether it should become involved, according to sources. The DA’s Office also did not receive a completed Crash Report.
The charges remained pending in Magistrate Court from May 28 until Aug. 24, with an intermediate pretrial hearing scheduled for Aug. 25.
On the afternoon of Aug. 24, a dismissal was filed in Magistrate Court and the Aug. 25 hearing was canceled. Members of Easton’s family, who had planned to attend the hearing, subsequently traveled from Arizona to Los Alamos only to learn that the hearing had been canceled.