Hialeah cops battered homeless man in the woods and tried to buy his silence, state says
Two Hialeah police officers and a private investigator were charged Thursday with beating a homeless man in the woods and a convoluted attempt to cover it up.
Police Chief George Fuente said the arrests made it a “sad and disappointing day” for a department trying to clean up its image.
State investigators said the mid-December incident began after a perturbed shopkeeper at a small strip mall called police complaining about a vagrant bothering people. They say the two responding officers — Rafael Quinones Otano and Lorenzo Rafael Orfila — drove Jose Ortega Gutierrez to a wooded area almost seven miles away, knocked him unconscious and left him there on the ground.
Almost two weeks later, investigators said, private investigator Ali Amin Saleh, who they say is friends with the officers, found Gutierrez at the same strip mall and gave him $1,350 in exchange for a signed affidavit that claimed he was not beaten and that he didn’t want the officers punished.
On Thursday, with Fuente at her side, State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said the officers failed to document transporting Gutierrez and didn’t notify dispatch or turn on their police-issued body-worn cameras.
“We will not allow rogue police officers to abuse their power,” Fernandez Rundle said.
Otano, a six-year veteran, was charged with armed kidnapping and battery. His partner Orfila, who has been with the agency for three years, is facing charges of armed kidnapping, battery and official misconduct. Also arrested and charged with witness tampering was private investigator Saleh.
Fuente said the two officers, who have only had minor disciplinary infractions during their relatively brief careers, were fired Thursday and booked into the Turner Guilford Knight correctional center. Otano and Orfila were denied bond. Both men are facing possible life sentences if convicted.
Attorneys for the officers denied the charges. Otano’s attorney Michael Pizzi called the case an “abomination” and a “gross mischaracterization of justice” intended to scapegoat his client for Hialeah’s history of police issues. He said his client has a wife and young child.
“What’s most offensive about this case is that they’re charging an experienced police officer with armed kidnapping when he was wearing a police-issued revolver and was in uniform on shift in the sector he was supposed to be patrolling,” Pizzi said. “My client did not handcuff anyone or put him in a patrol car. My client did not commit any crimes or engage in any wrongdoing.”
The arrest warrants for the officers claim that Orfila handcuffed Gutierrez, 52, and placed him in the back of his patrol vehicle. Neither Pizzi or Orfila’s attorney Robert Barrar would directly address the state’s claim that the officers drove Gutierrez more than six miles from where he was picked up before beating him and that they failed to follow department protocol along the way, like notifying dispatch.
“From what I understand my client is absolutely not guilty and we look forward to our ability to go to trial,” said Barrar. “We don’t believe the victim is telling the truth and we’re confident we will prevail at trial.”
Court records didn’t show whether Saleh had retained a defense attorney.
State records show Gutierrez has a criminal history of mostly minor crimes like trespassing and disorderly conduct dating back 25 years. Though in 1998 he was charged with attempted first-degree murder and he was charged with attempted second-degree murder a year later. It wasn’t immediately clear what came of those charges. He was arrested as recently as Jan. 17 for possession with intent to sell cocaine.
A RIDE TO THE WOODS
According to Hialeah police and state investigators, Otano and Orfila were dispatched to the Los Tres Conejitos Bakery at 1912 W. 16th St., just after 5 p.m. on Dec. 17, after receiving a call by a shopkeeper upset with Gutierrez’s presence at the small strip mall. Investigators said Gutierrez was misled by the officers and was told he was being taken to jail for being drunk and disorderly.
Then, through GPS and surveillance video, investigators determined that the officers drove with their emergency lights on to a wooded area 6.6 miles away at Northwest 94th Avenue and 174th Street, but kept no records of the transport.
“Instead, he was taken to an isolated and dark location against his will,” the state attorney said.
Gutierrez, who later spoke with police, said he didn’t know where he was when he was knocked unconscious and that when he awoke, the cuffs were gone and he had bruises on his swollen face. According to Fernandez Rundle, a few minutes later, as Gutierrez was making his way back toward the strip mall, an off-duty Hialeah police officer spotted him and called 911. When Gutierrez relayed his story to police, another officer met him to investigate his claims.
According to the incident report that day obtained by the Miami Herald, Gutierrez, who had a strong odor of alcohol on him, was taken to a Mt. Sinai emergency care center in Hialeah. Hialeah police then contacted the state attorney. Fernandez Rundle said one of the two officers even called the Hialeah officer who was interviewing Gutierrez and told him “they dropped off the victim in Sector 6 and they had roughed him up.” Then, she said, the officer asked him not to write up a report.
“These are serious criminal acts,” she said.
Twelve days later on Dec. 29, is when Saleh became involved, according to police investigators. Investigators weren’t certain as to the licensed private investigator’s relationship with the Hialeah officers, though the state attorney said she believed they were friends.
With the help of Gutierrez’s statements and video surveillance, investigators determined Saleh, driving a white truck, showed up at the same mall Gutierrez had been taken from two weeks earlier. They said Saleh was able to convince Gutierrez to accept $1,350 and sign an affidavit saying he was not battered and that the officer’s did no wrong.
HIALEAH CHIEF VOWED CHANGE
The latest arrests add to a lengthy list of problems at the Hialeah Police Department in recent years.
Chief Fuente, sworn in only last March, was immediately saddled with a department under the gun. He followed a chief being investigated for torching the truck of a business owner whose former girlfriend he was dating. The department had also recently seen the fall of a highly decorated officer who was arrested for sexually assaulting a handful of teenage girls while on duty.
Fernandez Rundle said the firings of Otano and Orfila were in keeping with a promise Fuente made to clean house of rogue cops when he came on board less than a year ago.
“I said from the beginning I’d be transparent, professional and responsible,” the chief said.
Prosecutors said there are still unanswered questions: Who contacted Saleh and suggested trying to buy off Gutierrez. And, what prompted the officers to allegedly drive Gutierrez to a faraway isolated spot, beat him up and leave him there.
“That’s a question we’ve asked ourselves a bunch of times: why?” said Fernandez Rundle.
El Nuevo Staff Reporter Veronica Egui Brito contributed to this report.
This story was originally published January 26, 2023 at 9:27 AM.
