MIAMI — The demo for 1 of two former Hialeah Law enforcement Section officers who are accused of beating a homeless guy and then trying to include it up commenced Monday with opening arguments.
“They betrayed the badge and they betrayed the community,” mentioned Assistant Miami-Dade Point out Legal professional Shawn Abuhoff in the course of his opening assertion in courtroom.
Opening arguments commenced in the jury demo of Rafael Otano, 27, who had been a three-year member of the department, right before he was terminated from the work.
Miami-Dade Corrections Division
He and Lorenzo Orfila, 23, a 5-year member of the force, have been arrested previously this yr after they allegedly responded to a nuisance connect with on Dec. 17, 2022 about a guy stated to be harassing enterprises and patrons at a Hialeah browsing plaza found at W. 19th Avenue and 60th Avenue.
That person, recognized as Jose Ortega Gutierrez, 51, was taken into custody and in its place of being transported to the county jail, prosecutors claimed the younger officers took the male to a dump web site ahead of beating him and abandoning him.
Condition investigators say Otano and Orfila informed Gutierrez he was likely to be locked up for becoming drunk and disorderly.
An off-duty Miami-Dade police detective just occurred to cross paths in the detective’s north Hialeah neighborhood with Gutierrez a number of hours after the incident and named police, he said through the Monday court proceeding.
“He experienced a cut or laceration on major of his head,” reported the officer. “His experience seemed swollen and bruised. His outfits seemed torn and he appeared intoxicated. He accused police officers or robing him, beating him and dropping him off around my local community.”
Michael Pizzi, attorney for Otano, explained to the court that there was no proof to help involvement by his shopper.
“There is completely zero proof,” Pizzi explained. “None whatsoever that Rafael Otano committed an armed kidnapping or committed a battery on any one.”
Prosecutors termed a few officers to testify for the point out and reported they would show surveillance online video from the purchasing plaza of Otano and Orfila escorting Gutierrez away from the shopping plaza.
“If you happen to be using another person to jail you can find only a person place in the county and that’s TGK,” Abuhoff mentioned. “Which is just north of the airport. In Hialeah, that’s south.”
The condition lawyer charged both of those of the ex-officers in January 2023 before they were being fired from their careers. They are dealing with prices that consist of kidnapping and battery.
If convicted, the former regulation enforcement officers could be experiencing a prolonged prison sentence.
