Killeen city manager continues to ignore requests for 911 recordings in assault case

Killeen officials have ignored a third attempt by the Herald to obtain 911 calls in a case in which the alleged victim claimed it took police two hours to respond to her pleas for help.

The newspaper last asked City Manager Kent Cagle to release the recordings in February after the city attorney’s office relied on a Texas attorney general’s opinion issued on Dec. 20, 2022, that “agrees” officials do not have to release the audio because it is related to “an investigation that concluded in a result other than conviction or deferred adjudication” under the Texas Government Code.

The law is often used as a loophole by police and local governments to not release investigations or public documents.

Shroud of secrecy

The alleged assault victim also wants the 911 calls to be released, but the city has denied her requests as well. The Herald first requested the 911 calls from AnJanette de la Cruz Abad’s case on Nov. 3. Its third request was sent on Thursday.

The release of the 911 recordings may provide at least some clarity on what the alleged victim reported when she called police, how the dispatcher responded and what she relayed to the responding officer. The Herald’s coverage is a celebration of the start of Sunshine Week — an annual period when journalists “promote open government and shine light into the dark recesses of government secrecy.”

While state law does appear to allow the city of Killeen to withhold the 911 calls because the suspect in the case has neither been convicted nor received deferred adjudication, the newspaper challenged the city’s reliance on that provision of the law.

‘Used as a loophole’

“Section 552.108 of the Texas Government Code is often used as a loophole for law enforcement agencies to justify not releasing requested materials or documents under the Texas Public Information Act,” the Herald wrote in an email to Cagle on Feb. 9 asking him to release the 911 calls. “However, the intent of the Texas Public Information Act is not now and never has been to limit the press in its pursuit of information the publication of which is in the best interest of the public.”

The Texas Tribune has faced the same hurdles in obtaining police records in the Uvalde school shooting last May, including the 911 tapes. In a Tribune story published in June, House Speaker Dade Phelan, R-Beaumont, said at the time that it would be “absolutely unconscionable” for officials to use what’s called “the dead suspect loophole” to withhold records related to the shooting.

‘Allowed police to hide records’

Also in June, Austin law firm Cobb & Counsel posted on its website that the same loophole in Section 552.108 of the Texas Government Code “was intended to protect the privacy of the accused, but in many cases, it’s allowed police to hide records related to use-of-force incidents and in-custody deaths.”

Cobb & Counsel argues that when a suspect dies and cannot be charged with a crime, police can withhold records related to the incident under Section 552.108. That means “families of those who die in custody never get closure or access to details of their loved one’s death,” Phelan has said on Twitter.

“Victims and their families are similarly prevented from obtaining information when the suspect has died,” according to Cobb & Counsel. “The family of Army Specialist Vanessa Guillen, who was murdered at Fort Hood, says they have been refused access to officer body cam footage because her killer committed suicide.”

Furthermore, the Combined Law Enforcement Associations of Texas (CLEAT) “has fought hard to keep the ‘dead suspect loophole’ and prevent the release of information about alleged police misconduct, saying that the ‘information would . . . be used to trash an officer on social media or in the press,’” according to the law firm.

‘Calls for reform’

Texas State Rep. Joe Moody, D-El Paso, filed bills in the last three legislative sessions to close the loophole, but the bills faced opposition from CLEAT and ultimately failed, Cobb & Counsel reported on its website.

According to the law firm, the Uvalde school shooting “has re-energized calls for reform,” and Phelan says he will work to end the dead suspect loophole “for good” this legislative session.

On Oct. 9, 2022, Abad called 911 multiple times between 7:48 and 8:10 a.m. after the relative of a neighbor allegedly assaulted and injured her. Killeen police spokeswoman Ofelia Miramontez confirmed in November that officers did arrive two hours later.

“Since then, I have been harassed by (the alleged suspect’s) mother, mother’s boyfriend and her brother,” Abad, 52, told the newspaper on Feb. 9. “They were constantly coming by my door and window, yelling that they were going to beat me like (she) beat me and to ‘Get out of here.’”

The Herald is not identifying the woman because she has not been charged in the case.

“This investigation is complete and a warrant was issued and served,” Miramontez told the Herald on Feb. 10.

“I have been called all types of names,” Abad said. “My car window was busted out. I don’t have proof it was any of them. However, my car was the only one vandalized.”

Abad lives in a downtown Killeen apartment building in the 600 block of North Gray Street.

“She has been allowed back on the property any time she wants because her mother lives there,” Abad said of the person she accused of attacking her. “I tried to get a protective/restraining order and was told by KPD that I do not fall into the criteria to get one because it’s not domestic violence.”

‘They don’t show up’

On the morning of the reported assault, Abad said she called police because the woman “was making a disturbance out here at 6 in the morning,” she told the newspaper in November. “The girl doesn’t live here but her mom does. She had already beaten up her mom, and I caught the back end of it when I took my dog out.”

The owner of the property, Lawrence Passariello, told the Herald last year that “every time we call the police — whether it’s to criminally trespass someone or someone is pointing a gun at one of the tenants — they don’t show up or they take a very, very long time to show up.”

The American Society of News Editors — now the News Leaders Association — created Sunshine Week in 2005.