CONVICTION QUESTION REVISITED; RECENT SCANDAL TURNS SPOTLIGHT ON WRONGFUL IMPRISONMENT CLAIM.

Byline: Troy Anderson Staff Writer

As part of its widening probe into the Los Angeles police scandal, the District Attorney's Office said Thursday it is reviewing the case of a man who says he was wrongly convicted of a 1980 murder and shot and wounded during a police interrogation.

``We are taking a very serious look at this case, certainly in light of everything that is going on,'' said Victoria Pipkin, director of communications for the District Attorney's Office. ``We are reviewing it as part of the investigation into the LAPD scandal.''

Arrested on suspicion of killing Jesse Porras on Nov. 18, 1980, former El Monte resident Jose Luis Frutis, now 41, was shot and wounded during interrogation at the LAPD's Central Division station and then convicted of murder, according to his attorney, Antonio Rodriguez.

But some 19 years later, another man, Soledad Correctional Training Facility inmate Joey Garcia, has made a videotaped confession to the gang-related death, implicating himself and two other gang members, Rodriguez said.

Rodriguez filed a writ of habeas corpus Aug. 27 in Los Angeles Superior Court in an effort to obtain the release of Frutis, who is serving a 25-years-to-life sentence at Soledad.

``This just confirms what we've known for decades - that LAPD officers have been involved in unjustified shootings and coverups, and many people in the inner city are now in jail, prison or a coffin as a result of police misconduct,'' Rodriguez said.

LAPD spokesman Jason Lee said the department would not comment on the Frutis case, citing the potential for litigation.

On Dec. 26, 1980, Frutis was picked up, taken to the CRASH unit at the Central Division and accused of killing Porras. ``It was a case of mistaken identity,'' Rodriguez said.

As Frutis sat handcuffed in an interrogation room, Detective Steve Miller angrily threatened to kill him unless he told him who killed Jesse Porras, Frutis wrote in a May 13 court declaration.

Miller was joined in the interrogation room by Detective Albert Gonzalez, who is still a detective at Central Division. Miller, now retired, could not be reached for comment. Gonzalez declined to comment.

Frutis repeatedly denied his involvement in the slaying. ``Suddenly, Miller reached into his jacket for his gun and shot me in the left chest, near the heart,'' Frutis wrote.

Miller later testified that his gun misfired while he handed it to Gonzalez to take it out of the room, Rodriguez said.

Frutis settled a $1 million civil lawsuit against the LAPD for $18,000, said Claremont attorney Stuart Holmes, a former Pomona police officer who took the case in the early 1980s.

``In my humble opinion, it was a very suspect shooting,'' Holmes said. ``There was no reason to have a gun out in the first place.''

Third Street gang member Garcia, in a court declaration, wrote that he was one of several men who beat Porras to death.

``Mr. Frutis is completely innocent of the murder of Mr. Porras,'' Garcia said. ``He was not present at the scene of the crime at the time it was committed.''

Frutis' mother, Irma C. Madero of San Dimas, said she is optimistic. ``Of all the years we've been fighting the system, finally something is moving in the right direction.''

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Photo

Photo: Jose Luis Frutis' mother, Irma Madero, and brothers Juan Carlos Madero, left, and Francisco Madero attend a press conference Downtown on Thursday.

Michael Owen Baker/Staff Photographer