Autopsy diagram surfaces, shows the man under the Harlingen bridge was shot in the back

HARLINGEN - A Mexican national shot by police under an Expressway 77 overpass Jan. 5 was killed by two shotgun blasts to the back, an attorney representing his family claims.

A medical examiner says Diego Rivas-Soto was shot in the side of the back, but that he was shot only once.

However, Juan Angel Guerra, a former Willacy County district attorney now in private practice, says it appears that Rivas-Soto was shot twice in the back.

Guerra said Thursday the autopsy report contains conflicting and confusing language, but most parts show that buckshot from two shotgun shells entered Rivas-Soto's lower left side and exited his right front chest.

The report itself concludes that Rivas-Soto died from a shotgun wound "of (the) chest into (the) abdomen." The entrance wound is described as the "posterolateral back," meaning the side of the back.

The pellets followed a track from Rivas-Soto's "left to right, back to front, and slightly upward," the report states.

A diagram signed by the medical examiner and part of the autopsy report - not previously supplied to the Valley Morning Star - shows an entrance wound to the side of the back.

"That's conflicting," Guerra said of the report. "Because it states the cause of death was a shotgun wound of the chest into the abdomen, but states elsewhere that there is a shotgun wound on the lower left back and two exit wounds on the upper right chest area.

"It's real confusing. It says two (shotgun wounds) and then it says one."

Dr. Norma Jean Farley, whose forensics lab conducted the autopsy, said one gunshot wound entered "the side of the left back."

But she said Rivas-Soto was shot only once. "We only have one entrance wound. There is not a second shot," she said.

She said eight shotgun pellets from one shell entered Rivas-Soto's body and two of those exited the right side of the body.

A second mark on the back of the body is not an entrance wound, but one pellet that did not leave the body, Farley said.

But Guerra says it appears the report describes two entrance wounds.

Police Chief Daniel Castillo said Thursday he cannot comment on the autopsy report and will not respond to Guerra's comments.

"What I can say is a Texas Ranger responded to the (shooting) scene at our request and we trust in his findings," he said. "I'm not going to comment on Mr. Guerra's statements."

The Ranger's report goes directly to Cameron County District Attorney Armando Villalobos' office, not to his department, Castillo said.

The case is now at the District Attorney's Office.

Rivas-Soto, 41, was the father of five children from a tiny village outside of San Juan del Rio in Durango, Mexico, and had come to Harlingen looking for work, Guerra has said.

Police said that on the night of Jan. 5, Rivas-Soto pulled a knife after officers confronted him about lighting a fire under an overpass at the interchange of Expressway 83 and Expressway 77.

According to police statements, he was asked in English and Spanish to take his hands out of his pockets before he took out the knife and charged at Officer Jose Luis Palafox Jr. A fellow officer - who has never been publicly identified - had no choice but to shoot to protect
Palafox, officials have said.

However, officials have refused to describe the knife.

Guerra said state District Judge Leonel Alejandro held a hearing Thursday in Brownsville to hear his plea that he be allowed to take the depositions of Castillo and the officers involved in the shooting.

On Aug. 5, he will return to court to ask the judge to consider his petition to be allowed to begin the discovery process for a possible lawsuit against the city, Guerra said.

Guerra said he and attorney James B. Ragan of Corpus Christi represent Rivas-Soto's widow, two adult children and three minor children.

Guerra said he has not yet filed a lawsuit against the city on behalf of Rivas-Soto's family because he has no evidence yet.

"They're not letting me do any discovery at this point," he said of the legal process through which the court orders prosecutors to give the attorney representing a plaintiff access to information gathered by police and prosecutors.

"They're saying the attorney general said they don't have to give me anything yet," Guerra said.

He said he is trying to find out if the city attorney has a statement from the AG in writing or if it was just a verbal statement.

"There is a criminal investigation (by Texas Rangers), but I have nothing to do with it," Guerra said. "But if it shows negligence or negligence with malice," he will file a lawsuit.

However, he said that until he is allowed to see the evidence prosecutors have and take the depositions of Castillo and his officers, he will have no grounds to file a lawsuit against the police department or the city.

"That would be a frivolous lawsuit," he said.