{"id":115861,"date":"2026-01-01T04:27:25","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T04:27:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/115861\/"},"modified":"2026-01-01T04:27:25","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T04:27:25","slug":"family-of-woman-found-in-lemon-grove-ditch-sues-sheriffs-office-san-diego-union-tribune","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/115861\/","title":{"rendered":"Family of woman found in Lemon Grove ditch sues Sheriff\u2019s Office \u2013 San Diego Union-Tribune"},"content":{"rendered":"

The three children of the woman found earlier this year in a Lemon Grove ditch<\/a> have sued the San Diego County Sheriff\u2019s Office for allegedly ignoring pleas for help.<\/p>\n

Irma Perez Espinoza, 43, died in August. The lawsuit accuses the department of lying and negligence in Espinoza\u2019s \u201cwrongful death.\u201d It also alleges that a longstanding failure to properly supervise deputies contributed to Espinoza\u2019s suffering, among other accusations.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was foreseeable that a woman left alone in a weakened state with no food or water would be unable to defend herself,\u201d the filing says. \u201cIt was foreseeable that leaving someone in a ditch would cause her to suffer from exposure and die.\u201d<\/p>\n

A representative for the Sheriff\u2019s Office declined comment.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court by attorneys Eugene Iredale and Julia Yoo. It asks for a jury trial to determine an unspecified amount of damages.<\/p>\n

The county has in recent years spent almost $158 million<\/a> on legal payouts. Most of that total, nearly $95 million, involved accusations of misconduct by sheriff\u2019s personnel, and Tuesday\u2019s lawsuit suggests that Espinoza\u2019s death resulted from similar issues.<\/p>\n

Dispatch records note that someone in late July reported a woman \u201csitting in ditch\u201d who \u201chas not had food or water.\u201d Yet while a sheriff\u2019s vehicle did pull up to the area, it soon backed up and drove off without anyone stepping outside, according to a neighbor named Richard Quinones.<\/p>\n

When that neighbor reached back out to say the woman remained in the ditch, Quinones said he got a call directly from someone at the sheriff\u2019s office. \u201cShe\u2019s a transient,\u201d that official allegedly said, referring to Espinoza. \u201cThere\u2019s gonna be more, get used to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Espinoza was only taken to a hospital several days later after Quinones again saw her in the same ditch. This time she was half-naked and covered in ants. An autopsy later concluded that Espinoza was suffering from hypothermia<\/a> when first responders finally pulled her out.<\/p>\n

Supervisors at the Sheriff\u2019s Office \u201cwere aware that their deputies were treating unhoused or \u2018transient\u2019 people differently than housed people,\u201d the lawsuit alleges. \u201cThey took no action to ensure that their deputies were providing equal services to all people.\u201d<\/p>\n

The filing additionally accuses the deputy who responded to the scene of lying.<\/p>\n

Public records show<\/a> that a caller asked for a welfare check on a woman in a ditch the morning of July 29. About a half-hour later, the dispatch record was updated to label the call as \u201cGA.\u201d Those letters can sometimes stand for \u201cgone on arrival,\u201d meaning that deputies can\u2019t find the person in question.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was a lie,\u201d the lawsuit alleges.<\/p>\n

Then, despite the caller reaching back out, the dispatch record ends a few minutes later. It\u2019s not clear why there wasn\u2019t more follow-up. The call record was heavily redacted before it was released to The San Diego Union-Tribune, and it\u2019s possible that the explanation was blacked out.<\/p>\n

Regardless, the attorneys for Espinoza\u2019s family argue that a deputy must have improperly \u201ccleared\u201d the call in the computer system. This prevented others from helping Espinoza, the lawsuit alleges. If the deputy had instead \u201cignored the call or rejected the call, another deputy would have responded to offer Ms. Espinoza help.\u201d<\/p>\n

Furthermore, the attorneys add a new detail to the theory that Espinoza was sexually assaulted in the ditch. Around the same time of Quinones\u2019 initial request for a welfare check, a different neighbor witnessed \u201ca man coming out of the area where Ms. Espinoza had last been seen, acting suspiciously,\u201d the lawsuit says. \u201cWhen the man saw the neighbor, he hurried away.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat neighbor did not call the police because she knew that Mr. Quinones had already called\u201d and been told \u201cto leave it alone,\u201d the filing adds.<\/p>\n

The autopsy report previously noted \u201cmultiple contusions and abrasions\u201d on Espinoza\u2019s body. The sheriff\u2019s Major Crimes Division launched an investigation into a possible assault.<\/p>\n

Separate inquires into whether a deputy ignored calls for aid are being overseen by the sheriff\u2019s office and the Citizens Law Enforcement Review Board.<\/p>\n

Staff writer Teri Figueroa contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The three children of the woman found earlier this year in a Lemon Grove ditch have sued the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":96556,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[7,3053,6503,23,100,74,84,76,75,1696,77],"class_list":{"0":"post-115861","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-east-county","10":"tag-lemon-grove","11":"tag-local-news","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-san-diego","14":"tag-san-diego-county","15":"tag-san-diego-headlines","16":"tag-san-diego-news","17":"tag-top-stories-sdut","18":"tag-uncategorized"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115861\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}