The legal power of Florida police officers is being tested in a South Florida courtroom as a former Hialeah police officer fights to overturn his kidnapping conviction.
Rafael Otano is serving a five-year prison sentence after jurors found him guilty of kidnapping a homeless man in 2022. Prosecutors said Otano and another officer, Lorenzo Orfila, arrested José Ortega Gutierrez outside of a shopping plaza after a business owner complained he was disturbing the peace.
Instead of bringing Ortega Gutierrez to the jail, prosecutors argued in trial two years ago that the officers drove him to a remote location, beat him, and failed to document it. GPS records later placed the officers near the dump site, according to the trial evidence.
“I’m not telling you they didn’t have a right to arrest him that day,” prosecutor Shawn Abuhoff told jurors during Otano’s trial. “What I am telling you is at the point in time they realized who it was they were dealing with, they needed to invoke their own justice.”
Body camera video was at the center of a lawsuit filed on behalf of former Hialeah Officer Rafael Otano, who was accused of abducting and beating a homeless man in 2022.
Otano was acquitted of the beating allegation but convicted of kidnapping. His attorneys now argue that Florida law does not explicitly require police to transport an arrestee directly to jail, and they are asking an appeals court to throw out the guilty verdict.
“Mr. Otano was wrongfully convicted of a crime he didn’t commit,” said defense attorney Michael Davis. “Police have civil rights as well, and this case is about ensuring that the rights of everyone — including law enforcement — are protected.”
Judges on the appeals panel pressed both sides with pointed questions. Judge Fleur J. Lobree challenged the defense argument, asking, “To take someone to a shoal island off the shore of Biscayne Bay and leave them there isolated — and there would be nothing wrongful about that conduct?”
Judge Kansas R. Gooden questioned prosecutors on where the line should be drawn: “Your whole theory is they went outside where they were supposed to be, and that’s unlawful? What if there’s a bad accident and they have to route way outside of their area to go to a jail — is that lawful?”
The appeals court has not yet issued a ruling. The decision could also affect the pending case of Orfila, the other former officer charged in connection with the incident, who has not yet gone to trial.