Stow-Dodgers trial: Security officers testify

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- L.A. Dodgers security officers took the stand Thursday in the Bryan Stow civil trial. Stow, who was severely beaten in Dodger stadium parking lot, accuses the Dodgers organization of negligence.

The Dodgers defense has told the jury that security on opening day of 2011 was at an all-time high. But Thursday the plaintiffs presented a far different picture.

Were there security personnel gaps that left an outlying parking lot untended? That's where Giants fan Bryan Stow was beaten up and permanently disabled on opening day in 2011.

In Stow's lawsuit against the Dodgers management, two security officers testified Thursday that they were assigned to patrol two areas: Parking Lot 2 before the game, then move inside the stadium during the game; and then after the game, traverse the grounds to watch lot 2 again.

According to records, it took officers 25 minutes after the final out to get to their post in the parking lot. No security was present to stop the Stow attack. Thursday, jurors learned what slowed them down.

It was a full house on opening day of 2011: 56,000 fans. The score in the 9th inning was 1 to nothing. Spectators waited until it was all over, then flooded out of the stands.

The officers, busy watching the packed concourses, could not be out in the parking lot at the same time.

Stow's attorney asked, "So the only way to provide proper protection would be to hire more people?" The answer was yes.

The plaintiffs went over Dodgers policies requiring ushers and security personnel to report all fights, verbal or physical. Somehow, though, there was no record of this brawl that erupted that opening day.

The interim director of security, Sharam Aryan, testified that he had wanted more uniformed LAPD officers because they were a more effective deterrent to violence.

Instead, he said, the number of uniformed officers inside the stadium went down, from 120 in 2009 to 57 in 2010, to 19 in 2011.

Aryan says it is one reason he left the Dodgers, though he came back a year later and was promoted.

The two security officers testified that they had no idea that Lot 2 would not be patrolled in their absence. They said they had been earlier briefed that there would be scores of LAPD officers outside the stadium after the game.