One of the seven criminal cases against the West Palm Beach police officers involved in a fatal Boynton Beach pursuit will proceed, a judge ruled Monday, denying a defense argument that the officer’s conduct was not criminal.
Former West Palm Beach Officer William Loayza is charged with official misconduct, a third-degree-felony. Palm Beach County prosecutors say he and six other officers failed to report the July 2024 high-speed chase that ended when the man they were pursuing crashed into a mother and daughter, killing them both. The officers then left the scene and returned to West Palm Beach without checking on the occupants of the car, writing a police report, or notifying emergency services. One of the officers drove directly around the site of the crash on his way back, according to a probable cause affidavit.
Loayza is the first of the seven officers to have a motion to dismiss filed or heard in court following the officers’ arrests in June. His attorney, Stephen Melnick, argued Monday that his client’s conduct does not constitute a crime under state statute, even if it violates ethical norms or department policy. He also pointed to evidence suggesting that the crash itself was called in before Loayza arrived.
But Judge Howard Coates determined that Loayza is sufficiently accused of a crime and it will be up to a jury to decide if the facts prove he committed it.
“Ultimately, the resolution will turn on whatever the actual facts are that are found,” the judge said. “But I do conclude at this point the state has alleged a sufficient argument and basis that their facts arguably do fall within the statute.”
Loayza was a passenger in one of three West Palm Beach police cars involved in the pursuit of Neoni Copeland, who crashed into Marcia Pochette, 57, and Jenice Woods, 27, while fleeing. Woods was pregnant and had just announced it to her family.
Three of the seven officers, Austin Danielovich, Pierre Etienne and Christopher Rekdahl, were driving, and each faces two counts of leaving the scene of a crash involving death, a first-degree felony, as well as one count of official misconduct, a third-degree felony.
Three other officers were passengers, Michael Borgen, Brandan Stedfelt and Darien J. Thomas, and each face a single charge of official misconduct like Loayza.
All seven officers were fired in June, shortly after their arrests.
‘They’re trying to make it a crime’
Melnick argued Monday that prosecutors are incorrectly criminalizing Loayza and the other officers who were passengers for violating a police department policy that requires officers to report pursuits.
“Morally, they were wrong, ethically, departmentally, all of these things, they were wrong,” he said. “But they’re not in violation of state statute. And that’s what my argument is. It’s not a crime. It’s everything else. It’s against the laws of morals, ethics, everything we’ve been taught from the time we’re children, stop and render aid, do this, do that, but that doesn’t make it a crime and they’re trying to make it a crime.”
Chief Assistant State Attorney Alan Johnson replied that Loayza is not charged with a crime because he violated a policy, but rather that he and his fellow officers committed a crime because they didn’t want to be punished for violating a policy.
Prosecutors charged Loayza based on the state statute which considers official misconduct to include “obstructing, delaying, or preventing the communication of information relating to the commission of a felony that directly involves or affects the government entity served by the public servant or public contractor.” Loayza and others delayed the reporting of three different felonies: the fleeing and eluding that led to the pursuit, the fatal crash, and their fellow officers’ decision to leave the scene, prosecutors said.
Loayza and the six other officers had driven all the way back to West Palm Beach and did not report anything until their supervisor was notified by Boynton Beach Police hours later, prosecutors said.
“That whole trip back, 14 miles back to West Palm Beach, where the defendants sat in that car and did not communicate that felony, any of the felonies,” Johnson said. “It wasn’t until three hours later, when Boynton Beach called his supervisors, was Mr. Loayza confronted with what he delayed reporting.”
Melnick had also argued in a separate motion that someone else had reported the crash before Loayza arrived at the scene, and that prosecutors have no proof that he actually witnessed the crash he failed to report. Cellphone data placed Loayza two minutes away from the crash when it occurred, according to court records.
“Two minutes driving, you could be two blocks away, you could be four blocks away,” Melnick said Monday. “You can’t see, and if you do not see the accident occur, and you don’t see where the vehicle is, they can’t say that he avoided doing something.”
Johnson replied that the car with Loayza inside turned around within “meters” of the accident, something prosecutors intend to prove. But the facts are for a jury to decide, he said, not a judge during a motion hearing.
Coates ultimately denied three of Melnick’s motions, two to dismiss the case and one for a statement of particulars.
Officer had ‘unusual’ number of traffic citations before hire
Loayza joined the police department in January 2020, according to his personnel file. During a background check prior to his hiring, “an unusual amount of traffic citations and interactions with the police were discovered,” a background investigator wrote.
The officer had 53 prior traffic citations, and admitted to two prior arrests during a polygraph, one for carrying brass knuckles and one for disorderly conduct. He was charged with disorderly conduct and resisting an officer without violence in 2007, court records show. Prosecutors later dropped the case.
Other reports involving Loayza also came up in a background check: and a “violation restrict D/L” case where he was the subject and three domestic dispute cases where he was not the subject.
Melnick told the South Florida Sun Sentinel after the hearing that he disagreed with Coates’ decision, but the hearing shed more light on how prosecutors are going to approach his client’s case and possibly the cases of the other officers charged with official misconduct.
“I needed to see how they will charge a passenger of a vehicle with something, how they’re stretching the official misconduct to include the actions of a passenger,” he said.
The Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office declined to comment on the judge’s decision, referring to prosecutors’ motions and arguments in court.
Several family members of the two victims attended the hearing Monday, wearing T-shirts with Pochette and Woods’ names. They declined to speak to the South Florida Sun Sentinel after the hearing.
Lawyers for the victims have also filed notices of their intention to sue the city of West Palm Beach on behalf of Pochette, Woods, and Woods’ unborn child.
A calendar call for all seven officers is set for Sept. 22.