The city of Chula Vista and its police department are facing a wrongful death suit over the killing of a retired Navy corpsman.
Three police officers, responding to a disturbance call, shot Carlos Enriquez 16 times with assault-style rifles at his home last April. The lawsuit alleges the officers used excessive and unnecessary force.
Enriquez dodged bullets to save fellow sailors in the Iraq war but did not survive the emotional scars he carried home from it.
“He suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder as many veterans do,” attorney Eugene Iredale said.
Iredale is representing the family in a lawsuit, which alleges Chula Vista police failed to summon, or refused to wait for, the police department’s Crisis Negotiation Team or any other mental health professionals. It also alleges police knew Enriquez suffered from PTSD, at the time was experiencing a mental health crisis and was also intoxicated.
“He needed somebody who knew how to talk to him, knew how to defuse the situation and who knew how to use time and distance to be able to avoid the unnecessary use of deadly force,“ Iredale said.
Chula Vista police released an edited version of body worn camera and drone video from that fateful April 19, 2025.
Enriquez’s wife Maria called 911, fearing her husband might kill himself or others — a call she now regrets.
“We had no idea this was going to happen to him. If we knew, we would never have called 911,” she said.
