On June 6, 2020 California Highway Patrol officers shot 40 bullets into the car where Erik Salgado and Brianna Colombo sat. Erik died and Brianna, who was four months pregnant at the time, spent eight days in the hospital being treated for gunshot wounds, including one to her stomach. Erik and Brianna were unarmed and the CHP officers never identified themselves as law enforcement. The couple were both just 23 years old at the time and have a three year old child together. 

CHP has refused to release the names of the officers, but sources from within law enforcement identified the name of one officer: CHP Sergeant Richard Henderson. In July of 2016 Henderson killed 19 year old Pedro Erik Villanueva and injured his passenger Francisco Orozco Jr  in Orange County. Henderson shot 12 of the 14 bullets himself.

These two incidents follow a chillingly similar pattern—in both, CHP officers were not uniformed and did not identify themselves, and they shot unarmed victims. Richard Henderson was never held accountable and was instead shuffled to the Northern California CHP unit and promoted to Sergeant. Richard Henderson is still working and the other two names of the officers involved in Erik Salgado’s death have not been released.

The California Highway Patrol has shown a pattern of violence and mishandling of investigations including:

• CHP refused to release the names of the three officers, consistent with a pattern of not complying with SB 1421 
• CHP destroyed video footage of the event—either from body cameras, dash cameras, or the neighbor’s surveillance footage, which they confiscated

We demand that State Attorney General Xavier Becerra:

1. Open an investigation into CHP for a pattern of systematic racialized violence
2. Open an investigation into the killing of Erik Salgado and shooting of Brianna Colombo 
3. Arrest and charge Richard Henderson
4. Release the names and records of the other two officers and arrest and charge them

#Justice4ErikSalgado

linktr.ee/justice4erik