SAPD officer fired after DWI arrest

Arthur Lopez among 17 SAPD, BCSO law officers suspended last month

SAN ANTONIO – A San Antonio police officer facing a charge of driving while intoxicated has been indefinitely suspended without pay from the department, the equivalent of being fired.

Arthur Lopez was arrested on suspicion of DWI last October after he was involved in a traffic accident near the intersection of West Market and Navarro Streets. He was off duty at the time of the accident.

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"Blood analysis later revealed Officer Lopez had a blood alcohol content of 0.115," records obtained by the Defenders said. A blood alcohol content above .08 is considered intoxicated.

Court records show Lopez's DWI case is still pending. His attorney, Karl Brehm, filed a request for arbitration. He also denied the allegations against Lopez.

"Officer Lopez asserts herein that the punishment is clearly excessive considering all the mitigating circumstances," Brehm said.

Lopez is among 14 SAPD officers suspended in the last month. They include:

Three deputies with the Bexar County Sheriff's Office were also suspended. They are:

  • Sergeant Jelane Thompson, one-day suspension without pay. Thompson did not make sure "pipe system checks" in the jail were performed every 30 minutes, as required. Instead, "it was discovered that the pipe checks were missed for 4 hours and 59 minutes."
  • Sergeant Gilbert Bedia received two suspensions. One suspension was for three-days without pay for becoming upset with a supervisor over his assignment on June 4, 2017, then sharing his "discontent with the officers under (Bedia's) direct supervision, using disparaging comments toward the lieutenant's abilities as a shift commander." The second suspension was for two days without pay for a July 8, 2017, incident inside the jail that left two deputies injured in an attack by an inmate. Bedia "acted in an unprofessional manner by criticizing the unit deputies, making unprofessional statements against a fellow sergeant and diminishing the work performance of some of (Bedia's) deputies while speaking to inmates in the unit."
  • Deputy Nicholas Diaz, five-day suspension without pay. Diaz did not conduct a proper "face to face observation check" while working in the jail, leaving another deputy to find an inmate had been attacked by two other inmates in a cell.