SAN ANTONIO – A San Antonio police officer was suspended for five days without pay for violating SAPD procedures.
While responding to a call for a suspicious vehicle in April 2025, Eric Padilla became very agitated. According to body camera video from Padilla and fellow responding officer Jaren Falcon obtained by KSAT 12 on Monday, Padilla used various expletives at least 19 times in approximately four minutes to a man involved in the call.
“The reason that we’re here is because someone called in a suspicious vehicle,” Padilla said in the video. “The window is rolled down. It looks suspicious here.”
When the vehicle’s owner tried to interject, Padilla quickly responded by saying, “I’m not done f—— talking.”
When Padilla finished his sentence, the vehicle’s owner said, “Everyone in the complex knows that that’s my vehicle.”
“I don’t give a f— who you know. I don’t give a f— who knows you,” Padilla said to the vehicle’s owner. “We got a call for someone saying the vehicle looks suspicious.”
While the officers attempted to open one of the doors of the reported suspicious vehicle, the car’s alarm went off.
The blaring car alarm caused its owner to come out of his third-floor apartment balcony to turn the alarm off. The car owner then started yelling at the officers to figure out what was going on.
A few minutes later, the car owner came downstairs to speak with Padilla and Falcon. He explained to them that the car had brake issues. The owner said he left the vehicle on the public street to avoid the risk of attempting to drive it into his complex’s lot with other cars.
“Did I commit a crime?” the car owner asked Padilla.
“Look m—–f—–.” Padilla began to answer.
“I’m telling you, did I commit a crime?” the vehicle owner asked.
“I’m telling you, go back inside your apartment,” Padilla said. “Nothing is going to f—— happen with your f—— car.”
“Is my vehicle going to be towed?” the vehicle owner asked.
While KSAT only shared parts of the body camera footage, the car owner started the interaction with police when he heard his car alarm and then said, from a distance, “It’s my own f—— car. What does it matter?”
However, that was the only expletive word the car owner said during the entire interaction with both SAPD officers. According to the body camera footage, Falcon did not utter an expletive during the officers’ interaction with the car owner.
According to the suspension paperwork obtained by KSAT, Padilla violated SAPD’s Rules, Regulations, and Procedures, which states, “Members shall at all times be courteous, kind, patient and respectful in dealing with the public, and shall strive to merit the esteem of all law abiding citizens by an impartial discharge of their official duties.”
“Members, on- or off-duty, shall be governed by the ordinary and reasonable rules of good conduct and behavior, and shall not commit any act tending to bring reproach or discredit on themselves or the department,” the rules continued.
According to Padilla’s suspension paperwork, “The nature of the call did not justify the use of expletive language and unnecessarily escalated the situation.”
Padilla was suspended from June 5 to June 9.
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Great Job Alexandra Diaz, Dillon Collier & the Team @ KSAT San Antonio Source link for sharing this story.
