The Ventura County District Attorney’s Office said Tuesday two separate police shootings it investigated, one in 2022 and the other in 2023, were both justified uses of deadly force and will not be prosecuted.

The first incident was the fatal Simi Valley police shooting of Derrick Padilla in 2022. Padilla was a suspect in his wife’s murder and was killed in a firefight with officers, according to the DA’s report on the matter.

The second was the Oxnard police shooting of Adam Barcenas in 2023. Officers had pulled over a suspected drunken driver in an unrelated incident when Barcenas approached them with a 5-foot metal pole. The district attorney’s report concluded Barcenas was running at an officer with the pole raised when the officer fatally shot him.

In each case, the police department initially investigated the shooting with help from District Attorney Erik Nasarenko’s office. Prosecutors then analyzed the evidence, including body camera video, to determine whether the shooting was justified or could result in criminal charges against the officers. The findings by Nasarenko’s office that each killing was done in legal self-defense closes the book on both investigations.

Any deadly use of force by a law enforcement officer spurs multiple investigations, including the DA’s review, which looks only at whether an officer’s actions were legally justified.

Fatal Simi Valley police shooting of Derrick Padilla

Padilla, 29, was the subject of a manhunt when he turned up in Simi Valley on April 28, 2022. The night before, police had found his wife, Monique Ayala, shot dead at their home in Los Angeles and identified Padilla as the prime suspect, according to the DA’s report on his death. Shortly after the shooting in LA, Padilla carjacked his sister, stealing her BMW at gunpoint.

The next morning, Simi Valley police found the car abandoned on Royal Avenue. When they were told it had been stolen by a murder suspect who was considered armed and very dangerous, every officer on duty began looking for Padilla.

At about 5 p.m. that day, Padilla walked into a 7-Eleven in Simi Valley and borrowed the clerk’s phone to call his father. Padilla told his father it was probably the last time they would talk. His father reported the call to a Los Angeles police detective, who alerted the Simi Valley Police Department.

At 8 p.m., Simi Valley Officer David Maupin thought he spotted Padilla walking near a car wash on East Los Angeles Avenue, about a mile and a half from the 7-Eleven. He called for backup. When a second officer arrived, Maupin pulled over to stop Padilla.

What happened next was captured by a security camera at the car wash as well as the body cameras of multiple officers. The footage is described in detail in the DA’s report. Investigators also interviewed five police officers and a bystander who were all at the scene.

Maupin got out of his car, drew his gun and ordered Padilla onto the ground. Padilla did not comply, instead raising his hands in what Maupin described as a “challenging” gesture.

At about this time, Officer Daniel Stradling pulled up to the curb. As he was taking his rifle out of his car, he saw Padilla point a silver handgun at Maupin.

Maupin fired and so did Padilla, each of them unloading multiple rounds.

Padilla began to run away through the car wash parking lot, still firing his .357 Magnum revolver back at both officers, hitting both of their cars. Stradling fired three rounds from his rifle at Padilla, hitting him at least once. Padilla, now on the ground, again raised his gun, and Stradling fired three more shots.

Padilla did not move again, and was pronounced dead at the scene shortly afterward by emergency medical personnel. About 15 seconds had passed between Maupin’s first attempt to stop Padilla and the last shots fired by Stradling, according to the report.

Padilla was shot five times. Neither officer was hit. Four of the bullet fragments recovered from Padilla’s body during an autopsy were consistent with those fired by Stradling’s .223-caliber Remington rifle; the fifth fragment didn’t have enough detail to determine whether it had come from Maupin’s handgun or Stradling’s rifle.

Senior Deputy DA Thomas Dunlevy reviewed the case for Nasarenko’s office and concluded Padilla’s death was a justifiable homicide, which means it was not a crime. Both Stradling and Maupin “used no more force than was reasonably necessary” to defend themselves, and their use of deadly force was justifiable, the report states.

Fatal Oxnard police shooting of Adam Barcenas

At around 5 a.m. on March 12, 2023, Oxnard Police Department Officer Shayn Schwartz pulled over a suspected drunken driver in downtown Oxnard at the corner of Fourth and A streets, according to the DA’s report. Since the driver spoke Spanish and Schwartz did not, two other officers soon arrived to help.

About an hour later, with the driver and officers standing at the roadside, a man ran toward them, yelling “F— pigs” and “I hate pigs,” according to the DA’s report. He held a 5-foot metal pole over his shoulder “like a baseball bat,” the report said.

The man was later identified as Barcenas. The 60-year-old, described by police as homeless, had been released from state prison six months earlier after serving a little more than three years for felony elder abuse.

In 2019, Barcenas had randomly assaulted two people on the same day in downtown Oxnard: a 71-year-old woman and an 80-year-old man. The woman, whom Barcenas had punched in the head and kicked when she was on the ground, at first appeared to have only minor injuries, but she died a few days later.

As Barcenas approached the officers with the pole raised, one officer drew her taser and the other two drew their guns, all of them telling him to “put it down.” Barcenas swung at one officer, then charged at Schwartz “with the pole raised over his shoulder in a ready-to-strike position,” the DA’s report states.

Schwartz fired four shots from his Sig Sauer 9 mm handgun, hitting Barcenas with three of them. Barcenas was conscious as officers and medical responders administered aid, but his condition soon deteriorated and he died at Ventura County Medical Center.

In an interview with investigators, the passenger in the car that was pulled over said it looked like Barcenas was about 2 feet away from Schwartz when Schwartz fired his last shots and was “moving his body in a swinging motion,” according to the report. Another witness said he heard Barcenas yell “I’m going to kill you” as he ran at the officers.

Deputy DA Stephanie Leija reviewed the case and determined Schwartz “used no more force than was reasonably necessary to defend against the apparent danger” posed by Barcenas in finding the death a justifiable homicide.

Tony Biasotti is an investigative and watchdog reporter for the Ventura County Star. Reach him at tbiasotti@vcstar.com. This story was made possible by a grant from the Ventura County Community Foundation’s Fund to Support Local Journalism.

This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Fatal Oxnard, Simi Valley police shootings ruled justified