SAN ANTONIO – A San Antonio police officer was suspended 30 days in March after body-worn camera footage showed him using a knife to puncture bicycle and trailer tires at a Northwest Side homeless encampment.
Officer Kenneth Cortez was suspended for rules violations including conduct and behavior and proper use of body-worn cameras, SAPD discipline records show.
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Cortez and a second SAPD officer were called to the encampment on Oct. 26, 2024, at the intersection of Callaghan Road and Farragut Drive.
While the other officer was ticketing a man and a woman for camping in public, Cortez pulled out a knife and popped the tires of a bicycle and a bicycle trailer, records show.
Video of the incident was later discovered by a sergeant reviewing body-worn camera footage, a department spokesman confirmed to KSAT this week.
SAPD officials eventually contacted the two people, who declined to pursue criminal mischief charges against Cortez, the spokesman told KSAT.
The man and woman said they wanted to pursue an administrative complaint against Cortez but did not show up to provide internal affairs investigators formal statements, the spokesman said.
SAPD administration moved forward with the internal affairs complaint against Cortez anyways, and he agreed March 10 to a 30-day suspension, discipline records show.
Cortez was also dinged for waiting to turn on his body-worn camera until after he had already spoken to a person at the scene, records show.
Cortez will remain on suspension through April 26, according to records.
Cortez is a seven-year veteran of SAPD, city records show.
Read more reporting on the KSAT Investigates page.
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