Vigil Held for Mitrice Richardson as New Controversy Arises

LOS ANGELES -- A candlelight memorial was held in the memory of Mitrice Richardson Monday night -- four days after authorities confirmed that her remains were found in a remote Malibu Canyon.

Friends and family gathered at 6 p.m. at Leimert Plaza Park near the intersection of Crenshaw Boulevard and Vernon Avenue in South Los Angeles.

Richardson's father asked for no tears, but could not hold back his own when he arrived at the memorial.


Meantime, Michael Richardson is accusing Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department officials of mishandling his daughter's case from beginning to end.

He's calling for changes to the department's procedures for releasing people at night. There's also new controversy that recorded phone calls from Richardson's mother to the sheriff's station have been edited prior to being posted online.

The phone calls were made by Mitrice's mother, Latice Sutton, on the night her daughter was arrested.

"I think the only way I will come get her tonight is if you guys are going to release her tonight," part of one phone call states.

"She definitely has no place... you know... she's not from that area and I would hate to wake up to a morning report... lost somewhere with her head chopped off. So I guess I would have to come and get her. Oh my God," Sutton says.

The recordings can be found on several websites.

Michael Gennaco, Chief attorney for the Office of Independent Review, tells KTLA that the recordings have been edited. Gennaco says the edited portions showed Sutton wavered on whether she should pick up her daughter from the sheriff's station.

Michael Richardson insists they have unedited CDs of the recordings.

He says his daughter's release from the Malibu-Lost Hills sheriff's station shortly after midnight on Sept. 17 was "wrongful based on her mental state."

He wants sheriff's officials to take a lie detector test to find out what happened on the night his daughter vanished.

"Let's streamline. Let's find out who walked out the door. Who followed her? Who took her to that canyon? Who knows something about that canyon? She didn't get there by herself," Michael Richardson told KTLA.

Richardson says his daughter suffered from bipolar disorder and calls her release a "set up."

"You shouldn't let no woman, or anyone, out in an area of that magnitude... in the way she did with no purse, no cell phone," he said.

"I will seek justice by any means necessary."

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca says deputies acted properly.

"But the point is, is that 'properly' doesn't necessarily mean we didn't do something, or could have done something more," he said.