SEPTA report: Death of man hit by stun-gun was drug-related

PHILADELPHIA -- Transit agency officials in Philadelphia say the death of a man who was hit with a stun gun during a struggle with a transit police officer last fall was drug-related, but a sergeant was disciplined for sending him to a hospital farther away than the nearest facility.

SEPTA said in an internal affairs report released Monday that 24-year-old Omar Lopez was hit by a stun gun 10 times in about two minutes during an eight-minute struggle outside the Huntingdon Station in October.

An autopsy concluded that he died of acute PCP toxicity. But it said a SEPTA police sergeant had Lopez taken to a hospital 3.3 miles away, not one a little more than one-half mile away, because he mistakenly thought the first station was closer.