Man Seeks Millions for Partial Loss of Sight : Suits: Attorney says his client was blinded in one eye by Simi Valley police. The defense claims there is no evidence to support charge.

A man who was allegedly blinded in one eye during a beating at the hands of Simi Valley police more than five years ago should be awarded millions of dollars in damages, an attorney said Thursday.

Anthony Cardilino, a former Simi Valley resident who now lives in Tarzana, contends in a civil lawsuit that he was deliberately poked in the eye with a baton by Police Detective Thomas Marshall before being handcuffed, bounced off the hood of a patrol car and thrown to the ground.

“No amount of money in the world is going to compensate for losing his sight,” Encino attorney Jeffrey M. Galen told a Ventura County Superior Court jury Thursday in his closing statement. “For the rest of his life, Tony will be blind in that eye.”

The jury is scheduled to begin deliberations today.

Cardilino, 33, was arrested Oct. 31, 1987, at a convenience store in Simi Valley on outstanding traffic warrants after an altercation with an off-duty sheriff’s deputy. He contends in the suit that Simi Valley Police Officers Marshall and Anthony Anzilotti used excessive force in arresting him and delayed getting him to a doctor.

A charge of resisting arrest was later dismissed by the district attorney’s office, Galen said.

Marshall, Anzilotti and the city of Simi Valley are named as co-defendants in the civil case. Both officers have been promoted to detective since the arrest.

Assistant City Atty. Richard A. Wylie said there is no evidence that Marshall struck Cardilino with the baton, and claimed the eye injury could have happened while Cardilino was in Ventura County Jail.

“It sure wouldn’t be the first jail fight that ever happened,” he told jurors.

Wylie told the jurors there is no record of Cardilino telling emergency room physicians about the eye injury when he was treated for a laceration to his head immediately after the arrest.

“Forget about what’s possible. Look at what’s proven,” he said. “It’s inconceivable that someone could come in complaining about his eye and have no record of it.”

Wylie also downplayed the pain Cardilino claims he was in as a result of pressure building up behind his eye. Cardilino was released from jail at 11:30 p.m. Nov. 5, 1987, but waited almost 10 hours before going back to a doctor, Wylie said.

But Galen disputed those elements of the jail records and said his client was “rushed” to a hospital and underwent emergency laser surgery hours after his release from custody.

Jerry Weaver, the Camarillo sheriff’s deputy who confronted Cardilino and others at the convenience store before calling police, said in a report that he saw the officers “bounce” and “throw” Cardilino, Galen said.

But in court, Weaver testified that he did not see any improper police procedures. “That’s the bottom line of (Weaver’s) testimony,” Wylie told jurors, “regardless of what he said in his report.”

Galen blamed a “code of silence” among peace officers for the discrepancy between Weaver’s report and testimony.

Wylie said Galen asked for a $300,000 cash settlement before the case went to trial, but said he recommended that the city reject it. Simi Valley is self-insured, so any monetary award would have to be paid by taxpayers, he said.

Galen told jurors Thursday that damages “in the neighborhood” of $3.5 million should be awarded to his client.

Outside the court, Cardilino said he was unable to work because of the blindness in his right eye. He said he had worked in construction before the arrest, but is unable to find another job, in part because he cannot read or write.

“It’s been a nightmare,” he said.