June 30--A former Los Angeles city firefighter apologized in court Tuesday for assaulting a woman who commonly fed stray cats near his West Adams home.
Ian Eulian was sentenced to 180 days in jail for repeatedly punching Rebecca Stafford. A security camera at a nearby community arts center captured the Sept. 14, 2013, incident on video.
Shortly before a judge sentenced him, Eulian stood in a downtown L.A. courtroom and said his behavior was a "split-second reaction."
"First," he said, "I'd like to say, 'I'm sorry,' to Ms. Stafford."
He turned to face her and whispered: "I'm sorry."
Stafford nodded and mouthed: "Thank you."
Eulian, 39, choked back tears as he told the judge he wasn't proud of that night in 2013.
"My emotions got the best of me," he said.
A few minutes later, Stafford addressed the court, again thanking Eulian for his apology and saying she knows what it feels like to lose one's temper. She told the judge that she used to avoid markets in her neighborhood for fear of running into Eulian, but said those feelings went away with his apology.
A jury convicted Eulian of assault and battery in May. Jurors in an earlier trial had deadlocked last year on the charges.
Deputy Dist. Atty. Joshua Ritter asked the judge to sentence Eulian to a year in jail. Although Eulian lived an exemplary life until the assault, his actions that night were "shockingly violent and callous," Ritter said.
Eulian, who was off duty at the time, knocked Stafford unconscious, Ritter said, and she still suffers neck pain and emotional damage from the attack.
Defense attorney Robert A. Schwartz called the moment captured on video a "total, total aberration" from his client's exemplary behavior during the rest of his life. His client only intervened that night, Schwartz said, to defend his mother, who is captured on the recording arguing with Stafford before Eulian punches her.
Schwartz asked Superior Court Judge Jose Sandoval not to give any jail time to his client -- who recently resigned from the Fire Department -- asking the judge to consider that Eulian lost his career, which he loved.
"He will never be a firefighter again -- this is devastating," he said. "There are huge consequences already."
Sandoval said he believed Eulian's actions that night were, indeed, "aberrant behavior," and commended him for apologizing.
"This is, unfortunately, a sad case," Sandoval said. "His anger got the best of him."
When Sandoval sentenced Eulian to jail time -- as well as probation, 25 days of Caltrans work and anger-management classes -- Eulian's mother gasped. A man sitting next to her shrieked and Stafford looked up at the ceiling.
Schwartz filed a notice of appeal Tuesday. Over the objection of the prosecutor, Eulian remains free on $20,000 bond while his appeal is pending, the district attorney's office said.
To streamline the case, Ritter said, the district attorney's office dismissed the charges against Eulian's 72-year-old mother, Lonieta Fontaine, after the first trial.
Outside of the courthouse, Stafford said Eulian's apology -- a move she didn't expect -- had changed her entire view of the case.
"That's kind of what I wanted from the beginning," she said.
