My friends told the truth. They took a plea to avoid going to trial without dash camera video.
In the trial of their roommate, the police lied. I was at the trial and heard the audio part of the dash recording, which contradicted the cops' testimony. The fact that neither the prosecutor, the judge, or even the defense attorney called his account into question was unnerving, to say the least. The defendant in that trial also took a plea after seeing that the cops' lies were going to be believed. (He was able to do that because it came out in the trial that EPD  was withholding evidence in the case.)
At least using a DA from another county in the Lara case avoided a conflict of interest with the Lane County DA who works hand in hand with EPD. And I am saying that there SHOULD be an independent prosecutor to handle police crimes. Now that the GOP is in charge of the U.S. Dept. of Justice, it will be less likely that police departments will be investigated for criminal behavior.