Los Angeles police slammed after teenage girl killed during shop intervention
The 14-year-old was in a changing room when she was shot by a police officer responding to an assault.
A 14-year-old girl was killed in a changing room by a stray bullet fired by a police officer responding to an assault in the store, Los Angeles police said Monday, Dec. 27, who opened an investigation and released the videos of the accident.
The tragedy took place on December 23 at a clothing store in North Hollywood, near Los Angeles, where police were called for an "armed robbery" in progress, according to the police statement. In her call to the police, a store worker explained that the man was holding up a heavy bicycle lock that he used to try to assault customers. In another emergency call, a client mentioned a gun and shots, but no gun was found at the scene.
On their arrival, the police discovered in the shelves of the store a woman in blood "suffering from various injuries" but conscious, a few meters from the suspect. According to on-board camera videos released on Monday, one of the police officers, armed with a rifle, repelled his colleagues with lighter weapons before immediately opening fire on the suspect three times, fatally injuring him. "Unbeknownst to the police, a 14-year-old girl was in a dressing room on the other side of a wall directly behind the suspect" and it was only after the shooting that the officers discovered that the teenager had been killed by a bullet.
"Chaotic accident"
According to the first elements of the investigation, "it seems that the victim was struck by a bullet which ricocheted on the ground and penetrated the wall of the dressing room," police said. Valentina Orellana-Peralta was shopping with her mother, and she died "in her arms" while trying on dresses for Christmas, according to a family statement released Monday evening.
Los Angeles Police Chief (LAPD) Michel Moore lamented "a chaotic accident resulting in the death of an innocent child", apologized to the family and pledged to shed light on "On the circumstances which led to this tragedy". As such, he requested that emergency calls, radio exchanges, images from on-board cameras and CCTV be made public on Monday.
"Unacceptable"
The man who provoked the intervention, aged 24 and already prosecuted for acts of violence, was first stationed at the foot of an escalator where he had attacked two clients, trying to take their bags . Obviously very agitated and in a daze, we see him in the CCTV footage removing his pants before going upstairs. It was there that he attacked a third victim from behind, repeatedly hitting her on the head with his padlock.
One of the main civil rights organizations of Latin American citizens, Lulac, on Monday strongly criticized the conditions under which the police intervened. "It is unacceptable that the Los Angeles police were able to open fire in a crowded store at the height of Christmas shopping without knowing for sure whether the suspect was armed," reacted the president of Lulac, Domingo Garcia.
In a similar accident, the manager of a supermarket in the Silver Lake district was killed by a police officer in July 2018, when she was the victim of a hostage-taking. The LAPD considered the shooting to have been carried out properly and the prosecutor at the time did not prosecute.
In 2021, the LAPD opened fire 38 times and killed 18 people, up from 27 times (and 7 dead) in 2020, and 26 times (and 12 dead) in 2019, according to the Los Angeles Times tally.