No one suggests that the death, by a bullet fired by an LA police officer at 24-year-old Daniel Elena Lopez that missed, was anything other than a tragedy. Valentina Orellana-Peralta, a 14-year-old with her mother in a dressing room on the other side of the wall, was struck by the cop’s bullet. A child died while trying on quinceañera dresses with her mother. A tragedy.
When the story broke, there was significant criticism for the passive voice headlines used to describe this tragedy, but as much as the exonerative tense typically buried in the phrase “police-involved shooting” manages to conceal rather than reveal, the question here wasn’t bad journalistic practices, but that another cop shot and killed another innocent person.
But is this yet another outrage or just another tragedy?
A woman clutched at her bloodied face in an aisle splotched with red as she scrambled away from a man who had been pummeling her with a bike lock. A frightened employee at the Burlington clothing store told Los Angeles police officers that a man was “going crazy” in the store.
“I have a hostile customer in my store attacking customers!” she told dispatchers in a 911 call. “He’s walking around the store looking for people.” Someone else called in a report of “a guy with a gun.”
This is what the police knew going into the Burlington Coat Factory that day. This frames their expectations of what they’re about to confront, that there was violence, that people were being harmed, that there might be a gun.
A scrum of officers mounted the escalators in a diamond formation, weapons drawn. Within moments of spotting the man, later identified as Daniel Elena Lopez, 24, at least one officer opened fire.
The scene unfolded in chaotic detail on Monday in newly released footage from surveillance and police body cameras of the episode on Thursday that left both Mr. Elena Lopez and Ms. Orellana-Peralta dead.
Lopez didn’t have a gun, but he had what appeared to be a bike lock and was using it to beat people. If Lopez was not going to stop upon seeing police and lay down his weapon, but instead continue to beat people with the lock, was it beyond the pale for an officer to decide that this was not something to let continue? If Lopez beat to death a person as the cops stood there watching, pleading, threatening, but taking no action, would that have been acceptable?
But why didn’t the cops rush Lopez, who only had a bike lock and take him to the ground, disarm him and cuff him without compressing his chest? The First Rule of Policing kicks in, that the cops will not risk their lives, their safety, for the sake of avoiding harm to another. What if they tried to take Lopez down and he nailed a cop in the head with one good shot with the bike lock and killed the cop? Then the tragedy would have been the dead cop, his widow, his children.
What about a less-lethal, but more distant, means of disabling Lopez, like a taser? Were the officers armed with less-lethal weapons? Was there a reason why they leaped over this alternative to firing deadly rounds?
“There was nothing in the video that justified opening fire the way the police officer with the assault rifle did,” John Hamasaki, a criminal defense lawyer who is a member of the San Francisco police commission and regularly reviews footage of police killings, told The Guardian. “I was shocked to see the video … Deadly force is the last option on the table.”
The round hit the floor and struck the wall behind Lopez. Unbeknownst to the police, there were dressing rooms on the other side of the wall. Inside was Valentina Orellana-Peralta.
“Valentina was a shy girl in Chile, but everything was turning out well for her in the U.S.,” her aunt Carolina Peralta, 51, told the Los Angeles Times. “She was catching up with English and being more outgoing. She was happy to be with her older sister.”
On Monday, Valentina’s family and the League of United Latin American Citizens, the nation’s oldest Latino civil right group, demanded answers, vowing that the league “will not let her death become just another statistic,” the Los Angeles Daily News reported.
“Valentina died in the arms of her mother, inside the dressing room,” her aunt told the Los Angeles Times. “My sister does not understand how this tragedy could have happened just when they had managed to reunite the family.”
Ben Crump has announced that he’s been retained to represent the family. There is no “reason” why this tragedy happened, why this girl had to die. No doubt she was loved, that she had dreams of a wonderful life in her new country. But even if she was miserable and unloved, her death would be a tragedy. She did nothing to deserve to die.
But that’s not the question presented by what the unnamed police officer did that day. Was it wrong for him to shoot? Were there better alternatives that did not put the officers at risk of death or bodily harm when they confronted Lopez, who was doing harm to others?
The immediate reaction to tragedies such as this, where the outcome is tragic and the cause is the decision of a police officer, is to default to finding reasons to blame the cop. We’re fairly close to the point where reasons are no longer needed, that any time a cop shoots and someone is killed, the cop is culpable.
And indeed, that may well be the case here, if the decision to shoot, even though he didn’t know that there was a child on the other side of a wall who might die from a misaimed round, was unjustified. But the question isn’t whether the outcome was a tragedy, but whether the shoot was justified to protect both other shoppers and cops from Lopez, or there was a better alternative that, as it happened, would not have ended in the death of Valentina Orellana-Peralta or, for that matter, Daniel Elena Lopez.
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“We’re fairly close to the point where…any time a cop shoots and someone is killed, the cop is culpable.”
Culpable? I’m not sure I’ve seen that in any protester demands. I’d settle for a shooter being held accountable. In either case, as you know, the cops have had plenty of time to police themselves, yet here we, the general public, are, still trying to figure out how to do it for them.
Accountable? I’m not sure I’ve seen that in any demands. I’d settle for a shooter being held responsible. In either case, as you know, semantics are pointless if you don’t talk about what you think the difference is. Yet, here I am, trying to figure out what you mean while also telling you that you haven’t said anything at all.
Do you really need me to copy/paste the dictionary definitions of the words culpable and accountable for you to understand the difference, PK?
Mockery is not an argument and does nothing to move the discussion forward. I expect more from you.
We’ve done this before. Don’t go to the dictionary for answers on these topics, please. Sorry if I’m disoriented from the deja vu. The mockery was meant in good fun and to highlight the argument tucked inside. I’m sad I have to make that clear again.
This is why we need to disarm the police,… to prevent the temptation to use deadly force in the “heat of the moment.” No amount of additional “training” or “self-policing”–whatever that is–is going to solve this epidemic of official misconduct.
Accountability is not the answer either, as prosecutors and the courts have historically shown deference to the Blue Wall. And we know officers frequently testilie under oath. How did we get here and how long does this domestic war last?
Preserve and Protect? Humbug!
This is where the talking heads on CBS know so much more than police officers. The officer probably had his rifle in his hands because of the gun report, and fired the rifle because it was the weapon he had in his hands. As we all know. Once he saw the suspect was only bludgeoning a woman with a bike lock, he should have realized that he ought to re-sling the rifle and try his taser instead. If he had one. Maybe it would have worked, and stopped the beating. If it didn’t, then the officer could have drawn a pistol, taking care to load it with hollow points to control ricochets. Maybe that wouldn’t have penetrated the wall or the 14-year-old girl. Clearly, the officer failed to go through all the proper steps and also did not try to “deescalate” the beating. This is why CBS broadcast journalists should have been summoned to the scene instead of police.
If you’re going to take time to write out all these “what-ifs”, you could put that time to better use by clicking the link in the article, watching the video, and seeing the cops say they have “less than lethal” options out already and that the cop standing 2 feet next to the shooter had a less than lethal shotgun trained on the guy, who was 10 – 15 feet minimum away from anyone, when they shot.
Of course, none of that changes much about the post, it only highlights the issue our host raised — namely that being a cop isn’t supposed to be a no-risk occupation, so why do cops like this seem so unwilling to take any risk before invoking the first rule of policing?
Strange how police elsewhere and in other times, seem to be capable of dealing with violent people wielding improvised bludgeons (which are present everywhere and have been since prehistoric times) without using firearms.
The call was reported as a shooting. There were multiple calls, some of whom said he had a gun, at least one reported he was shooting. All of the tactics they used were in anticipation of a gunman.
He may well have perceived there was a gun. Also, given the damage done to the woman, he may have fired to prevent the suspect from fleeing into the fitting room to attack someone else (whom, tragically, the shooting killed).
The latter raises the question as to why not use the 40mm less-lethal weapon that was present. It may or may not have been possible.
To me, the biggest question is shooting with a high-penetration weapon at a moving target in front of an uncertain background. That’s not the preference by training, but all training is situation dependent.
5 seconds of video and a headline do not a fact set make. My guess, given the politics here in LA, is that this officer will not be prosecuted, because there is no way George Gascon’s first target will be a black cop. If the officer had been white, he would definitely be charged with a negligence variety of homicide.
It was reported as a shooting. So what? This isn’t the artillery, he shouldn’t be opening fire based on secondhand reports.
The officer who made the fatal shot was yanking other officers in front of him out-of-the-way so he could be first on the scene and use his marksmanship skills. He clearly wanted to engage in a shootout and was not about to allow other officers to get there before him and cheat him out of this opportunity. It was obvious from the moment he chambered a round into the barrel he was hellbent on a firefight. No doubt he was jubilant and high-fiving like a madman in the locker room once back at the station. The officer who fired the shot has not been identified but I’d bet he’s got quite the history of escalating situations.
He was hell bent on a fire fight? Or the supervisor on-scene had specifically requested a riflem-equipped officer, and the best place, tactically, to place a rifle is at the front of the clearing formation?
If you were clearing a 200-foot-long store, looking for what was reported as a shooting suspect, why would you not want the rifle at the front?
If you had that rifle, would you let other officers step-off and leave you (and them) at a tactical disadvantage? Or would you urge them to wait so you could push forward and take the lead?
Of course, being in the lead is also the riskiest position for seeking a gunman, especially in an envionment like a store, with innumerable ambush positions.
So, he clearly was quite a jerk for pushing himself to the most tactically sound position while exposing himself to the greatest risk. But absolute proof of his assholianism was how he pushed forward to the injured woman. What kind of decent man moves urgently down a blood trail to a lady with her skull crushed in?
Now I know how SHG feels when people pontificate about lawyers using the law.
I appreciate your anger, but crushing idiots is only half the equation. Is there any way the little girl’s death could have been avoided here? I can count one person who may have deserved to die, but two people died here. The wails on the footage which I assume come from the mother after the shooting are extremely distressing. Connect some dots, say the shoot was justified and back it up if that’s what you mean, please. It just might help more than shutting others down who are reacting to something terrible.
So, there are three questions here:
1) Was the shooting reasonable, in a broad legal/moral sense.
2) Were there better alternatives?
3) Could the girl’s death have been averted?
The answers, I’d say, are yes, maybe and tough to tell.
1) The suspect was a lethal threat, no doubt. The victim’s injuries appear potentially life threatening. Whether the officer mistook the lock for a gun or simply wanted to prevent him fleeing (sadly and ironically) into the fitting area and finding another victim, there was reason to use lethal force to stop him. But, that doesn’t make it the only method
2) There was a 40mm (less-lethal) gun present. That might have been the best option. But the guy was moving. It’s plausible the officer thought there was no time. A pistol shot would have been less accurate (more risk of missing). A shotgun blast more risk of collateral damage. Simply chasing him down to tackle him risks him getting another victim, or, if he did have the reported gun, getting a position of advantage. No easy answers
3) Avoiding the fitting room? If the 40mm and chase/taser options were reasonably unviable, then could the shooting have been better. You see in the video he was already moving off the short aisle, out of view. The window of opportunity to stop him was quickly closing. Letting him go back creates cross fire risk from other officers. But, I don’t know that three shots were necessary. And I do think the idea people would hide in fitting rooms should have been in mind. But does that rule out stopping him to prevent more mayhem?
I don’t know. It’s a tough call. The only sure thing is 20/20 hindsight. And in this case it’s tragic.
From an article in this morning’s USA Today newspaper.
“The lone officer who opened fire, however, was told to “slow down” more than a dozen times by other responding officers before shots were fired”.
The officers already at the scene had assessed the situation, taken defensive positions, knew the suspect was no longer an immediate threat to the victim, and were in the process of de-escalation.
The shooter had other plans and wasn’t to be denied his kill. Not the first time we’ve seen this….
The training for a concealed carry permit emphasizes that you are responsible for every bullet you fire, and the for rules of gun safety include knowing your backstop and what’s behind it. By that measure the police officer who killed Valentina Orellana-Peralta is negligent and culpable and should be charged and prosecuted. I see this as no different than Kim Potter mistaking a gun for a Taser and killing Daunte Wright. Police negligence needs to be prosecuted, so that officers will learn their actions have consequences.
Backing a little farther away from the incident itself, I can’t believe any police department in the country looks at their mission and decides “5.56 hardball seems fine for this”, but they ALL do. Ignorant. Reckless. Thoughtless. A complete lack of preparation.
You can’t understand why a police department responding to a report of a shooting in a 200-foot long open building would want a weapon reliably accurate beyond 75 feet? Really?
I think Bob is referring to using the cheapest full metal jacket ammunition available, guaranteed to over penetrate, instead of frangible ammunition that won’t and is often more accurate to boot. It’s not just cops, though. People often cheap out in the wrong places and over spend in others. It’s why “Penny wise and Pound foolish” is a proverb.
I’ve been involved with firearms for almost 50 years. There is no way I would ever use a rifle inside a building that has an unknown number of people besides the suspect inside. Even if every shot hits the suspect, rifle bullets tend to go through a human sized target, and carry on into whatever is in the background. Really bad decision by the officer who fired the shots and whoever authorized the use of a rifle.
I saw some data a while back(that I forgot to download and save) that indicated that more people are saying that the suspect in a crime like this has a gun when they call police, even if no one saw a firearm. Using the magic words “he has a gun” results in faster police response with more officers. Which increases the chances of a tragedy like this occurring.
You’d never use a rifle in a building with 200-foot-long open stretches to engage an active shooter?
Sure.
Frangible 5.56 gets reliable hits past 200 meters, are you shilling for the cops by arguing this fantasy?
They could use hollow-point ammunition, which is less likely to pass through and cause collateral damage to persons or property, but then the intended targets would suffer much greater internal bodily damage. It’s a lose-lose situation.
By coincidence, last night in Lakewood, Colorado an officer (female) shouted twice for a gunman to put this weapon down. He shot her as she held fire.
The LA Times is really doing their part to add the this nuanced conversation by titling their article “A ‘shy girl’ from Chile, shot by LAPD while shopping, died in her mother’s arms.”
One of the rules of firearm use is “Always be aware of your background.” It would seem, absent a Ma’Khia Bryant active stabbing situation, the officer was in error. How do you train the urge to shoot the bad guy out of police? If you take away their guns, and the video instead showed 9 cops beating the everloving shit out of this guy, does that go over better?