LOS ANGELES, CA — A Los Angeles Police Department officer accused of secretly recording colleagues pleaded not guilty Monday to 16 felony counts as newly filed court papers detailed the scope of the recordings and prosecutors' case against him.
Daniel Flores, 43, is accused of recording confidential workplace conversations involving 16 colleagues while assigned to the LAPD's Recruitment and Employment Division in 2024. The conversations included racist, sexist and homophobic remarks, according to the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office.
According to a prosecution brief filed Friday in Los Angeles County Superior Court, investigators reviewed 122 audio recordings that prosecutors say Flores made between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 2024. The recordings were made in an office responsible for conducting background investigations of prospective LAPD applicants, where employees handled confidential applicant information, prosecutors said.
The recordings surfaced Jan. 18, 2025, when the LAPD's Office of Inspector General received an anonymous letter accompanied by a flash drive containing the audio files, according to the filing. The complaint submitted to the inspector general accused employees in the unit of misconduct during a period stretching from May to November 2024.
Internal Affairs investigators subsequently interviewed 16 LAPD employees whose voices appeared on the recordings. All told investigators they had not known they were being recorded and had not consented to having the conversations recorded or distributed, prosecutors said.
The District Attorney's Office contends the recordings often captured only portions of conversations.
"Several victims further stated the recordings lacked the full context of the conversations and omitted defendant's own participation immediately preceding the recorded portions," the court filing reads.
Several employees told investigators they believed Flores would initiate or participate in conversations before activating a recording device, according to the filing.
Investigators also said Flores could be heard participating in many of the conversations and, in some instances, answering his desk telephone shortly before a recording ended, evidence prosecutors contend ties him to the recording device.
The filing acknowledges that some recordings captured racially, sexually or otherwise offensive comments Several employees admitted making insensitive remarks but described them to investigators as jokes, banter or conversations among coworkers that were not intended to target applicants or offend colleagues.
One person was captured in a recording "teasing his former partner insensitively about having molested his cousin, a candidate, as well as making jokes regarding his mastery of English and level of sexual experience," according to the filing.
In another conversation, people were captured referring to "red" "blue" and "purple" rooms as a way to describe political beliefs. An Asian employee "identified another Asian employee jokingly saying it was 'a yellow room' due to the number of Asian employees," the filing reads.
District Attorney Nathan Hochman said his office condemned sexist, homophobic and racist remarks but that California law generally requires all parties to consent to the recording of confidential communications.
"The options are not break the law or do nothing," Hochman said in a release. "One can address important issues by going through the proper legal channels."
The prosecution brief says investigators searched LAPD and city records for complaints Flores had made about the 16 employees before the recordings were anonymously submitted and found no previous reports concerning allegations of misconduct.
Flores has offered a sharply different account.
In a lawsuit filed against the city in June, Flores said he believed he was conducting a lawful police investigation into racist, sexist and homophobic remarks by department employees. He claimed a hostile work environment developed after a new supervisor took over the recruiting division in late 2021 and encouraged a culture in which derogatory comments were tolerated.
His lawsuit claims coworkers made disparaging comments about women, Asians, Hispanics, Black people and gay people. Flores said he eventually submitted complaints to LAPD Internal Affairs and the Los Angeles Police Commission in January 2025.
His lawyer, high-profile defense attorney Alan Jackson, criticized the criminal case after Monday's arraignment, saying Flores was being prosecuted for exposing misconduct inside the department.
"The prosecution of this case, the prosecution of my client, Daniel Flores, sends a really, really scary message," Jackson told reporters. "That message is if you expose racism and sexism and bigotry and misogyny and bias within the walls of the LAPD, then you're going to be ... the one exposed to potential state prison because of a prosecution like this."
Jackson said Flores "did exactly that which we would expect him to do as an officer of the law" and said the defense intends to challenge the case in court.
Flores remains free on his own recognizance. He is due back in court Sept. 9, when a date is expected to be set for a preliminary hearing to determine whether there is enough evidence for him to stand trial.
He could face up to 13 years in prison if convicted.
City News Service contributed to this report.
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