LAPD Body-Cam Footage Shows Department Store Shooting

NORTH HOLLYWOOD, CA — As the community mourns the death of a 14-year-old girl struck down by a stray police bullet while shopping for her quinceanera dress at a North Hollywood Burlington Coat Factory, the Los Angeles Police Department released footage from the incident Monday.

Community activists called for criminal prosecution of the unnamed officer, who was placed on administrative leave following the store shooting that took the life of Valentina Orellana-Peralta as well as assault suspect Daniel Elena Lopez, 24. According to police, an unarmed Elena Lopez was attacking a woman inside the store when the officer opened fire, killing him and sending a stray bullet into a dressing room occupied by Valentina. The shooting began a week in which LA officers killed four people. So far in 2021, Los Angeles police shot 37 people, killing 17.

Authorities released body-camera footage and other details of a shooting including audio of the 9-1-1 call summoning officers to the store on one of the busiest shopping days of the year.

Police were called to the Burlington store at 12121 Victory Blvd., near Laurel Canyon Boulevard, at about 11:45 a.m Thursday after receiving a 911 call from a person who reported hearing shots fired and arguing inside the store, according to the LAPD.

According to police, responding officers found a suspect assaulting a woman inside the store, prompting at least one officer to open fire. On Thursday, witnesses in North Hollywood told KCBS-TV that the man began acting erratically, threatening to throw items from the upper floor, and he attacked a woman with a bicycle lock shortly before noon as the store was crowded with holiday shoppers.

In the video, he can be seen assaulting at least three women and removing his pants.

"[The suspect] took the escalator up to the second floor," LAPD Cpt. Stacy Spell said. "He laid his bike in an aisle and walked around the store putting on clothes."

Spell said a store employee approached Lopez about his bicycle and left the area. Lopez then allegedly smashed a computer monitor and a glass railing with a bike lock before going back down the escalator and encountering a woman.

Lopez allegedly attempted to steal the woman's bag and hit her with the bike lock when she resisted. The woman fled the scene and has not been identified.

Lopez waited at the bottom of the escalator as another woman descended, and he allegedly attempted to grab her, but she was able to break free and fled the store as well, Spell said. He then went back up to the second floor and struck a third woman from behind with the lock.
The woman fell to the ground, and Lopez can bee seen in the video beating her with the bike lock.

Body-camera footage shows police as they spotted the woman on the floor, then the suspect a moment later -- then the sound of police gunfire. After the wounded suspect was detained, and eventually pronounced dead, officers found the 14-year-old girl, identified as Valentina Orellana-Peralta, dead in a dressing room that was behind the suspect when the shooting occurred. According to the video released Monday, police believe a bullet fired by police skipped off the floor of the store and passed through the dressing room wall, striking the teen on the other side.

Officers found the teenager dead after seeing a hole in “a solid wall that you can't see behind,” LAPD Assistant Chief Dominic Choi said. "We went behind it (the wall), and it turned out to be a dressing room up there," Choi said. "... We were able to locate a 14-year-old female who was found deceased in that dressing room."

Asked if the girl was shot by police, Choi said, "Preliminarily, we believe that round was an officer's round."

Investigators didn't immediately know whether she was in the dressing room before the violence began or ran in there to hide, he said.

Meanwhile, local civil rights leaders plan to make a public call Monday afternoon for the arrest and prosecution of the officer who fired the shot that killed the teen.

Los Angeles has endured dramatic rise in cases where officers shot or killed people in either of the last two years — 27 people were shot and 7 of them killed by LA police in all of 2020. In 2019, officers shot 26 people, killing 12.

"The slaying was unwarranted and involved the reckless use of deadly force by the LAPD," Earl Ofari Hutchinson of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable said in a statement ahead of an afternoon news conference. "This is only the latest in a continuing series of LAPD shootings of civilians under highly dubious circumstances."

LAPD Chief Michel Moore, who was out of town with family but briefed on the shooting, said in a statement over the holiday weekend: "This chaotic incident resulting in the death of an innocent child is tragic and devastating for everyone involved."

"I am profoundly sorry for the loss of this young girl's life and I know there are no words that can relieve the unimaginable pain for the family," Moore said. "My commitment is to conduct a thorough, complete and transparent investigation into the circumstances that led up to this tragedy and provide the family and public with as much information as possible," the chief added.

Moore said he directed critical incident video from the scene to be released by Monday. The release will include 911 calls, radio transmissions, body-worn video and any surveillance video gathered.

The LAPD Family Liaison is working closely with the Mayor's Crisis Response Team and Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez to provide assistance to the 14- year-old girl's family, a department official said.

The department's Force Investigation Division and Inspector General's Office were both investigating the shooting, along with the California Department of Justice's California Police Shooting Investigation Team for Southern California. The DOJ investigates officer shootings under provisions of a bill signed into law last year.

Once the investigation has been completed, the results will be turned over to the California Department of Justice's Special Prosecutions Section within the Criminal Law Division for independent review.

The Los Angeles Times reported that Elana Lopez had convictions for car theft, carrying a loaded gun in public and carrying a gun as a felon.

The newspaper also reported that he was arrested in the San Fernando Valley in August 2020 and charged with domestic battery, stealing a car and recklessly fleeing the police, later pleading guilty to domestic battery and fleeing police and sentenced to two years in state prison.

A spokeswoman for the state corrections department declined to release Elena Lopez's commitment history to The Times, citing the ongoing investigation into the North Hollywood shooting.

Moore told The Times it did not appear that the officer who fired "would have known that there was anyone behind there or that he was looking at anyone other than the suspect and a wall," but said every aspect of what occurred and why would be analyzed by LAPD investigators.

On Saturday, the League of United Latin American Citizens criticized the shooting.

"It is indefensible that trained Los Angeles police officers could open fire in a crowded store at the height of Christmas shopping without first knowing for sure if the suspect was armed. Also, were they thinking about the danger of their actions to innocent bystanders? If not, they should have, and no apology or any number of words of regret will bring back Valentina!" LULAC National President Domingo Garcia said.

"Everything in their academy training is supposed to teach them to consider the worst-case scenario before drawing their service revolvers. Equally troubling is that this incident is only the latest in a rash of recent LAPD shootings involving Latinos. It is apparent that the days of shoot-first, ask-questions-second are rearing their ugly head again in one of the nation's largest law enforcement agencies," Garcia continued.

City News Service, the Associated Press and Patch Staffer Paige Austin contributed to this report.