There will be no criminal charges filed against a Los Angeles Police Department officer who opened fire at a suspect attacking a clothing store customer, and accidentally killed a 14-year-old girl cowering in a dress room, officials announced Wednesday.
No criminal charges will be filed against a Los Angeles Police Department officer who opened fire at a suspect inside a clothing store, killing a 14-year-old girl who was hiding and praying with her mother in a dressing room, the California Attorney General's office announced.
Officer William Dorsey Jones Jr. fired three times as officers responded to a Burlington department store in the San Fernando Valley, where 24-year-old Daniel Elena Lopez had brutally attacked two women on Dec. 23, 2021.
“This case was a particularly challenging one to process as this involved the loss of two lives,” Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement.
“Any loss of life is a tragedy, and my heart goes out especially to the family of Valentina Orellana Peralta, who tragically lost her life and whose only involvement in this incident was by being at the wrong place at the wrong time,” the state's top prosecutor said.
The girl and the suspect, Lopez, were killed by Jones, who said he opened fire because he thought officers were responding to an active shooter. The suspect's weapon turned out to be a heavy bike lock, police said.
The mother and daughter had been shopping for a Christmas dress when they heard screaming and ran to hide, authorities said.
The shooting prompted widespread controversy and demonstrations accusing the officer of using excessive force.
A civilian review board ruled in 2022 that the shooting violated department policy. The Los Angeles Police Commission found Jones was justified in firing once, but that two subsequent rounds he fired were outside policy guidelines.
The state Department of Justice, led by Bonta, investigates all police shootings in which an unarmed person is killed. Instead of pressing charges, justice officials recommend the police department "should consider updating their communication training bulletin, and any related training, to account for the type of situation presented during this event.”
The police chief at the time disagreed with the commission and called all three shots unjustified.
Jones remains with the department and is stationed at the Topanga Division, the LAPD told Inside Edition Digital on Thursday.
The department issued no statement concerning the state decision to not charge Jones.
Inside Edition Digital also reached out for comment to Jones' attorney, and to the attorney for the victim's family. The officer's lawyer has previously said her client was devastated by the girl's death and had responded with force because he believed the suspect had a gun.
The dead girl's parents filed a civil suit against the department and Jones in 2022. Mom Soledad Peralta was holding her daughter when one of the rounds pierced the dressing room's wall and hit her daughter. The mother “felt her daughter’s body go limp and watched helplessly as her daughter died while still in her arms,” the lawsuit suit.
It alleges the police department failed to provide adequate training and supervision to the responding officers, and “fostered an environment that allowed and permitted this shooting to occur,” according to the complaint.
That lawsuit is pending.
The Department of Justice decision was released with the agency's report on the shooting, which determined the round that fatally struck the girl had bounced off the store's floor and slammed through a wall into the changing cubicles.
The report said state prosecutors could not file criminal charges against Jones because the killing of Orellana-Peralta was “unintended and unforeseeable.”
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