8 L.A. County probation officers placed on leave for allegedly allowing beatdown at Los Padrinos
The Los Angeles County Probation Department has placed eight officers on leave after they allegedly stood by while a group of youths beat up another teen inside Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall, a facility for detained youths in Downey, sources told The Times on Thursday.
The department announced the discipline in a news release Wednesday evening, though it offered no specifics about what occurred.
“We are actively identifying and removing those who do not align with our core values and standards to eliminate the negative influences within our organization,” Probation Chief Guillermo Viera Rosa said in a statement.
Two sources with knowledge of the incident — who spoke on condition of anonymity to protect the ongoing investigation — said the officers allegedly stood by and allowed a youth in custody to suffer an assault at the hands of fellow juveniles. The sources did not say how severely the youth was injured or how the incident came to light.
The sources also told The Times that the incident was captured on video, which showed several youths beating on one victim in full view of the officers, who did nothing in response.
One source said the victim suffered a broken nose and had to be hospitalized. The incident happened in December, the sources said.
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Two Probation Department sources, who also requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media, said the suspended officers were “walked out” of Los Padrinos and had their badges taken. Another source inside the department, who also was not authorized to speak publicly, said the conduct was egregious enough that the officers were unlikely to return.
The Probation Department declined to comment. Nicole Nishida, a spokeswoman for the Sheriff’s Department, said the agency launched its investigation into the incident on Monday. Nishida could not offer additional details and said investigators were still trying to “determine the extent and scope of the alleged misconduct.”
The alleged incident capped a tumultuous year for the troubled agency. One teen died of a drug overdose, leading to accusations that officers are smuggling fentanyl into the facility that houses youths accused of the most violent crimes. The chief of two years was fired after The Times published video of officers violently restraining a 17-year-old, and the officer at the center of the troubling footage is now being prosecuted. A state oversight agency ordered most youth out of the county’s two oldest juvenile halls, citing consistently dismal conditions.
The opening of Los Padrinos was supposed to mark a turning point for the agency, but shortly after the facility began housing youths, news helicopters were circling the building after a riot and escape attempt in late July.
Six youths were reportedly involved in an altercation at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall in Downey, and one youth escaped but was recaptured within 10 minutes.
According to the release issued Wednesday, Viera Rosa has asked that the Sheriff’s Department investigate the incident, rather than the agency’s own internal affairs department, “to maintain the integrity of the investigation.”
The announcement came one day after county Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, at the request of Viera Rosa, introduced a last-minute motion to make it easier for the agency to go outside its own internal affairs department for investigations.
The motion asks county lawyers to see whether the chief could hire outside experts to evaluate the internal affairs office and contract with outside investigators to oversee some internal affairs investigations while that review is underway.
“We can’t root out corruption without holding people accountable,” Horvath said at the Tuesday board meeting. “If we’re serious about changing this department all options must be on the table.”
On Thursday, Probation Department representatives, called in front of the Probation Oversight Commission for their regular meeting, agreed there were myriad problems with how they investigated their own.
“There are many pieces missing,” Deputy Chief Kimberly Epps told the commission of the internal affairs process.
The department, she said, knew where it stood in the public’s eyes: “We completely understand that, as a department, we have lost public trust.”
Probation officials said at the meeting they could not comment on the most recent incident.
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