The DA retreats after public outcry for charging an officer with felony counts.
By Carlos Reyes
Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman announced the reduction of criminal charges against a Los Angeles Police Department officer who secretly recorded colleagues making racist, sexist, and homophobic comments.
In a court filing, prosecutors agreed to lower 16 felony counts of illegal eavesdropping against 43-year-old Officer Daniel Flores to misdemeanor charges. The decision opens the door for Flores’ defense counsel to request a one-year judicial diversion program. If granted by the court, successful completion without further offenses will result in a total dismissal of the case.
Flores, who served in an LAPD recruiting unit, recorded 16 colleagues across 122 separate occasions during 2024 without their consent, which is a practice prohibited under California law since 1967. The audio submitted to internal affairs captured recruitment officers joking about a famous Latino baseball pitcher dying from eating “too many tacos,” invoking racist tropes about Black people, and calling a young female recruit “rapeable” because she was “someone who could be taken advantage of.”
The original felony charges sparked sharp backlash from whistleblower attorneys, community activists, and Mayor Karen Bass, who argued that prosecuting Flores penalized an officer for exposing blatant bigotry. Defense attorney Alan Jackson noted that Hochman’s actions sent a “really, really scary...
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