A Los Angeles Police Department commander who claims she was effectively demoted after raising concerns about officers’ failure to turn on body-worn cameras has filed a whistleblower retaliation lawsuit against the city.
The suit, which was filed May 12 in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleges the department misled and falsified reports to the Board of Police Commissioners — a civilian oversight board — about compliance with body-worn cameras.
According to the suit, Cmdr. Natalie Cortez had told at least one superior that the department was providing false information to the board. Those superiors, according to the suit, “formed the belief” that she planned to support a fellow colleague, Capt. Johnny Smith, in a separate civil lawsuit alleging retaliation over complaints about noncompliance with body-worn cameras and officers’ use of bean bag rounds on protestors in 2020. Smith’s suit was filed against the city on Feb. 1, 2022.
Less than two weeks later, then-Chief Michel Moore “punitively transferred” Cortez from her “prestigious” post in the Operations Valley Bureau to an “insignificant” post in the Transit Services Group, Cortez’s suit claims. In 2024 and 2025, according to the suit, she was also passed over for promotions to the rank of deputy chief.
Diana Wells, an attorney for Cortez, said the LAPD rewards commanding officers who shield the department from criticism. “In order to stay where you are and continue climbing up the ladder, you do what you are told,” Wells...
(CNN) — President Donald Trump made a series of false claims to members of the military on Tuesday in a partisan and combative speech at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. Trump lied again about the 20...