On Monday, the Los Angeles Police Department promised to disclose video footage from the fatal shooting of a teenage girl in a clothes store when a bullet entered the wall of her dressing room as officers opened fire on an assault suspect.
The errant cartridge that injured the 14-year-old girl, Valentina Orellana-Peralta, was probably shot mistakenly into the changing room by an LAPD officer on the other side of the wall, according to police.
The child was shopping with her mother for a dress for her forthcoming quinceanera, a 15th birthday celebration in Hispanic traditions, when she was shot on December 23, Los Angeles news agencies reported.
The suspect was also slain in the shooting, who had attacked a woman on the upper floor of the clothes store when officers arrived. The injured woman was sent to a local hospital for treatment.
Officers found a bullet hole in a wall exactly behind where the suspect had been standing and investigated the premises, where they discovered the 14-year-old shot to death in a dressing room on the other side of that wall in the line of fire, police said.
In a press conference later that day, Assistant LAPD Chief Dominic Choi told reporters that detectives believe that the youngster was hit by a shell fired from a police officer’s revolver. According to an LAPD official, the officer has been placed on administrative leave while the inquiry is ongoing.
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