LAPD Board Finds Fatal Shooting of Jeremy Flores Within Policy

_{Isabella Rivera, the mother of Jeremy Flores, looks at a memorial to him on July 15, 2025 (Sean Beckner-Carmitchel)}

By Sean Beckner-Carmitchel, Kayjel Mairena

LOS ANGELES — Amid protests and calls for accountability from community leaders and the family of Jeremy Flores, LAPD’s Board of Police Commissioners voted that officers who shot him will receive little discipline from the department. On Tuesday, June 30, the commissioners voted unanimously that the officer’s lethal use of force and drawing their firearms were within department policy.

All of the officers who shot will face a mandatory tactical debrief. Tactical debriefs are additional, mandatory training and take the incident into account.

On July 14, 2025 Jeremy Flores was sitting inside his van near the home of his family in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles. LAPD officers working out of the Hollenbeck Division officers responded to a report of a man near Eighth Street and Spence Street. The suspect, who turned out to be Flores, had a “possible assault rifle” according to a person calling LAPD in the early morning.

Officers arriving began to shout towards the van. “Drop the gun mother—,” an officer shouted. Another, “Drop the gun or you’re going to get shot.”

Officers fatally shot Flores while he was sitting inside the van. “I got you covered. He was honestly pointing at you and your partner,” an officer told others responding to the scene.

The “possible assault rifle,” Flores had been in possession of turned out to be a MP5-style, automatic BB Airsoft rifle. Even after the airsoft gun was booked into evidence, LAPD press releases occasionally referred to it as a rifle without any qualifiers.

It took nearly two hours for him to get medical attention because of a “stand off” that included SWAT and tear gas with Flores after he’d been shot. Officers shouted commands to exit his vehicle for hours, even as Flores bled and was unresponsive. SWAT officers arrived as backup to the call. A tear gas canister was launched into the van.

Isabella Rivera, Flores’ mother, told commissioners during public comment “They waited two hours for the SWAT team to throw gas bombs at him when he was already gone.”

Eyewitnesses say that Flores was already dead when officers launched the tear gas into his vehicle. When the chemical irritant was launched into the van in footage provided by LAPD, Flores does not move.

A drone was deployed by officers to observe him; still, he was unresponsive. Finally, LAPD officers responded along with Los Angeles Fire Department medical personnel.

Those officers involved were identified by the department as Livier Jimenez, Fernando Godinez and Michael Ruiz.

_{Video produced by LAPD featuring body worn video of the incident (LAPD)}

LAFD declared Flores dead on scene. One LAPD officer could be heard saying “don’t bother handcuffing,” in a body-worn video release by the department as Flores was face down in the pavement. Officers did handcuff him on scene.

“They took him out of the car and threw him on the ground like a bag of trash,” Rivera said. Flores’ body remained in the street for hours after LAFD pronounced him deceased.

The officers involved will receive little discipline after LAPD’s Board of Police Commissioners voted June 30, 2026 that the fatal shooting was in policy; they’ll receive additional training.

Rivera said Flores “was beautiful at heart. Beautiful to all, not only to me, to everyone.” Flores was “the man of the house,” and “he’d stop eating so I could eat.” 

During Tuesday’s Police Commission meeting, multiple speakers expressed support for the Flores family and criticized the department over the fatal shooting. Several called on commissioners to release more information about the case and discipline any officers found to have violated department policy.

The public comments session was well-attended; comments varied on topic but were largely negative toward LAPD. Police oversight, surveillance technology and officer accountability were all discussed by many attending, but Flores’ death remained a recurring topic.

Daniel, a member of Centro CSO and Veterans Against The War told commissioners during public comment that officers responding to Flores “refuse to see a person going through a mental health crisis as anything but a threat to their lives.” 

Daniel said he watched a member of the family have a panic attack that day; she’d been saying “This isn’t real. This can’t be happening. This isn’t real.”

2025 saw a calendar year with a sharp rise in shootings by officers. There were four shootings by LAPD officers discussed in closed session during the meeting. Those shootings were of Flores, James Tullous, Gurpreet Singh and Carlos Rangel Huerta. All of those shootings had similar results: tactical debriefs, and uses of force in policy.

The California Department of Justice is also investigating the shooting. California law requires the department to investigate fatal shootings of unarmed civilians by law enforcement officers.

Rivera said that she hadn’t spoken to investigators with California’s DOJ since they announced their investigation. She said the DOJ has responded with “total silence.” Rivera said “The Department of Justice has also been investigating my son’s case for a year. So as of today, I haven’t received anything from them.”

_{Rivera alongside other family and members of Centro CSO in Chicago at the NAARPR (Courtesy of Gabe Quiroz, Jr.)}

Since the shooting, the family of Flores have been involved in calls for police accountability. Rivera and her son traveled to a conference held by the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (NAARPR) conference in Chicago. The NAARPR is a yearly gathering of police reform organizations.

Gabriel, a member of Centro CSO, told the commission during public comment that since Flores’ death their group and Flores’ family “have been fighting for justice.” They’ve organized protests in Boyle Heights regularly. 

Calls by the family and organizations like Centro CSO for police accountability have themselves seen flashes of force by officers. When Centro CSO activists protested a National Night Out event held by LAPD Hollenbeck officers, an officer lunged at them with a baton. Gabriel said during the meeting that during protests, members of the group “were pushed specifically by Captain Mayberry. I was pushed specifically by him. There’s video. We saw it. I made complaints to this guy right here in the room next door. He didn’t do a damn thing.”

Rivera said that she wanted Flores to be remembered “with justice. That they punish those police officers. Because they continue killing because no one, no one does anything. If there was someone who wanted to punish the police for their corruption, I think the rest would stop. Punish those officers to demonstrate to us what justice is.“

_{Isabella Rivera, the mother of Jeremy Flores, addresses a crowd on July 15, 2025 in front of members of Centro CSO (Sean Beckner-Carmitchel)}

When asked by Ten Four how Flores’ death has hit her, Rivera said “It impacted me, totally. It totally changed my life. Because a part of me left. My son left. My friend left. I’ll never have him back. Nothing and no one can return him to me.” She shed several tears while answering. Rivera continued, saying “but I want people to know what happened and for them to know who Jeremy Flores was because to me he continues being Jeremy Flores.”