LA DA Drops Felonies Against Whistleblower Cop

Hochman told reporters downtown that his office was "listening to the impact the case was having on potential whistleblowers," and that he wanted to make "crystal clear" his aim was to stop illegal investigative practices by police, not to silence officers who report bad behavior. "The message was not being clearly interpreted about us being protective of whistleblowers," he said.

He also defended the prosecution itself. "Here we have an LAPD officer who should know the law better than anyone else," Hochman said, noting his office works "every single day with individuals who are whistleblowers who have brought wrongdoing forward through legitimate means." He said he could technically have charged Flores with 122 felony counts — one per recording — and warned: "If you go ahead and illegally eavesdrop in our community, you will face criminal prosecution for doing it, so don't take out your cellphones and or your smart glasses or anything else."

Hochman denounced the taped comments as "hate speech" but said there was no evidence they amounted to a hate crime, which he said blocked his office from criminally prosecuting the officers who made them.

Flores' attorney, former L.A. County prosecutor Alan Jackson, claimed vindication. "Following this disposition, 16 felonies will be dismissed with no plea, no punishment, and no record, because Daniel Flores told the troubling truth about what he heard inside his own department," Jackson said. "As the investigators themselves concluded, there was no reasonable expectation of privacy in this open-plan LAPD office. That isn't eavesdropping, it's being a witness. Mr. Flores has committed no crime." In July, Jackson told the Los Angeles Times the charges told officers that "if you document bigotry inside the LAPD, you will be the one who ends up in a courtroom."

Mayor Karen Bass and some of Hochman's own prosecutors had criticized the filing as "insane" and a deterrent to police trying to expose misconduct, the Los Angeles Times reported. Bass said she worried about a chilling effect on other police whistleblowers.

Several county prosecutors who spoke to the Times anonymously called the DA's own motion in the case bizarre and unprecedented, and said the reversal within two weeks was embarrassing for the office. "From charging to doubling down to reducing to misdemeanors, this just makes it worse," one prosecutor said. "The filing was inappropriate but then to bend to public pressure isn't appropriate either."

An LAPD spokesman referred all questions to the district attorney's office. The AP said Jackson did not respond to an emailed request for comment Wednesday morning.