LOS ANGELES—Thirty officers at the Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall in Downey were indicted on charges of child endangerment and abuse, conspiracy, and battery impacting 143 victims between the ages of 12 and 18.
Twenty-two of the officers were arraigned on March 3 at Los Angeles Superior Court and the remaining will be arraigned on April 18, according to California Attorney General Rob Bonta.
The grand jury indictment alleges that the officers allowed and, in some instances, encouraged 69 fights to occur between youths at the facility, located 15 miles south of Los Angeles, from July 1, 2023, to Dec. 31, 2023.
“Some officers are even seen laughing and shaking hands with the young people involved,” said Attorney General Bonta. “Watching the video, the officers look more like referees or audience members at a prize fight, not adults charged with the care and supervision of young people. The officers don’t step in or intervene and don’t protect their charges,” he stated during a news conference on March 3.
On or about December 22, 2023, two officers, Shawn Smyles and Taneha Brooks, “told new Detention Service Officers on duty that youth fights were going to occur in Unit L before any fights between youths occurred,” read the indictment.
On or about that same date, they told new Detention Service Officers “that they were not to say anything, write down anything, and just watch when youth fights occurred on that day in Unit L.” Further, Shawn Styles told the youths after the Unit L fights to refuse treatment when they went to medical to get treated by nurses, the indictment continued.
The indictment includes special allegations, including the vulnerability of the victims and the officer’s position of trust or confidence, which helped enable them to commit the offense, according to Attorney General Bonta.
Including those indicted were: Isaiah Goodie, Ramses Patron, Julian Lira, Vanessa Wattanachinda-Jones, Kenneth Silva, Robert Ford Jr., Rene Conant Jr., Lenton Abram, Cain Cabrera, Flor Sanchez, Jacqueline Rivera-Castillo, Sophea Kiet, Ariel Phelix Espinoza,
Chezzaray White, Timothy Gould, Raymond Ramirez, Eunice Huerta, Nancy Sostre, Diana Jacobo, Kenneth Haywood, Benjamin Cano, Robert Perkins, Enrique Alvarenga, Lafrance Davis, Angelina Medina, Jessica Juarez-Serrano, Sergio Magos and Randy Baca.
“These so-called ‘gladiator fights’ resulted in physical harm to youth involved and, if the charges are proven, were a dereliction of the officers’ duty to protect those in their care,” the attorney general stated, in a news release dated March 3. He announced the unsealing of the Feb. 13, 2025, indictment on March 3.
A leaked security video published in Jan. 2024 by the Los Angeles Times (The Times) shows eight probation officers standing idly by while a group of teens attacked a 17-year-old inside Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall, according to the news outlet.
According to the Associated Press (AP), Attorney Jamal Tooson, representing the 17-year-old and his family in a civil case against the county, called the indictment the “the tip of the iceberg” of a systemic problem in the probation department.
“There’s a “culture that promotes a lack of accountability, violence and policies that encourage officers to look the other way as evident in the video,” Atty. Tooson said. “The reaction of the children who were eating their lunch, they really didn’t seem shocked or surprised, which tells me this is a daily occurrence.”
Attorney Tooson represents several other families with children harmed at Los Padrinos, including one who was left with a traumatic brain injury after being knocked unconscious in a classroom, he said, according to AP.
“The current staff named in today’s indictments have all been placed on leave without pay. Accountability is a cornerstone of our mission, and we have zero tolerance for misconduct of any peace officers, especially those dealing with young people in our system,” Attorney Tooson’s news release stated.
The Final Call has contacted the Los Angeles County Probation Department for an interview and has not yet received a reply.
“It’s really sickening and appalling, what’s happening inside of these youth detention centers and I think the conclusion I reached very quickly is that children don’t belong in cages,” said Dr. Melina Abdullah, co-founder and director of the Los Angeles-based Black Lives Matter Grassroots, which is committed to ending state-sanctioned violence in all its forms—socially, politically, and economically.
It is the idea of not just locking children up but then subjecting them to dehumanized, slave-like conditioning, she explained. “When we think about the gladiator fights, where does that come from?” questioned Dr. Abdullah.
“I think about the ways in which enslaved people were treated and made to show their strength and had no right, no autonomy over their own beings and that’s exactly what’s happening in these detention centers.
We know that jails descend from plantations and police descend from slave catchers and so that’s what’s happening and then the question becomes what are we willing to do to save our children?”
