With prosecutors insisting they could not prove the case, voluntary manslaughter charges against two former Torrance police officers stemming from the 2018 shooting death of a Black man sitting inside a parked car were dismissed Thursday.
Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Sam Ohta granted the District Attorney’s Office request to dismiss the case against ex-Officers Matthew Concannon and Anthony Chavez. Prosecutors made the request last November, but the judge’s decision was delayed due to an appeal in the case that had been pending before the state Supreme Court.
With that matter resolved, Ohta on Thursday tossed the case.
In explaining his ruling to grant the dismissal, Ohta said, “courts do not make decisions based on the feelings of the public,” adding that it was “unfortunate” the case had garnered so much publicity.
“This is not a civil rights case,” Ohta said from the bench. “This is a voluntary manslaughter case.”
Before the ruling was announced, Sherlyn Haynes, mother of the victim, 23-year-old Christopher DeAndre Mitchell, stood in the downtown Los Angeles courtroom crowded with supporters and said the former Torrance officers should be held accountable for the death of her son.
Concannon and Chavez acted like “judge, jury and executioner” when they shot Mitchell, Haynes said.
“I’m hurt and angry,” she continued. “My son had rights, too. He deserved to live. … Real change has to happen.”
The decision ended a legal roller-coaster ride for the former officers, who could have faced up to 11 years in prison if convicted for the Dec. 9, 2018, killing of Mitchell. In 2020, then-District Attorney Jackie Lacey’s office declined to file any charges against the two officers, finding they were justified in using deadly force against Mitchell, who was found in the parking lot of a supermarket inside a black Honda Civic that had been reported stolen. An air rifle was found inside the vehicle.
But three years later, then-District Attorney George Gascón — who took office with a vow to take a harder look at law enforcement use-of-force cases — re-opened the investigation. That review led to the two officers being indicted for voluntary manslaughter, with Gascón saying “there were many questions for us concerning the justification of the shooting.”
Last year, however, current District Attorney Nathan Hochman said yet another review of the case by his special prosecutor, Michael Gennaco, concluded that the prosecution “cannot prove its case of voluntary manslaughter against these two officers beyond a reasonable doubt.”
The district attorney said the case came down to a thorough analysis of the 12-second encounter.
“What (we’ve) spent the hundreds of hours trying to figure out, is did these officers have a reasonable belief that they were in imminent peril by Mr. Mitchell at the moment he’s lowering his hands towards the weapon, where he could have then grabbed the weapon and shot them?” Hochman said. “This is a split-second decision. While the entire event is 12 seconds, the decision that they are making is taking place over one or two or three seconds. And it’s not just that we have to prove it, we have to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, the highest standard in the system.”
He added, “These are the most difficult cases that come before a district attorney and this whole team to evaluate, which is why we’ve methodically gone over those 12 seconds from every single angle to see whether or not there was any theory or attack or legal strategy where we could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that these two officers committed the crime of voluntary manslaughter at that moment in time knowing we cannot prove involuntary manslaughter — that has been taken away from us by the original prosecutor’s timing and we’re lacking all the additional evidence he had relied on — so after an extensive analysis we determined no, we cannot prove this beyond a reasonable doubt.”
The district attorney said he has “absolutely no problem bringing a righteous case against police officers that we can prove beyond a reasonable doubt.”
“But where we don’t have that evidence, we’re not going to just kick that can to a jury or kick that can to a judge, we’re going to do our job. Our job is to fairly evaluate that evidence and where we don’t have it, we have to say that. And a motion to dismiss in that case is our saying that. So while this has been an extremely difficult decision impacting so many different lives, it is we believe the right decision to make at this time, and we have (to) make it.”
According to a 2019 review of the case by the District Attorney’s Office, a man flagged down Torrance police around 8 p.m. Dec. 9, 2018, near 220th Street and Western Avenue, saying his black Honda Civic had been stolen. A short time later, surveillance video captured the vehicle pulled into a Ralphs parking lot on West Carson Street.
Chavez, now 37, and Concannon, now 40, pulled into the parking lot and used their patrol car to block the Honda in place.
The officers got out of their vehicle, approached the Honda and saw Mitchell in the driver’s seat, the report said. The officers yelled “police” and told Mitchell to put his hands on the steering wheel, which — after a moment’s hesitation — he did. Concannon opened the door, the 2019 report added. Mitchell, according to the report, dropped his hands into his lap and Concannon — following Mitchell’s movement — saw what he thought was a firearm but what actually turned out to be an air rifle, according to the report.
Concannon drew his gun and told Mitchell not to move. Mitchell, who police said later was believed to be a gang member, returned his hands to the wheel, apologized twice and then dropped his hands again.
Concannon, the report said, gripped his gun with both hands. But, according to body camera footage released later, it’s not clear whether Mitchell dropped his hands a second time because Concannon blocked the view of his body-worn camera as he gripped the gun. The district attorney’s report acknowledged this, too.
“Mitchell is not visible on the body-worn footage during the three seconds preceding the first shot,” the report said, noting that Concannon ordered Mitchell to get out of the car. “About one second after repeating that command, the first shot was fired.” Three shots total were fired, one by Concannon and two by Chavez, according to the report.
Concannon and Chavez waited for backup and, after it was clear there was no further threat, officers attempted life-saving measures on Mitchell. But he died from his injuries.
The shooting was repeatedly criticized by Black Lives Matter activists, who held regular protests at Torrance City Council meetings for months following Mitchell’s death. It was also cited in various protests aimed at Lacey, whom BLM activists criticized as being unwilling to prosecute law enforcement officers.