By Jason Henry
Los Angeles Daily News
LOS ANGELES — State prosecutors have quietly dismissed nearly half of the cases against the 30 Los Angeles County probation employees indicted last year for allegedly allowing — and potentially encouraging — 69 fights, including “gladiator”-style fight clubs, at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall.
The L.A. County Superior Court’s website now lists only 16 remaining cases, four of which recently had “no contest” pleas entered that will allow defendants to complete community service in exchange for the dismissal of the charges against them as well.
The California Attorney General’s Office, in a statement, acknowledged the dismissals and indicated it adjusts the treatment of defendants based on “continued consideration of all evidence developed before, during and after criminal charges were initiated.”
“We bring charges based on the law and the facts as we know them,” Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement. “And we determine the criminal culpability of each individual based on their specific and unique actions. That’s what justice and the law require. We will continue to be firm and fair as we work to secure accountability for criminal conduct that harms Californians.”
Some of the defendants were “appropriately dismissed” based on the factual circumstances, while others will “continue to be prosecuted in accordance with the law,” according to the statement.
The dismissals were first reported by the Los Angeles Times.
Attorney Tom Yu, who represents one of the four who pleaded no contest April 7, said his client’s case will be dismissed once he completes 40 hours of community service. The client, who worked as a director at Los Padrinos, did not have any knowledge of the fights and had only been assigned to the juvenile hall for a week, he said.
“I’m glad this nightmare is over for my client,” Yu said in an interview.
Indictments have a lower burden of proof and require only probable cause, while a trial would require prosecutors to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that each defendant is culpable.
The California Department of Justice launched its investigation after the L.A. Times published surveillance footage showing youths attacking a 17-year-old one at a time, as each entered a day room at Los Padrinos in Downey. At least four officers stood by during the assaults, while two others halfheartedly attempted to break them up. Some could be seen laughing and even shaking hands with the attackers.
The investigation uncovered even more fights, with Bonta saying officers “looked more like referees or audience members at a prize fight, not adults charged with the care or supervision of young people.”
A Los Angeles County grand jury indicted the 30 employees, ranging from detention service officers to at least one supervisor, in March 2025 . The charges included 69 counts of child abuse, one count of conspiracy to commit a crime and one count of battery.
The fights, which occurred from June to December 2023, involved 143 victims ranging from age 12 to 18, according to the DOJ.
The original indictment described specific allegations against only three of the officers — Taneha Brooks, Shawn Smyles and Nancy Sostre — and did not have any examples for the other 27, leading some defense attorneys and those within the Probation Department to claim the prosecution had overreached.
All of the employees were placed on unpaid leave at the time.
Curtis Chambers, president of the Los Angeles County Probation Officers Union, said the dismissals raise “serious concerns about whether due process has been followed from the start.”
“What we are seeing raises real questions about a rush to judgment, one that has already had the effect of maligning an entire profession without the facts being fully vetted,” he said in a statement. “When cases begin to fall apart after being advanced so publicly, it is fair to ask whether the process itself was flawed from the outset, and what damage has already been done to the men and women who do this work every day.”
Regino Torres Jr ., president of the Supervising Deputy Probation Officers Association, agreed and said there should have been a “careful, fact-based review from the very beginning.”
“These cases placed supervising officers that we represent in extraordinarily difficult situations, and too many were swept into charges that did not reflect the realities of their daily work,” Torres stated. “Accountability matters, but it must go hand in hand with fairness and due process. Our members deserve both.”
The indictment alleged Smyles and Brooks allowed up to nine combatants to engage in fights that occurred at least five times over the six-month period. The pair allegedly told new officers about fights in advance and warned them “not to say anything, write down anything and just watch when youth fights occurred,” the indictment states.
In December 2023 , Smyles, Brooks and Sostre allowed one youth to participate in “eight one-on-one fights” that led to him sustaining a broken nose, according to the indictment. Smyles allegedly told the youth involved to “refuse treatment” from the facility’s nurses.
That month, Smyles gave a “briefing” to new detention service officers and told them the fights were “how they operated and controlled the youths and the unit,” the court filing states.
Los Angeles County later agreed to pay a $2.7 million settlement to one teen involved in the fights. Others have filed similar claims since the indictments.
The charges came at a particularly challenging time for Los Padrinos. State regulators had declared the juvenile hall “unsuitable” for the confinement of youths due to a severe staffing shortage and had ordered it to close just months earlier.
The facility remains open today, though still deemed “unsuitable,” and is locked in two legal battles over the juvenile hall’s future. One is challenging the juvenile hall’s continued operation in violation of state law. The other, filed by Bonta’s office, is seeking to have the county’s juvenile detention system placed under receivership.
Both cases are still pending.
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