There are speed demons, and then there’s this guy.
A former California Highway Patrol officer — the very kind of person whose job it is to pull you over for going 85 in a 65 — has been charged with murder after allegedly barreling down a Los Angeles freeway at a staggering 130 mph with absolutely nowhere important to be.
Angelo Rodriguez, 24, is accused of slamming his patrol cruiser into a Nissan Versa on the southbound 605 Freeway near Norwalk in the early hours of July 20 last year. No emergency call. No lights. No sirens. Just speed… And apparently, zero regard for the people sharing the road with him at 1 in the morning.
Here’s where it gets worse.
A Horrible Tragedy That Could Have Been Prevented
After the impact, Rodriguez didn’t rush to help the people he’d just disabled on a live freeway. He didn’t radio in what happened. He didn’t warn anyone. What he did do, according to Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman, was sit in his damaged cruiser for nearly three minutes, and at one point, actually stepped out to check on the condition of his own car. A car guy’s priorities, one might say — though perhaps not the right moment for a damage assessment.
When he finally did report something to dispatch, he conveniently left out the part where he caused it.
Minutes later, with the crippled Nissan still sitting exposed in an HOV lane, another driver — Iris Salmeron, who prosecutors say had been drinking and had texted friends that night about her plans to get spectacularly intoxicated — came through at over 100 mph and slammed into the disabled vehicle. The collision triggered a fireball.
Julie Hamori, 23. Armand Del Campo, 24. Jordan Partridge, 23. Samantha Skocilic, 22. All four were on their way home from a concert. All four died at the scene. Hamori and Del Campo were engaged.
Their families had reportedly heard from them after the first crash, according to the L.A. Times. They were alive. Shaken, surely, but alive — until they weren’t.
“These are some of the hardest cases I have to talk about,” DA Hochman said at a press conference Monday, and honestly, it’s hard to argue with that. “This horrible tragedy could have been prevented had this officer not been driving at ridiculously high speeds for no reason whatsoever.”
Prosecutors charged Rodriguez with murder on the grounds that his initial collision was a “substantial factor” in the deaths — meaning the legal chain didn’t start with the drunk driver. It started with the cop who apparently thought a patrol car was a personal track vehicle on a Tuesday night.
Both Rodriguez and Salmeron are expected to be arraigned Tuesday in Bellflower. Prosecutors are seeking $8 million bail for each. Rodriguez has since been fired by the CHP — roughly four months after the crash, for those keeping score at home.
Attorneys representing the victims’ families in a separate civil lawsuit say they’ve heard from credible sources that Rodriguez had been in previous accidents during his three-year tenure. The CHP hasn’t confirmed or denied that, offering only condolences and a statement about the “comprehensive” investigation that preceded the charges.
“Why is it that the CHP allowed for this particular officer to even be on the road?” asked attorney Tom Feher. “How many other CHP officers are like this one, driving with reckless disregard?”
Fair question. One the agency hasn’t directly answered.
The families, for their part, released a statement thanking prosecutors while calling for systemic reform: “What happened to Armand, Julie, Jordan, and Samantha should never happen to another family in our community.”
For now, a former officer who spent his career handing out speeding tickets faces a murder charge for the very recklessness he was sworn to stop. The irony would almost be poetic — if four young people hadn’t lost their lives because of it.