The family of a 14-year-old girl is suing the Los Angeles Police Department after a stray bullet struck and killed the teen.

The incident took place just two days before Christmas 2021 after police were responding to a 911 call about a belligerent man in a store. Valentina Orellana-Peralta was with her mother in a Burlington Coat Factory dressing room when officers shot at the suspect inside the store. One of the stray bullets penetrated the dressing room wall, killing Peralta at the scene.

According to reports, 24-year-old Daniel Elena Lopez of Los Angeles entered the popular retail store on a bicycle and began harassing employees. On surveillance footage, Lopez can be seen behaving erratically, smashing a computer after an employee approached him, and hitting the glass railing on an escalator. After getting off the escalator, Lopez continued his erratic behavior, stripping off his pants, and taunting several women with a bike lock he was swinging around.

Store surveillance footage then shows Lopez confronting a woman and attacking her with the bike lock. The footage shows Lopez beating her repeatedly with the lock before police intervene. Body cam footage captured by one of the officers shows several officers making their way to Lopez where they encounter the beaten and bloodied woman still on the ground. At this point, three gunshots can be heard and Lopez can be seen falling to the ground. Lopez died as a result of his gunshot wound.

Unbeknownst to the officers, the teen and her mother, Soledad Peralta, were in the dressing room directly behind where Lopez stood before he got shot. The LA Police Department later detailed that one of the bullets fired ricocheted off the floor and went through the wall of the dressing room.

In the body cam footage, officers can be heard telling Officer William Dorsey Jones to “slow down” and “slow it down” several times. Jones was the alleged officer who was wielding a rifle and leading the other officers forward in the hunt for the suspect.

In the family's lawsuit, Peralta's mother explains that she “felt her daughter’s body go limp and watched helplessly as her daughter died while still in her arms.”

The lawsuit lays blame on the LA Police Department for the wrongful death of their daughter and the negligence that led to the outcome that resulted in their daughter's death.

The family's lawsuit emphasizes that the Los Angeles Police Department failed to properly train and supervise the officers who responded to the scene. They accuse the LAPD of fostering “an environment that allowed and permitted this shooting to occur.”

The family's lawyer Rahul Ravipudi shared following the announcement of the complaint, “Filing this lawsuit is the first step for Soledad and Juan Pablo in seeking the transparency and justice promised to them by Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti following the fatal shooting of their daughter, Valentina.” Ravipudi added, "It is their deepest hope that those responsible for her death will be held accountable and that changes will be made to LAPD policies, practices, and standards for using deadly force that will prevent yet another senseless tragedy at the hands of law enforcement.”

The lawsuit was filed on January 14th in Los Angeles Superior Court. Along with wrongful death and negligence allegations, the suit accuses the defendants of negligently inflicting emotional distress. The family is seeking a jury trial and an unspecified amount in damages. Along with the Los Angeles Police Department, the lawsuit names the city of Los Angeles, Burlington Coat Stores, and Officer William Dorsey Jones Jr.