The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office on Thursday announced charges against a sheriff’s deputy accused of unlawfully using her taser stun gun on a shoplifting suspect that had already been detained.  

The incident, according to the DA’s office, occurred on Dec. 14, 2020, in Compton.  

L.A. County Sheriff’s Deputy Hiraudi Lopez-Romero responded to a possible shoplifting call near the Blue Line Train Station. A male suspect was detained and after allegedly resisting getting in the deputy’s vehicle, he was pepper-sprayed.  

Once inside the deputy’s vehicle, where he was being transported to the hospital to be treated, the handcuffed suspect shattered one of the car windows with his feet.

That’s when the DA’s office accuses Deputy Lopez-Romero of stopping the vehicle, getting out and using the taser on the handcuffed suspect in the backseat of the car.  

“Those who are sworn to protect our communities are required to make ethical decisions within the confines of the law,” District Attorney George Gascón said in a news release. “But when they resort to using unreasonable and excessive force to exact revenge rather than in self-defense, their actions break the law that they are supposed to uphold. My office will hold them accountable for their actions.”  

The 29-year-old deputy was charged with a felony count of assault under color of authority and is scheduled to appear in court on Jan. 31.  

The case remains under investigation by LASD’s Internal Criminal Investigations Bureau.