Is That Justice? LAPD Cops Who Leaked Pics of Beaten Rihanna Get Off Without Charges

June 29th, 2012 - By Brande Victorian

Source: rihanna-ol.blogspot.com

By now you’ve probably forgetten about the investigation into the two Los Angeles police officers who leaked photos of Rihanna to the media after her 2009 domestic dispute with Chris Brown. The officers, Blanca Lopez and Rebecca Reyes, reportedly sent the images of the bruised and beaten Rihanna which became a media spectacle at the time to TMZ, but because prosecutors couldn’t find sufficient evidence to prove the gossip site paid the cops for the photos, they will not face criminal charges.

That decision was actually made in March but just went public in a report obtained by the LA Times. Internal investigators had obtained numerous search warrants and forensic exams of computer hard drives, phones and e-mail accounts, over the past three years but apparently came up short in terms of making anything stick. One report is said to have shown the officers received $62,000 for the pics but searches of the officers’ bank accounts revealed no evidence of a payment. Of course the cops could have had the money funneled to them in other ways but District Attorney’s office spokeswoman Jane Robison said, “You can’t go on a fishing expedition and subpoena everybody who might be related or a friend.”

Though these two may have escaped formal charges, they will likely lose their jobs at the very least. Both women are to appear before LAPD disciplinary panels in August and the department will recommend that they be fired. I would think leaking criminal evidence to the press regardless of whether these two were paid or not would be enough to warrant charges but maybe pay was the only thing that would have definitively linked them to the leak.

What do you think, should these officers have been charged?

Brande Victorian is the news and operations editor for madamenoire.com. Follow her on twitter @Be_Vic.

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  • http://twitter.com/brandnewdaydesi brandnewdaydesigns

    Not happy about it. The LA police get away with a lot. I don’t like playing the race card, but if that had been a white female superstar, I wonder if there would have been a leak in the first place and if so, would they have been charged and fired. #annoyed

    • Me

      Well the two LAPD were NOT white so what’s your explanation now? I guess you tried the race card that you didn’t want to play & looked the fool. Yeah, the two Hispanic female cops got a break. No, that only happens to white people per you.

  • Erica

    I know we the people aren’t outraged at the LAPD fuckery when it comes to policy and procedures. Like isn’t this the same police department the beat the holy hell out of the late Rodney King, and countless others and let the rich walk for crimes and severely punish the common man for the same crimes. C’mon leaking photos of a beaten celeb is a mild day for the department. The LAPD don’t care about nobody but protecting there own. Rihanna and Chris needs to understand that it isn’t worth pursuing.

  • Katarina

    That is not justice, cops study at the academy, remember they are LAW ENFORCERS, so if they break the law they should be punished. You cant have law enforcers breaking the law period. These police are totally out of control and getting away with murder literally. Police are going to stand up for each other and cover each other. the police officer sold the pics for money and he gets away with it, first off why did it take this long, 3 years later.
    Cop should be discharged without pay.

    • katarina

      they know enough to fire them so why not charge them, regardless if you find out how much they have been paid, they know that they did the crime. this is serious my mother is a domestic abuse survivor and i would hate that, that would happen to anyone, regardless of socio-economic class or status.

  • Guest360

    When the man who beat the crap out of her got a slap on the wrist, I hardly think those that released a picture should be made to pay a harsher penalty than the guy who committed the crime in the first place. It’s not balanced to me. Losing their jobs? Most definitely. They didn’t act as cops in this instance and were completely disrespectful to the person they were supposed to be helping. They should never be put in that position ever again. Should charges be filed against them? Again, no. CB beat her and didn’t get but a fine and a restraining order. They were wrong. What’s done is done. Fire them and get back to cleaning up the streets of LA.

    • Katarina

      the law doesnt work like that hun. blacks get higher jail time than whites for doing the same crime. everyone has a right to a fair & speedy trial. they dont compare cases if they did there probably would be a disparity in jail time between for people doing the same crime.

      So, with that said, those cops are law enforcers in communities, we can not tolerate them breaking the law. another citizen breaking the law (c.brown) does not justify the police officers actions-period.
      They should have gotten charged. But if you wanna compare, C.Brown has gotten 5 years probation, and over 1000 hours community service, plus having to go to anger management classes-what did the police get-just fired-not charged and thats messed up.

      • Guest360

        Clearly that’s how the law works because they all got off lol. Of course you can compare the crimes. Beating vs. releasing a picture. One of these things is not like the others lol. If CB got off for nearly beating this girl to death, why wouldn’t the cops get off too? What they did was wrong but it pales in comparison to what CB did and he got a measly restraining order. The cops should be fired, no doubt, but anything else is wasting people’s time and money that could be better served elsewhere and not on these fools who chose money over respecting this woman’s privacy. It’s morally reprehensible but hardly illegal or big enough to continue investigating.

  • wlknluv

    LAPD still being shady

  • http://twitter.com/VictoriaGrooves Victoria grooves

    Rihanna should sue

    • Bam

      She don’t care about what happened to her….why should they?

      • http://twitter.com/VictoriaGrooves Victoria grooves

        She can choose to forgive CB that’s her right but no one who was supposed to protect and serve has the right to violates her privacy

  • Trisha_B

    Idk, i don’t think picture should have been leaked. That was disrespectful. & TMZ was wrong for being so press to get the picture to broadcast it. That’s embarrassing. But if that picture didn’t come out, things would have been very different for Chris Brown & Rihanna today

  • emily

    no

  • http://twitter.com/MsRedboneBrite Tee Elyse

    I wonder what Rihanna thinks…