Prosecutors say a patrol car hit a Nissan at about 130 mph before another speeding driver struck it minutes later, killing four young adults on the 605 Freeway in Norwalk.
NORWALK, CA — A former California Highway Patrol officer and a Bellflower woman were charged Monday with murder in a 605 Freeway crash that killed four people last summer, after prosecutors said each played a separate role in the chain of collisions.
Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said the case moved beyond a traffic prosecution because investigators concluded the deaths followed a series of deliberate and reckless choices, not a single mistake. Prosecutors say former Officer Angelo Rodriguez drove a CHP unit at extreme speed without lights or siren, hit a Nissan carrying four young adults, then failed to protect the crash scene before Iris Salmeron, allegedly drunk and also speeding, slammed into the disabled car. Both defendants were expected in court Tuesday, and each could face life in prison if convicted.
The charges grew out of a crash sequence that prosecutors laid out minute by minute from the early morning of July 20, 2025. Hochman said Rodriguez was driving south in the 605 carpool lane near Imperial Highway at about 12:50 a.m. at roughly 130 mph in a CHP vehicle, without emergency lights or siren and without any call that justified that speed. A Nissan carrying four young adults moved into the lane ahead of him, prosecutors said, and Rodriguez failed to react before striking it from behind. The impact disabled the Nissan but did not appear to cause fatal injuries by itself. Rodriguez moved his patrol vehicle to the right shoulder, according to prosecutors, while the Nissan remained stuck in the carpool lane with its hazard lights on. “We today are bringing the most serious charges we can bring,” Hochman said at a Monday news conference. “Those are the crimes of murder.”
Prosecutors say Rodriguez then took no immediate steps to shield the stranded Nissan or warn approaching drivers. Hochman said Rodriguez sat in his patrol vehicle for about three minutes, got out to inspect damage to his own unit, then drove away from the scene before reporting the collision. The district attorney said Rodriguez made contact with dispatch only after he exited the freeway and did not initially tell dispatchers that he had been the officer behind the wheel. By the time he looped back, prosecutors said, the second and far deadlier crash had already happened. At 12:57 a.m., according to investigators, Salmeron was driving more than 110 mph when her car hit the disabled Nissan from behind, setting it ablaze. Hochman said investigators found evidence that Salmeron had been drinking in the hours before the crash and said she later tested above the legal blood alcohol limit. Prosecutors have also pointed to a text message they say she sent earlier that night saying she planned to get “F’d up.”
The four people inside the Nissan were identified as Julie Hamori, Armand Del Campo, Jordan Partridge and Sam Skocilic. Prosecutors have described them as young adults who were alive after the first collision and died in the fire after the second one. The timeline became a central issue months before charges were filed. In August 2025, relatives of Hamori and Del Campo filed a legal claim against the CHP, arguing that the agency’s account was incomplete and that an officer’s actions left the Nissan exposed in freeway traffic. Family attorneys said the car became a “sitting duck” in the carpool lane. Del Campo’s mother, Angie Reed, said her son texted her at 12:56 a.m. to say they had been in a crash but were OK and waiting for police. That message, if matched to investigators’ timeline, places the first collision at least a minute before the fire, undercutting early suggestions that the two crashes happened almost at once.
The case also raises questions about procedure inside one of California’s largest law enforcement agencies. Prosecutors said Rodriguez turned off his emergency lights after moving his patrol unit to the shoulder. Hochman said that choice also shut down the audio warning system in the cruiser, removing another signal for approaching traffic. Family lawyers later argued that Rodriguez failed to deploy flares or create any effective warning zone while the Nissan sat disabled in a live traffic lane. CHP officials have not publicly answered each of those allegations in detail, and some factual disputes may be tested later in court or civil proceedings. What the agency has said is that its investigators completed both a crash investigation and a criminal investigation and presented the case to the district attorney’s office, which recommended charges. The CHP also said it extends condolences to the families. Rodriguez, who was 24 when charges were announced, has since been fired, Hochman said.
The criminal case now moves into the court system while the civil fight may continue on a separate track. Prosecutors said Rodriguez and Salmeron each face second-degree murder charges tied to the deaths in Norwalk. Hochman said both defendants were being held on $8 million bail and were scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday in Bellflower. Court proceedings are expected to focus first on the filing of charges, appointment or appearance of counsel, and future dates for preliminary hearings and evidence litigation. The district attorney said both defendants could face life sentences if convicted on all counts. Defense arguments were not laid out at Monday’s announcement, and neither defendant appeared to speak publicly before the arraignment. The case is likely to turn on questions of implied malice, causation and whether each defendant knew the risks of their conduct and acted anyway.
The scene that investigators reconstructed was stark even by Southern California freeway standards: a disabled compact car in the dark, a patrol vehicle off to the side, and then a high-speed rear impact that turned the Nissan into a fireball on the southbound 605 just north of Rosecrans Avenue. Video from passing drivers captured the burning wreck in the roadway that night. For relatives, the public explanation came slowly and in painful pieces. Reed said she first believed her son had survived because of the text he sent after the first collision. Prosecutors later embraced that timeline in explaining why they believe the first crash, the officer’s actions afterward and the second impact all matter in the murder case. “To the victims’ families, I don’t know what to say,” Hochman said Monday. “We will bring the full weight of the law” in seeking accountability for what happened.
As of Monday, both defendants stood charged and the case had shifted from a long-running crash investigation to a murder prosecution. The next milestone was Tuesday’s arraignment in Bellflower, where the court was expected to formally address the charges and set the path for the hearings ahead.
Author note: Last updated March 16, 2026.