A Los Angeles Police Department employee who died yesterday has been identified as 44-year-old Nadine Hernandez, a member of the Robbery-Homicide Division Special Assault Section and one of two detectives investigating the rape allegations against Derrick Rose.
According to the Los Angeles Times, on Tuesday afternoon, Whittier, Calif., police received a call reporting a suicide attempt. Hernandez was found with a single gunshot wound and taken to PIH Health Hospital, where she declared dead at 3:27 p.m. According to property records, the home where her body was found belongs to a retired LAPD lieutenant.
Hernandez had recently written a letter to the attorney representing Jane Doe in a civil suit against Rose confirming the existence of a criminal investigation—which she later confirmed to Deadspin—and stressing the importance of anonymity for the plaintiff.
“The ability to offer anonymity to victims of sex crimes is an invaluable investigative aid to investigators as well as a great comfort to victims of crimes of such a sensitive nature,” she wrote in a letter dated September 22, just after a judge ruled that the woman accusing Rose of rape must use her real name in civil trial.
No arrests have been made in Hernandez’s death and Whittier Lt. Steve Dean told the L.A. Times that it’s still unclear if it was a suicide or a homicide.
[LA Times]