LOS ANGELES – A former Torrance police officer — who was charged with an on-duty shooting that left a man wounded — pleaded guilty Wednesday to a felony count of assault in a deal that is expected to result in the case against him being dismissed in one year.
David Chandler Jr., 37, pleaded guilty to one count of assault by an officer and must perform 100 hours of community service and relinquish his certification as a peace officer in California, with the case expected to be dismissed Nov. 5, 2026, according to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office.
“He’ll walk away without a conviction,” Chandler’s attorney, Tom Yu, said shortly after the plea.
Chandler was charged in October 2021 in the Aug. 27, 2018, shooting of Jarvis Goode. He was accused of firing multiple rounds at Goode, who emerged from his grandmother’s home in Torrance while allegedly holding a knife and then walked away from police.
Chandler was ordered to stand trial following an August 2023 hearing in which a judge reviewed body-worn camera footage from Chandler and another officer who was not charged.
Deputy District Attorney Guy Shirley conceded at the 2023 hearing that the initial shots could “reasonably be seen” as being in defense of Goode’s grandmother, who was also outside of the house, but argued that Chandler “continued shooting without lawful necessity” as the man fled from police.
Chandler’s attorney countered that his client had “about a second and a half to decide what he was going to do,” arguing that Goode had held the knife in an assaultive and threatening manner.
Goode’s grandmother, Margo Goode, testified that she had initially called police earlier that day after her grandson, whom she described as having a “history of mental health problems,” allegedly broke a sliding glass window and another window while she allowed him at her house to do his laundry despite a restraining order against him. She said she was mad but not scared and that he left on his skateboard before police arrived.
She said she called police again when he returned to the home that afternoon, and that “bullets started flying” shortly after she stepped out of the house.
“It scared me to death,” she said. “It was so traumatizing … I almost got hit.”
Chandler was initially placed on administrative leave.
A department spokesman said Wednesday that Chandler is “not employed with the Torrance Police Department.”
Chandler was the third then-current or former member of that city’s police force to face criminal charges within just over a week in October 2021.
Christopher Tomsic, now 33, and Cody Weldin, 32, pleaded guilty in April to a felony vandalism charge stemming from a swastika that was found spray-painted inside an impounded vehicle in 2020.
Tomsic and Weldin were each sentenced to two years probation and ordered to perform 100 hours of community service and 15 hours in an anti- racism class, along with completing a tour of the Museum of Tolerance as a result of the plea agreement with the District Attorney’s Office.
Tomsic and Weldin were also ordered to surrender their certification that allowed them to be police officers in California, and to pay just over $400 in court fees and fines.
Attorneys for the two are expected to ask a judge to reduce the felony count to a misdemeanor, which could subsequently result in the case being expunged.
