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An arrest for DUI anywhere in Artesia, Bellflower, Cerritos, Hawaiian Gardens, or Lakewood ends up at the same building: the Bellflower Courthouse on East Flower Street, a Los Angeles County Superior Court Southeast District branch. That's not a coincidence — all five cities police themselves the same unusual way, through a Sheriff's Department contract rather than their own police departments, though not all through the same station: four report to the Lakewood Station, while Cerritos runs its own separate Sheriff's contract through the Cerritos Station. Ron Chini handles DUI cases filed out of the Bellflower Courthouse, working from his Irvine office, and the deadline that can't wait for a court date starts the moment the handcuffs go on: California gives you 10 days to request a DMV hearing before your license is suspended automatically.
Bellflower Courthouse — court & DMV details
One station, five cities, one courthouse
Most Los Angeles County courthouses pull cases from a patchwork of city police departments and sheriff's substations. Bellflower is close to the exception: Artesia, Bellflower, Cerritos, Hawaiian Gardens, and Lakewood have no municipal police department among them, and have not had one for decades — but they don't all report to the same Sheriff's station. Artesia, Bellflower, Hawaiian Gardens, and Lakewood are patrolled by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Lakewood Station (5130 Clark Ave., Lakewood), with a dedicated substation on Bellflower Boulevard for the city itself; Cerritos instead has its own Cerritos Station (18135 Bloomfield Ave.), a separate Sheriff's contract covering just that city. Freeway stops are the other exception — the California Highway Patrol's Santa Fe Springs Area office covers the I-605 and SR-91 segments running through this cluster, so a stop made right off the freeway may carry a CHP report number instead of either Sheriff's station's.
Why these particular five cities share a department
This isn't an accident of geography — it's a model that started right here. When Lakewood incorporated in 1954, it became the first city in the country to contract out nearly all of its municipal services, including policing, to the county instead of building its own department, an arrangement that came to be known as the Lakewood Plan. Cerritos (incorporated two years later, in 1956, under the name 'Dairy Valley'), Bellflower, and Artesia each followed the same blueprint within a few years of incorporating; Hawaiian Gardens signed on at its 1964 incorporation, ran its own short-lived police department from 1995 to 1997, and then returned to the same Sheriff's contract it has used since. The practical difference for anyone arrested here: in Artesia, Bellflower, Hawaiian Gardens, or Lakewood, the arresting deputy and booking paperwork trace back to the Lakewood Station; in Cerritos, they trace back to that city's own separate Cerritos Station instead.
Who files the charge
Policing and prosecuting are two separate questions, and the Sheriff's contract only answers the first one. A handful of Los Angeles County cities — Burbank, Long Beach, and Los Angeles itself among them — run their own city prosecutor's office for misdemeanors. None of Artesia, Bellflower, Cerritos, Hawaiian Gardens, or Lakewood is on that list, so every DUI out of this cluster, misdemeanor or felony, is charged and prosecuted by the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office, which keeps a dedicated Bellflower Area Office inside the courthouse building itself. After an arrest, most people are booked at whichever station made the stop — Lakewood Station or its substation for Artesia/Bellflower/Hawaiian Gardens/Lakewood, Cerritos Station for Cerritos — and either released or transferred into county custody within hours; more serious cases can move downtown to the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center, but the charging decision and the arraignment almost always happen right here first.
The 10-day DMV deadline
Whatever happens at the Bellflower Courthouse, it runs on its own calendar — and it has nothing to do with the clock the DMV is already running. You get 10 days from the date of arrest to request a DMV hearing and contest the automatic license suspension; miss that window and the suspension takes effect regardless of how the criminal case eventually turns out. California now conducts these Driver Safety hearings by phone or video rather than in person, which makes the process faster but doesn't move the deadline. Call (833) 543-7703 to request a hearing. How the DMV hearing works →
How Ron defends a DUI at the Bellflower Courthouse
Because the policing side of these cases is unusually consistent — one sheriff's station, one patrol area, often the same handful of deputies working DUI shifts — Ron's first move is to pull the specific patrol unit's report, any body-worn or dash camera footage, and the full chain of custody on whatever breath or blood evidence was collected. He checks the legal basis for the stop, how field sobriety tests were actually administered against the Sheriff's own training standards, and whether the testing equipment's maintenance and calibration records hold up. From there the case might resolve through negotiation with the DA's Bellflower office, a suppression motion, or trial. He does not claim to be a certified specialist, and no result is ever guaranteed — but he has been doing this work out of his Irvine office since 2009, appears personally at the Bellflower Courthouse, and runs the DMV hearing in parallel rather than letting it fall through the cracks while the court case drags on.
Where will my Artesia, Bellflower, Cerritos, Hawaiian Gardens, or Lakewood DUI be heard?
Who prosecutes a DUI from these cities?
Which agency will have investigated my case?
How do I protect my license?
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Ron defends DUI cases across Southern California from his Irvine office, in English and Farsi — and works directly with you, not a call center.
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