Los Angeles- Just days after Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton pledged a crackdown on motion picture piracy, department investigators on Tuesday helped arrest an LAPD captain suspected of selling bootleg DVDs.

Julie D. Nelson, a decorated patrol captain and a 28-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department, was arrested at the Hollywood station following a sting operation in which she allegedly sold counterfeit film titles such as “The Cat in the Hat” to undercover officers.

Authorities said they recovered hundreds of suspected bootleg DVDs from her home in Orange County and from a friend’s home in Torrance. Officials said they also recovered recording equipment at the home in Torrance.

“The message here is, it does not matter what rank you are. If you break the law, we will come after you,” said Assistant Chief Jim McDonnell at a news conference after the arrest.

Nelson, who commanded the department’s Harbor Division until early this year, was booked on suspicion of possessing and selling counterfeit merchandise and for failing to disclose the origins of a recording, both felonies. Nelson, 52, has been suspended with pay pending further investigation, McDonnell said.

Although LAPD internal affairs officers arranged the sting operation, Nelson was arrested by police officers from La Palma, where she lives. McDonnell said Nelson would be prosecuted by the district attorney of Orange County.

Officers began investigating Nelson after receiving a tip. They arranged to purchase DVDs from her at an Orange County business Saturday, before Nelson attended the Hollywood station’s annual Christmas party, McDonnell said. He said it does not appear that Nelson sold DVDs at the Hollywood station, and it was unclear how long she might have been selling DVDs.

“She sold to people with whom she had personal relationships and people she knew,” McDonnell said. Another police source described the movies recovered at her home as recent blockbusters. “You name it, she had it, whatever was hot,” the source said.

The DVDs that were seized will be examined by the Encino-based Motion Picture Assn. of America, which has called for heightened enforcement of anti-piracy laws and launched a campaign to discourage the theft of movies.

Earlier this year, Nelson was shifted from the head of the Harbor Division to the No. 2 slot in Hollywood. Her new duty as a patrol captain was widely viewed as a reduction in authority.

A graduate of Cal State Fullerton, Nelson spent much of her career as an investigator, particularly of rapes and domestic violence.

She has been considered a pioneer in investigative methods. In 1994, she established one of the first emergency response programs for victims of domestic violence and served as the head of Robbery Homicide Division’s rape unit.

At a news conference Friday, Bratton joined Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca, City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo and movie industry executives on the steps of Los Angeles City Hall to announce efforts to combat movie piracy.

Among other initiatives, Bratton told reporters then that he personally would keep an eye out for movie pirates and that his department would instruct movie theater employees on how to make a citizen’s arrest if they found someone illegally taping a film with a camcorder.