Before discussing what happened at today's City Hall press conference with the mayor, please watch this absolutely infuriating new video from inside MacArthur Park on Tuesday. It basically shows how once Metro Division police cleared the park, they kept pushing people west on Sixth Street, in a military-like formation. And they kept shooting:
This afternoon I went over to watch Antonio Villaraigosa finally face the media after flying away from Los Angeles on May Day to talk to politicians and businessmen in San Salvador and Mexico City. He said what had to be said, but it was Supervisor Gloria Molina who spoke most passionately about the need to swiftly calm fears and anxiety in the immigrant community and seek justice for the blatant acts of police brutality on unarmed demonstrators and media at MacArthur Park. Molina said she was "very disappointed in the LAPD" and called their actions "shameful." Pointedly, she referred to herself as a "product of the Moratorium."
We're going to need a quick response. The mayor and the chief should work 24 hours a day [if need be]. We can't sugarcoat this. This is an embarrassing incident for every single one of us. I'm not threatening anyone. We just need to move quickly.
Elected leaders said they had meetings today with immigrant rights organizers in MacArthur Park, with Bratton, and will hold meetings with representatives of news media organizations. Others who spoke at City Hall today, besides Antonio (who said some of the footage made his skin crawl), included Speaker of the Assembly Fabian Nuñez (who was the first big-name official to call for an independent investigation, on Wednesday), City Councilman Ed Reyes, City Councilman Eric Garcetti, and Chief William Bratton.
Bratton's rhetoric was the most apologetic it's been since Tuesday's meltdown: "I'm embarrassed for the department." He said every officer involved will have to explain his or her actions. "Directions or orders do not make excuse for violations [of] common decency," he said.
There are still lots of unanswered questions, however. For the mayor, why did he schedule, again, a trip away from L.A. on May Day? That bizarre, misplaced fear of being seen as "too" immigrant-friendly? Why can Mayor Daley march with immigrants in Chicago and Villaraigosa can't in immigrant-crossroads Los Angeles? Imagine how differently Tuesday would have turned out if he was there.
For Bratton, who exactly was in charge? Lets name these guys, at all levels, and get some answers from them. Fast. Why were there so many more police officers at MacArthur Park this year than at immigrant rights marches last year? Who were police firing at? Why were police still firing and moving people after the park was cleared? Why were sound trucks not used and why were dispersal orders not issued in Spanish? Why were there dispersal orders at all? I've heard today that the police presence was also mysteriously heavy and nasty at the march on Broadway. Was the police department looking for a fight since morning? Below, an L.A. Times photo of the local media reaction to LAPD's new crowd-control tactics. I saw this altered press pass myself and could not help laughing. "Do you see me laughing?" its wearer asked.
Meanwhile, the first steps of the inevitable legal fall-out emerged today. Attorney Luis Carrillo filed a claim on behalf of two MacArthur Park demonstrators, and wrote a letter to the Justice Department asking that the LAPD consent decree to be extended five more years. KTTV camerawoman Patti Ballaz also filed a claim, alleging she was injured by advancing officers. "They didn't care who they hit," Ballaz said. "I did feel they targeted
the media."
Elsewhere on the media front, it's fairly evident The Times is getting played by "sources" in the LAPD who are telling them on background that "elite officers" were "sent home" before the clash with demonstrators, as if to suggest that more, not less, officers were needed to pelt kids and paleteros in the back with hard foam bullets. A year ago, remember, more than a half-a-million people marched downtown and not a single arrest was reported. To entertain any notion that more officers were needed on Tuesday at MacArthur Park is a bit offensive, given all that we've seen.
* LAT photos on top by Rick Loomis and Stefano Paltera.