"For a moment," writes editor and columnist Pilar Marerro on the front-page of La Opinion today, "it felt like Los Angeles had gone back in time." Marrero writes about a city in the not-too-distant past with a police force that operated as though it believed itself to be independent of the law. Echoes of that L.A. were painfully revived on Tuesday at MacArthur Park. Marrero quotes civil rights attorney Connie Rice, who says that it appeared the LAPD did not follow rules for dealing with the media that it implemented after the 2000 Democratic National Convention. In the L.A. Times, Steve Lopez says the LAPD owes the city some answers:
I'd like to know what commanders were in charge and what they were thinking. I'd like to know if police aimed rifles at specific targets or into the crowd. I'd like to know why police thought it was OK to rough up or muzzle reporters who were simply doing their jobs. And I'd like to know how this will be avoided in the future.
The 11 p.m. newscast on Univision is laying on the critique tonight, playing footage from the 1970 Chicano Moratorium, the Rodney King beating, and from MacArthur Park. There's a new clip I'm seeing of a group of little girls running away in terror from advancing officers of the PD's Metropolitan Division. The Times goes tonight with a story by Matt Lait and Richard Winton that suggests looming consequences for the commanding officers (or lack of?) at the park.
Enter the FBI. So Mayor Villaraigosa announces he's heading back from Mexico early. And the New York Times checks in. At LA IndyMedia, you can find an exhaustive amount of links on the May Day melee. * Art by Lalo Alcaraz.