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The LAPD had a shorter leash last night than earlier in the week, and made mass arrests of protesters they said went off sidewalks into streets and who refused police orders to disperse. Many of those arrested had laid down in the intersection of 6th and Hope streets in a symbolic gesture meant to protest the police killing in Ferguson, Mo. of unarmed teenager Michael Brown. Metro's 7th Street/Metro station was closed for about an hour. The numbers are varying — City News Service says the LAPD put out 130 this morning, with 12 of them juveniles, while the LA Times says 145. Nine had been arrested earlier in the day for invading and blocking traffic on the Hollywood Freeway. That makes 338 arrests of protesters in Los Angeles, by the LA Times' count, or 323 for CNS, since Monday's grand jury decision in Missouri not to charge the Ferguson police officer who shot and killed Brown. The Times says that is the most arrests of anywhere in the nation.
Those arrested would generally be booked on a misdeameanor charge of unlawful assembly or failure to disperse, with bail of $500, LAPD Chief Charlie Beck and department spokesmen said. No freeways were invaded Wednesday night. Holiday closures and processing delays mean some might spend longer than a few hours in jail. For some it's conceivable they will be locked up all weekend.
Those arrested include community activist Jasmyne Cannick, who says she was reporting for a radio station and not protesting at all when arrested. She says that the group at 6th and Hope were never told to disperse — she says they were boxed in by LAPD lines and arrested. "The LAPD gets a big fat F for last night's escapades," she tweeted today after her release. Her arrest is interesting because some of the high profile issues Cannick has pursued have involved LAPD officers, and she tweeted that Chief Charlie Beck seemed to observe her arrest with glee. She has been tweeting observations from within the group of those arrested and repeating her insistence that no dispersal orders were given or heard by those on the street. "If they say otherwise they are lying," Cannick tweets.
Some of her tweets:
For the record I never heard a dispersal order from LAPD last night on 6th and Hope. Before I knew it we were surrounded and under arrest.
— Jasmyne Cannick (@jasmyne) November 27, 2014There are a lot of young women in the Van Nuys jail who can't get out because they don't have an ID on them.
— Jasmyne Cannick (@jasmyne) November 27, 2014If you have someone in the Van Nuys jail and they don't have an ID you need to bring it to the jail. They can't get out without one.
— Jasmyne Cannick (@jasmyne) November 27, 2014From a distance it seemed that LAPD Chief Beck took a personal satisfaction in my arrest last night. Yes, I saw you. It's all good.
— Jasmyne Cannick (@jasmyne) November 27, 2014Getting calls from my sources in the LAPD telling me that the Chief was delighted in my arrest? I figured as much, he had a front row seat.
— Jasmyne Cannick (@jasmyne) November 27, 2014