More than 70 protesters were arrested Saturday evening after authorities shot tear gas and pepper balls into the crowd, leaving at least one teen with an eye wound and others with skin burns, according to demonstrators and police.
The confrontation outside the federal Metropolitan Detention Center came after hours of peaceful “No Kings” demonstrations in downtown Los Angeles and across the county. Authorities said the crowd that gathered at the federal building later in the afternoon, as the rally was winding down, had ignored orders to disperse.
Officers forcibly removed a Los Angeles Times reporter and other journalists from the area, saying they were about to conduct “mass arrests.” The demonstrators who remained were lined up outside the building as officers zip-tied their hands behind their backs and loaded them into vans. One was dressed as Lady Liberty with a chain around her waist as part of her costume.
Later in the evening, police officers, some on horseback, moved in on a smaller group of demonstrators around the corner from the federal detention facility. Arrests had slowed by 9 p.m.
First Assistant U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli posted on X that federal agents have video footage of people assaulting officers.
“To those who were smashing concrete blocks and throwing them at our officers, we have you on video. We will find you and arrest you too. You’ve been warned,” he wrote.
Earlier, a woman who declined to give her name but identified herself as a medic said she treated the teenager who was struck in the eye with a pepper ball before he was taken to the hospital, as well as others.
“They brutalized us,” she said, adding that she did not hear a warning. “We were just protesting, there was no aggression. They just started firing into the crowd.”
After the LAPD issued a tactical alert about 5 p.m., officers — some with gas masks and almost all wearing face shields — swarmed the area, where the air was cloudy with gas.
Organizers said that millions of people turned up for ‘No Kings’ rallies in all 50 states, voicing anger over the country’s direction, including fatal ICE shootings and troops dispatched to the Middle East.
Times staff writer Richard Winton contributed to this report.
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