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At around 1 a.m. on Tuesday morning, armed federal agents rappelled from helicopters onto the roof of a five-storey residential apartment in the South Shore of Chicago. As other agents worked their way through the building from the bottom, they kicked down doors and threw flash bang grenades, rounding up adults and screaming children alike, detaining them in zip-ties and arresting dozens, according to witnesses and local reporting.
The military-style raid was part of a widespread immigration crackdown in the country’s third-largest city as part of the Trump Administration’s “Operation Midway Blitz,” which has brought a dramatic increase in federal raids and arrests.
The raid has drawn outrage throughout Chicago and the state of Illinois, with rights groups and lawmakers claiming it represents a dramatic escalation in tactics used by federal authorities in the pursuit of Trump’s aggressive immigration crackdown.
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker accused the federal agents of separating children from their parents, zip-tying their hands, and detaining them in “dark vans” for hours. Videos show flashbang grenades erupting on the street, followed by residents of the building—children among them—being led to a parking lot across the street. Photos of the aftermath show toys and shoes littering the apartment hallways, evidence of those pulled from their beds by the operation that included FBI and Homeland Security agents.
‘Military-style tactics’
Pritzker condemned the raid and said that he would work with local law enforcement to hold the agents accountable. “Military-style tactics should never be used on children in a functioning democracy,” he said in a statement on Friday. “This didn’t happen in a country with an authoritarian regime – it happened here in Chicago. It happened in the United States of America – a country that should be a bastion of freedom, hope, and the rights of our people as guaranteed by the Constitution,” he added.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has touted some 900 arrests in its Chicago operation since it began in early September, as well as the 37 arrests made in the nighttime raid on Tuesday, all of whom it said were “involved in drug trafficking and distribution, weapons crimes and immigration violators.” The DHS said the building was targeted because it was “known to be frequented by Tren de Aragua members and their associates.” DHS Secretary Kristi Noem posted a video of the raid on social media, overlaid with dramatic music, showing helicopters shining bright lights onto the apartment, kicking down doors and armed agents leading people out of the building in cuffs.
A DHS spokesperson told CNN following the raid that children were taken into custody “for their own safety and to ensure these children were not being trafficked, abused or otherwise exploited.” The DHS also said that four children who are U.S. citizens with undocumented parents were taken into custody.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to send federal authorities and troops to Chicago and other Democratic-run cities to assist in immigration raids and to address what he perceives to be rampant crime.
The Trump Administration launched expanded immigration enforcement operations in Chicago on Sept. 8 as part of a wider federal crackdown on sanctuary cities across the country.
“This operation will target the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens in Chicago,” ICE Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in support of the operation.
Chicago officials mounted a pushback ahead of the crackdown. The city’s mayor, Brandon Johnson, signed an order directing Chicago law enforcement and officials not to cooperate with federal agents and established an initiative intended to protect residents’ rights. The city of Evanston, an urban suburb of Chicago, issued a statement warning its residents of impending raids by ICE agents and urging them to report sightings of law enforcement.
Zip-ties and guns
In the aftermath of the sweeping raid, residents and city lawmakers have been demanding answers from the federal government.
Ed Yohnka, from the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois (ACLU), told MSNBC on Saturday that the raid represented “an escalation of force and violence” from the federal government in Chicago.
“What we saw was a full-fledged military operation conducted on the south side of Chicago against an apartment building,” he added.
“They just treated us like we were nothing,” Pertissue Fisher, a U.S. citizen who lives in the apartment building, told ABC7 Chicago in an interview soon after the raid. She said she was then handcuffed, held for hours, and released around 3 a.m. This was the first time she said a gun was ever put in her face.
Neighbor Eboni Watson, who witnessed the raid, also told the ABC station that the children were zip-tied—some of them were without clothes—when they were taken out of the residential building by federal agents. “Where’s the morality?” Watson said she kept asking during the raid.
“As a father, I cannot help but think about what it means for a child to be torn from their bed in the middle of the night, detained for no reason other than a show of force,” National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) president Derrick Johnson said in a statement. “The trauma inflicted on these young people and their families is unconscionable.”
ICE and DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment from TIME.
Protests in the aftermath
The increased raids have turned Chicago into a flashpoint in the battle over Trump’s crackdown. Protests have hit the city in recent weeks over the ICE operations, and after the raid on Tuesday, they have concentrated outside the ICE Broadview detention facility near Chicago.
On Friday, at least 18 protestors were arrested near the facility as DHS head Kristi Noem said in a post late in the day that she and her team were blocked from entering the Village of Broadview Municipal Building.
“This is how JB Pritzker and his cronies treat our law enforcement. Absolutely shameful,” Noem said in a post on X.
On Saturday, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin shared on social media that law enforcement officers were “rammed by vehicles and boxed in by 10 cars.”
“One of the drivers who rammed the law enforcement vehicle was armed with a semi-automatic weapon,” McLaughlin said. “Law enforcement was forced to deploy their weapons and fire defensive shots at an armed US citizen who drove herself to the hospital to get care for wounds.”
ICE’s tactics were criticized again on Friday, when Chicago Alderperson Jessie Fuentes was handcuffed by federal immigration agents at a Chicago medical center after questioning agents about their warrant to arrest at the medical center.
Chicago’s Mayor Johnson called Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)’s tactics “abusive.”
The raids come just days after President Trump signaled a desire to make greater use of the U.S. military in American cities during a speech to top military leaders, as he assailed a “war from within” the nation.
“We are under invasion from within,” he said, “no different than a foreign enemy, but more difficult in many ways, because they don’t wear uniforms.” In the same speech, he called for U.S. cities to be “training grounds” for the military.
Trump has frequently singled out Chicago in his long-running feud with Democratic-run cities, threatening it with his newly named “Department of War.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth considered deploying an elite Army unit to Portland, Oregon, to address what President Donald Trump called “lawless mayhem,” according to text messages shared with the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Last weekend, in a crowded public setting, high-ranking Trump administration officials reportedly exchanged messages about potentially deploying the Army’s 82nd Airborne, a division historically sent into combat in both World Wars, Vietnam, and Afghanistan.
Any move to send the unit domestically would likely face legal challenges under federal restrictions on the use of military forces within the United States.
Ultimately, the administration opted to deploy 200 federalized National Guard troops to Portland rather than active-duty Army forces. The state of Oregon and the city of Portland have filed suit in federal court seeking to block that deployment.
While traveling in Minnesota, Anthony Salisbury, deputy to White House senior policy adviser Stephen Miller, reportedly used the private messaging app Signal to send the texts, which were visible to people nearby.
Concerned by the public discussion of sensitive military plans, a source, fearing retaliation, anonymously provided the Star Tribune with images of the texts. The newspaper confirmed Salisbury as the sender using photos, video, and facial recognition, while verifying the authenticity of the messages, it reports.
The Independent has contacted the White House and the Department of War on Saturday for comment.
Over dozens of messages, Salisbury spoke candidly, sometimes profanely, with Hegseth’s adviser, Patrick Weaver, and other officials, claiming that Hegseth wanted Trump’s explicit approval before sending troops into the city.
“Between you and I, I think Pete just wants the top cover from the boss if anything goes sideways with the troops there,” Weaver allegedly wrote.
He recognized the political risks of sending Army troops to a U.S. city, adding that Hegseth preferred deploying the National Guard instead.
“82nd is like our top tier [quick reaction force] for abroad. So it will cause a lot of headlines,” Weaver added. “Probably why he wants potus to tell him to do it.”
When approached for comment by the Star Tribune, the White House reportedly declined to address the substance of the texts, but defended Salisbury, noting he was in Minnesota to serve as a pallbearer at a family funeral.
“Despite dealing with grief from the loss of a family member, Tony continued his important work on behalf of the American people,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson told the outlet in a written statement. “Nothing in these private conversations, that are shamefully being reported on by morally bankrupt reporters, is new or classified information.”
Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell declined to answer questions for this report, but stated that the messages reflect officials “working around the clock.” A spokesperson also criticized the Star Tribune for refusing requests to provide access to the images or transcripts of the texts.
“The Department of War is a planning organization and does not speculate on potential future operations,” Parnell said. “The Department is continuously working with other agency partners to protect federal assets and personnel and to keep American communities safe.”
Trump administration officials privately discussed sending one of the country’s most hardened combat units into Portland, Oregon, leaked Signal messages reveal.
Anthony Salisbury, a top deputy to White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, was reportedly exchanging messages with War Secretary Pete Hegseth’s adviser Patrick Weaver over Signal in a crowded public space last weekend while traveling in Minnesota to a family funeral.
The alarmed source shared images of the exchange with the Minnesota Star Tribune under condition of anonymity.
According to the newspaper the texts reveal discussions about deploying the 82nd Airborne Division to Portland, a unit better known for parachuting into World War battlefields and Afghanistan than patrolling American streets.
“Between you and I, I think Pete just wants the top cover from the boss if anything goes sideways with the troops there,” wrote Weaver.
Another message acknowledged the political cost of such a move: “82nd is like our top tier for abroad. So it will cause a lot of headlines. Probably why he wants potus to tell him to do it.”
Hegseth wanted to send the National Guard instead, he added.
The administration ultimately ordered 200 National Guard troops to what the president called “war-ravaged” Portland on September 28. Both the state of Oregon and the city of Portland have since sued to block the deployment, arguing it violates federal limits on the domestic use of the military.
The revelations underscore remarks by President Donald Trump days in an address at Quantico to generals and admirals floating American cities “training grounds” for the armed forces.
Elsewhere the exchange revealed information about other ongoing campaigns within the cabinet, according to the outlet, with Salisbury insulting FBI director Kash Patel as a “giant douche canoe.”
The White House did not respond to questions on the exchanges by attacking the journalists reporting as “morally bankrupt.
A senior White House official accidentally disclosed that the Trump administration was considering deploying an elite army strike force into Portland by using Signal in a public place.
The Minnesota Star Tribune reported Friday that Anthony Salisbury, one of Stephen Miller’s top deputies, was observed discussing the plans via Signal in view of members of the public while traveling in Minnesota. The newspaper was then contacted by one member of the public who was troubled to see sensitive military plans discussed so openly.
In the messages, senior White House officials discussed the potential deployment of the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, an elite unit that specializes in parachuting into hostile territory. The division has been deployed in both world wars, including the Battle of the Bulge, as well as Vietnam and Afghanistan.
Across several conversations, the Star Tribune reports, Salisbury spoke about a range of matters with Pete Hegseth adviser Patrick Weaver as well as other officials.
In one of the messages, Weaver revealed that Hegseth wanted Trump to explicitly instruct him to send soldiers to Portland.
“Between you and I, I think Pete just wants the top cover from the boss if anything goes sideways with the troops there,” Weaver reportedly said.
Noting the potentially disastrous optics around sending an elite division into an American city, Weaver told Salisbury, “82nd is like our top tier [quick reaction force] for abroad. So it will cause a lot of headlines. Probably why he wants potus to tell him to do it.”
Ultimately, Trump opted to send 200 National Guard soldiers into Portland, following a similar playbook used in other Democrat-controlled cities like Los Angeles and Washington D.C. Both the state of Oregon and the city of Portland have sued to stop the deployment.
Abigail Jackson, a spokesperson for the White House, told the Daily Beast, “Tony recently traveled to Minnesota to serve as a pallbearer in his uncle’s funeral who passed away from cancer. Despite dealing with grief from the loss of a family member, Tony continued his important work on behalf of the American people.“
“Nothing in these private conversations, that are shamefully being reported on by morally bankrupt reporters, is new or classified information,” Jackson continued. “Frankly, this story just shows the entire Trump Administration is working around the clock—and even through funerals—to make America safe again.”
The incident marks the second time in six months that the Trump administration has experienced issues as a result of insecure lines of communication.
Earlier this year, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic Jeffrey Goldberg was accidentally added to a Signal chat where several high-ranking government officials discussed the logistics of a strike on Yemen’s Houthis.
The fiasco was quickly dubbed “Signalgate” and ultimately led to national security adviser Mike Waltz, who was responsible for adding Goldberg to the chat, leaving his role at the National Security Council. President Trump later appointed him Ambassador to the United Nations.
Trump has consistently asserted that sending soldiers into cities is the only way to address rampant crime. Meanwhile, the White House has admitted to “reconfiguring” crime statistics to suit Trump’s agenda after claiming that other official statistics are “phony.”
The president’s crime crackdown, which has been concentrated entirely on blue cities, is proving more and more unpopular with the American public. After looking at recent polling on Monday, CNN data guru Harry Enten told viewers, “If Donald Trump thinks that potentially sending in the National Guard into cities like Portland is a winning political issue, the polling says you’re wrong, Mr. President!”
Trump also faced a significant blow after a federal judge ruled that his deployment of the National Guard in Los Angeles was illegal, with Judge Charles Breyer finding that the president had violated the Posse Comitatus Act by requiring armed soldiers to carry out domestic law enforcement activities.
A Chicago community is reeling following a late-night immigration raid on a South Side apartment complex.
Over 300 armed federal agents swarmed a five-story apartment complex late Tuesday evening in what became an hours-long immigration raid.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, alongside the FBI and U.S. Border Patrol agents, were targeting over 30 suspected members of the Venezuelan gang, Tren de Aragua. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said 37 people were arrested.
Federal agents were seen rappelling from a Black Hawk helicopter on top of the building.
“My building is shaking. So, I’m like, ‘What is that?’ Then I look out the window, it’s a Blackhawk helicopter,” witness Dr. Alii Muhammad told ABC7 Chicago.
Residents said they ducked for cover as they heard several flash bangs go off, reports MSNBC.
One resident described the experience as “terrifying.”
“It was terrifying. The kids was crying. People were screaming. They were very distraught. I was out there crying when I seen the little girl come around the corner because they were bringing the kids out too, they had them zip-tied together,” said resident Eboni Watson to ABC7 Chicago.
“It was scary because I never had a gun put in my face,” another resident told the outlet.
Although the raid was aimed at detaining the suspected gang members, many residents say that U.S. citizens and children were swept into the mix.
Watson told the outlet that trucks and military-style vans were used to separate parents from their children. Other neighbors said agents destroyed property to get in the building, with doors blown off their hinges and holes in the wall, reports ABC7 Chicago.
According to MSNBC, dozens of residents were pulled from their homes in zip ties, including children. Residents were detained and held for hours, and cops told them that if they had any unrelated warrants, they would not be returning to their residences.
The raid on the apartment complex comes as Chicago residents have continuously staged protests against increased immigration enforcement activity in downtown Chicago. U.S. President Donald Trump previously vowed to deploy National Guard Troops to fight crime in Chicago, mirroring his current approach in Washington, D.C.
Beginning on Sept. 9, the Trump administration sent ICE to the city through Operation Midway Blitz. The U.S. The DHS launched the operation, which focuses on individuals in the country without legal status who also have criminal records or pending charges.
On Tuesday, during a massive military meeting at the Marine Corps Museum in Quantico, Virginia, Trump declared that Chicago is one of many Democratic cities that should be used as a “training ground” for the U.S. military.
https://www.irishstar.com/news/us-news/ice-agents-drag-children-bed-36011822
President Donald Trump has threatened to deploy the National Guard to Chicago amid Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s objections, pointing to Washington and Memphis as examples of federal intervention. Critics argue the move would mark an effort of federal overreach into state authority, while Republicans have argued it could help curb violent crime. Trump has withdrawn his plans to deploy the National Guard to Chicago, at least for the immediate future.
…
Trump said, “So I’m going to go to Chicago early against Pritzker. Pritzker is nothing. If Pritzker was smart, he’d say, ‘Please come in.’ … If they lose less than six or seven people a week with murder, they’re doing a great job in their opinion.”
Pritzker called Trump’s remarks inconsistent and not credible, warning that a deployment without state consent would face immediate legal challenges. Pritzker said, “That you can’t take anything that he says seriously from one day to the next.”
Pritzker added, “He’s attacking verbally, sometimes he attacks, sending his agents in, sometimes he forgets. I think he might be suffering from some dementia. The next day, he’ll wake up on the other side of the bed and stop talking about Chicago.”
Pritzker argued “Operation Midwest Blitz” could justify broader federal action and said the enforcement posture is likely to provoke confrontations. Legal limits may restrict deployment, as a federal judge in San Francisco ruled a June Los Angeles deployment violated the Posse Comitatus Act.
Trump said, “Chicago is a death trap and I’m going to make it just like I did with D.C., just like I’ll do with Memphis.”
Civil liberties groups criticized the Memphis operation as overreach and regressive policing. The White House has touted the move as a measure to reduce violent crime.
American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee said, “This latest step makes clear that the Trump administration is claiming a sweeping mandate to patrol, arrest and detain people in Memphis, and will bring back the same failed policing tactics that caused widespread constitutional violations for decades.”
Pritzker said, “The harder the ICE agents come in, the more people want to intervene and step in the way of them. And when that happens, and when there’s any kind of, well, touching or engagement with those ICE agents that involves actual potential battery, well, that’ll be the excuse.”
Angel Rodrigo Minguela Palacios was unloading boxes of strawberries during his final delivery in Los Angeles when a band of masked Border Patrol agents surrounded him and asked for his identification.
Minguela had unwittingly entered a political minefield on August 14 outside the Japanese American National Museum in Little Tokyo, where California Governor Gavin Newsom was addressing a crowd about his plans to fight back against a Republican-led gerrymandering campaign to maintain control of Congress.
Federal agents deployed by Donald Trump’s administration were patrolling the street directly in front of the building.
The timing of the spectacle drew immediate scrutiny and backlash, with the governor speaking out in the middle of his remarks to condemn what was happening just outside the event. “You think it’s coincidental?” he said.
Minguela, 48, was released from Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody last week after nearly two months inside a facility he described as a “prison” with lights on at all hours of the day, no beds and only a concrete floor to sleep on.
Detainees received little food, and the conditions were so bleak that some of the men inside volunteered to self-deport rather, he told CBS News.
“Those days were the hardest,” Minguela told The Los Angeles Times. “My first day there on the floor, I cried. It doesn’t matter that you’re men, it doesn’t matter your age. There, men cried.”
Minguela, who is undocumented, has lived in the United States for more than a decade after entering the country from Mexico on a tourist visa. He overstayed his visa after fleeing violence in the Mexican state of Coahuila, where he had been kidnapped twice and stabbed by people trying to steal money from ATMs he was servicing, according to The Times.
He does not have a criminal record.
Minguela was released on bond and is equipped with an ankle monitor as an immigration judge determines next steps in his case.
A spokesperson for Homeland Security said he “was arrested for breaking our country’s laws by overstaying his visa” but remains unclear why he was targeted for arrest.
Minguela had overstayed a tourist visa after fleeing the Mexican state of Coahuila in 2015 because of violence he faced there, his partner said. She said he had worked servicing ATMs there, was kidnapped twice and at one point was stabbed by people intent on stealing the money. After his employers cut staff, she said, he lost his job, helping drive his decision to leave.
On August 14, Minguela left his partner and three children — ages 15, 12 and six — while they were still asleep as he prepared for his daily delivery route at 2 a.m. He had worked for the same produce delivery company for eight years and never missed a day.
Minguela was unloading several boxes of strawberries and a box of apples when he noticed a group of masked Border Patrol agents roaming the area surrounding Newsom’s event.
Video from the scene shows the agents passing his van then doubling back and looking inside to find Minguela. He presented a red “know your rights” card from his wallet and handed it to an agent.
“This is of no use to me,” he said, according to The Times. Agents then asked him his name, nationality and immigration paperwork before leading him away in handcuffs.
“Immigration has already caught me,” Minguela wrote in text messages to his partner. “Don’t worry. God will help us a lot.”
U.S. Border Patrol El Centro Sector Chief Gregory Bovino was observing the arrest. He turned to the officers and shouted out “well done” moments before speaking with reporters who were filming the scene.
“We’re here making Los Angeles a safer place since we don’t have politicians that will do that,” Border Patrol El Centro Sector Chief Gregory Bovino told FOX 11. “We do that ourselves, so that’s why we’re here today.”
Asked whether he had a message for Newsom, who was speaking roughly 100 feet away, Bovino said he wasn’t aware where the governor was.
“I think it’s pretty sick and pathetic,” Newsom said of the arrest.
“They chose the time, manner, and place to send their district director outside right when we’re about to have this press conference,” he said. “That’s everything you know about Donald Trump’s America … about the authoritarian tendencies of the president.”
Minguela believes he was targeted for his appearance.
Immigration raids throughout the Los Angeles area in June sparked massive protests demanding the Trump administration withdraw ICE and federal agents from patrolling immigrant communities.
In response, Trump federalized National Guard troops and sent in hundreds of Marines despite objections from Democratic city and state officials.
A federal judge determined the administration had illegally deployed the Guard as part of an apparent nationwide effort to create “a national police force with the president as its chief.”
The Supreme Court also recently overturned an injunction that blocked federal agents from carrying out sweeps in southern California after a judge determined they were indiscriminately targeting people based on race and whether they spoke Spanish, among other factors.
The court’s opinion drew a forceful rebuke from liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic justice on the bench, who accused the conservative justices of ignoring the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unlawful searches and seizures
“We should not have to live in a country where the Government can seize anyone who looks Latino, speaks Spanish, and appears to work a low wage job,” she wrote in a dissenting opinion.
“The Fourth Amendment protects every individual’s constitutional right to be “free from arbitrary interference by law officers,’” she added. “After today, that may no longer be true for those who happen to look a certain way, speak a certain way, and appear to work a certain type of legitimate job that pays very little.”
Los Angeles police officers fired over 1,000 projectiles at protesters on a single day in June as demonstrators pushed back against the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown and decision to deploy the National Guard to the nation’s second largest city.
The police department released a state-mandated report Monday on use of force against protesters that included numbers on bean bags, rubber and foam rounds, and tear gas deployed during days of protests in Los Angeles.
On June 6, police fired 34 rounds at about 100 people. On June 8, police fired 1,040 projectiles at about 6,000 people, including 20 rounds of CS gas, a type of tear gas. Six injuries were reported as a result of those projectiles.
There were 584 police officers responding that day, the department said. Protesters had blocked off a major freeway and set self-driving cars on fire.
The report was concerning to Josh Parker, deputy director of policy at the New York University School of Law Policing Project.
“The sense that I got from that data is that if that’s how you police a protest, then you’re policing it wrong,” Parker said.
The protests have put the use of these types of munitions by law enforcement under scrutiny. After journalists were shot, a federal judge granted a temporary restraining order that blocked LA police from using rubber projectiles and other munitions against reporters.
A protester who was hit and lost a finger filed a civil rights lawsuit against the city of LA and county sheriff’s department.
California in 2021 restricted the use of less lethal munitions until alternatives to force have been tried to control a crowd. Police cannot aim “indiscriminately” into a crowd or at the head, neck or any other vital organs. They also cannot fire solely for a curfew violation, verbal threats toward officers, or not complying with directions given by law enforcement, such as when they order an unlawful assembly to disperse.
“To see such a high number of projectiles discharged in a relatively short time period gives me grave concern that the law and those best practices were violated,” Parker said.
A spokesperson for the Los Angeles Police Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. LAPD was planning a “comprehensive evaluation of each use-of-force incident,” said Chief Jim McDonnell in a statement reported June 23 by the Los Angeles Times.
The days of protests in “dangerous, fluid and ultimately violent conditions” left 52 officers with injuries that required medical treatment, McDonnell said. Officers were justified in their actions to prevent further harm, he said.
Tensions escalated in downtown Los Angeles on June 8 as National Guard troops arrived to patrol federal buildings.
“Agitators in the crowd vandalized buildings, threw rocks, broken pieces of concrete, Molotov cocktails, and other objects toward law enforcement officers,” the report said.
Many protesters left by evening, but some formed a barricade of chairs on one street and threw objects at police on the other side. Others standing above the closed southbound 101 Freeway threw chunks of concrete, rocks, electric scooters and fireworks at California Highway Patrol officers and their vehicles parked on the highway.
Police issued multiple unlawful assembly orders shutting down demonstrations in several blocks of downtown Los Angeles but the crowd remained and munitions were used to bring the situation under control, the report said.
A box that read, “Other de-escalation techniques or other alternatives to force attempted,” was blank.
Parker said departments should plan for when a crowd begins throwing objects or being unruly, drawing on crowd management techniques.
“It’s important that law enforcement agencies not needlessly provoke the crowd” with aggressive language or weapons on display, he said.
Los Angeles sheriff’s deputies far outpaced the LAPD’s use of projectiles. With more than 80 deputies responding, the department deployed over 2,500 projectiles on June 8, the agency reported last week. It also said there were “hundreds to thousands” of people.
The California Highway Patrol, whose 153 officers responded to protesters blocking a major downtown freeway, estimated a crowd of about 2,000 people and used 271 rounds.
The tallies reported by LA police and deputies are high, especially considering the small number of deputies sent by the sheriff’s department, said retired LAPD Lt. Jeff Wenninger, who provides expert testimony for court cases.
“I don’t believe law enforcement officers or commanders truly understand the extent of this law, the restriction it provides,” he said. “And they just default back to old practices.”
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