LOS ANGELES (AP) — More than 1,400 police officers,
some in riot gear, cleared the Occupy Los Angeles camp early Wednesday, driving
protesters from a park around City Hall and arresting more than 200 who defied
orders to leave. Similar raids in Philadelphia led to 52 arrests, but the scene
in both cities was relatively peaceful.
Police in Los Angeles and Philadelphia moved in on
Occupy Wall Street encampments under darkness in an effort to clear out some of
the longest-lasting protest sites since crackdowns ended similar occupations
across the country.
Beanbags fired from shotguns were used to subdue
the final three protesters in a makeshift tree house outside Los Angeles City
Hall, police Cmdr. Andrew Smith said, describing it as a minor use of force
incident. No serious injuries were reported.
Police Chief Charlie Beck praised the officers and
the protesters for their restraint and the peaceful way the eviction was
carried out.
Officers flooded down the steps of City Hall just
after midnight and started dismantling the two-month-old camp two days after a
deadline passed for campers to leave the park. Officers in helmets and wielding
batons and guns with rubber bullets converged on the park from all directions
with military precision and began making arrests after several orders were
given to leave.
There were no injuries and no drugs or weapons were
found during a search of the emptied camp, which was strewn with trash after
the raid. City workers put up concrete barriers to wall off the park while it
is restored. As of 5:10 a.m. PST, the park was clear of protesters, said LAPD
officer Cleon Joseph.
The raid in Los Angeles came after demonstrators
with the movement in Philadelphia marched through the streets after being
evicted from their site. Over 40 protesters were arrested after refusing to
clear a street several blocks northeast of City Hall, said Philadelphia Police
Commissioner Charles Ramsey. They were lined up in cuffs and loaded on to buses
by officers. Six others were arrested earlier after remaining on a street that
police tried to clear.
"The police officers who were involved in this
operation were hand-picked for this assignment," Philadelphia Mayor
Michael Nutter said. "They're highly trained and disciplined and showed a
tremendous amount of restraint and professionalism in carrying out this
morning's operation."
Nutter said the eviction had been planned for
several weeks and went off without largely without problems.
Ramsey said he would have preferred to evict the
protesters without making arrests, but some refused orders to clear the street
and had to be taken into custody. Three officers had minor injuries. One
protester was injured when a police horse stepped on her foot, Nutter said.
The Philadelphia protesters were ordered to clear
their encampment in part because a $50 million renovation project was due to
start at the City Hall plaza this fall.
"Dilworth Plaza was designated as a
construction site," Ramsey said. "They had to vacate. They knew that
from the very beginning."
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa raised
public safety and health concerns in announcing plans for the eviction last
week, while Philadelphia officials said protesters must clear their site to
make room for a $50 million renovation project.
Defiant Los Angeles campers who were chanting
slogans as the officers surrounded the park, booed when an unlawful assembly
was declared, paving the way for officers to begin arresting those who didn't
leave.
In the first moments of the raid, officers tore
down a tent and tackled a tattooed man with a camera on City Hall steps and
wrestled him to the ground. Someone yelled "police brutality."
Teams of four or five officers moved through the
crowd making arrests one at a time, cuffing the hands of protesters with white
plastic zip-ties. A circle of protesters sat with arms locked, many looking
calm and smiling.
Opamago Cascini, 29, said the night had been a
blast and he was willing to get arrested.
"It's easy to talk the talk, but you gotta
walk the walk," Cascini said.
Police used a cherry picker to pluck five men from
trees. Two others were in a tree house — one wore a crown and another taunted
police with an American flag.
In Philadelphia, police began pulling down tents at
about 1:20 a.m. EST after giving demonstrators three warnings that they would
have to leave, which nearly all of the protesters followed. Dozens of
demonstrators then began marching through the streets and continued through the
night.
Ramsey said breaking up the camp in the
early-morning hours helped minimize any disruption to businesses and traffic.
"We acknowledge the fact that we are going to
have to leave this space .... but in another sense this has been our home for
almost two months and no one wants to see their home taken away from
them," Philadelphia protester Bri Barton, 22, said before police began
clearing out the camp.
"Whether or not we have this space or work in
the city is nowhere near done," she said.
The eviction overall appeared to have been carried
out without any significant scuffles or violence.
Later Wednesday morning, workers used front-end
loaders to scoop up tents, trash and other debris and dump it into trucks to be
hauled away, while others swept the plaza clean.
Demonstrators and city officials in both Los
Angeles and Philadelphia were hoping any confrontation would be nonviolent,
unlike evictions at similar camps around the country that sometimes involved
pepper spray and tear gas. The movement against economic disparity and
perceived corporate greed began with Occupy Wall Street in Manhattan two months
ago.
The Los Angeles officers staged for hours outside
Dodger Stadium before the raid. They were warned that demonstrators might throw
everything from concrete and gravel to human feces at them.
"Please put your face masks down and watch
each other's back," a supervisor told them. "Now go to work."
The officers came from a wide range of specialized
units within the force, including the bomb squad, and the arson unit. Scores of
officers in hazmat suits also were sent in to deal with potentially unsanitary
conditions in the park.
Before police arrived in large numbers, protesters
were upbeat and the mood was almost festive. A protester in a Santa Claus hat
danced in the street. A woman showed off the reindeer antlers she had mounted
on her gas mask.
Matheson reported from Philadelphia. Associated
Press writer Shaya Tayefe Mohajer in Los Angeles also contributed to this
report.
Copyright
2011 The Associated Press.
(AP
Photo/ Joseph Kaczmarek)
