Bratton reassigns 2 LAPD leaders
Two high-ranking Los Angeles Police Department commanders were reassigned Monday for their role in overseeing the violent police response to last week's MacArthur Park immigration rally.
Deputy Chief Cayler "Lee" Carter Jr., commanding officer of Operations Central Bureau, and Cmdr. Louis Gray, the No. 2 official in the bureau, were shifted from their command posts.
At the same time, a preliminary inquiry suggested that police had made a series of tactical errors in the incident, which injured at least 10 protesters and journalists, as well as seven police officers. Carter and Gray were the senior commanders in charge of policing the protest.
"We're not going to shift responsibility down the chain of command," Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said at a City Hall news conference that included LAPD Chief William J. Bratton and Police Commission President John Mack. "Accountability begins at the top. What happened on May 1st was wrong. We're taking immediate action to address it."
The action comes as officials attempt to quell outrage over videotaped images of LAPD officers swinging batons and firing nearly 150 "less-than-lethal" rounds at reporters and largely peaceful protesters last Tuesday.
The staffing shift was announced as LAPD officials were preparing a preliminary investigation into what went wrong at MacArthur Park. Sources close to the probe, who spoke on the condition that they not be named because it was an ongoing case, said investigators had broken down the incident into three distinct phases that occurred between 5:15 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.
Investigators now believe that LAPD commanders made significant errors at all stages of the MacArthur Park action that served to inflame tensions rather than ease them.
About 5:15 p.m., LAPD officers came under attack from a relatively small group of protesters just outside the park who threw plastic bottles and other objects in their direction.
LAPD policies call on officers to isolate troublemakers and get them away from the larger crowd.
But for reasons investigators still don't understand, officers actually pushed the 30 to 40 agitators into the park, allowing them to mix with hundreds of marchers who were behaving peacefully, the sources said.
By about 6 p.m., commanders had decided to clear the park and surrounding area. The job was given to about 60 Metro Division officers, many of whom wore riot gear and were armed with shotguns that fired "less-than-lethal" rounds. Commanders directed an LAPD helicopter to issue a command in English -- but not Spanish -- for people to leave the area.
