On Saturday Anaheim Police Department officers openly fired bean bags, pepper spray and released an attack dog into a crowd that included women and children protesting an officer involved shooting earlier in the day. If that isn’t shocking enough, about 24-hours later Anaheim police killed another man who was allegedly driving a stolen car.
(You read that right, demonstrators who were protesting police brutality became victims of police brutality themselves and after all that cops shot a second guy that same weekend.)
Demonstrators gathered Saturday afternoon to demand the police department explain why officers shot and killed an unarmed 25-year-old male. The OC Register explains what went down just before the shooting:
Police described Diaz as a “documented gang member,” and said he was shot after the officers saw three men near a car in the 600 block of Anna Drive, near La Palma Avenue and State College Boulevard. Believing the activity to be suspicious, the officers approached the vehicle, and all three men fled on foot.
“What exactly happened during the shooting we don’t know, we’re still investigating that,” Sgt. Bob Dunn told KCAL-9 News on Saturday. “But the shooting occurred and the male was taken to a local hospital. “
The shooting victim, Manuel Angel Diaz of Santa Ana, was pronounced dead at the hospital at 7 p.m. Saturday.
“Once they shot him in the leg and he went down the cops continued and shot him in the head, what is that about? My brother didn’t have a weapon on him at all,” the victim’s sister Correna Chavez told KCBS-LA on Sunday.
Anaheim Police Chief John Welter said Sunday his officers fired bean bags and pepper spray at the crowd after “some known gang members” threw bottles and rocks at officers.
Welter also said the K-9 police dog seen in the video above “accidentally escaped” from an officer’s vehicle and rushed into the crowd. The dog bit two demonstrators, including one man who was trying to unbuckle his 1-year-old baby from a stroller.
Children present at the protest describe the scenes. (YouTube/Nauiocelotl)
“They’re saying they let the dog go out by accident but it was on purpose,” said a young girl in the video to the right uploaded to YouTube Sunday. “We saw the dog stop but then it just kept on going.”
A 5-year-old girl was also hit in the eye by a “rubber bullet,” according to another young resident in the video.
Almost 90% of the community where the shooting took place is Latino, according to public records.
The Mayor of Anaheim has asked the State Attorney to investigate the initial shooting.
“I’m asking for a full investigation,” Tait said at a Sunday news conference. “Transparency is essential. Whatever the truth is, we will own it.”
That statement didn’t mean much to residents because on Sunday night protests continued. Local news reports at 11pm Sunday showed two large trash containers that were lit on fire near the intersection where Diaz was shot.
An hour and a half later the OCWeekly broke the news that Anaheim police had shot and killed a second male. By 2am Monday morning 200 protesters are on the scene.
Details about the latest shooting are still emerging but according to the OCRegister it all started after “officers spotted a known gang member on probation in what they soon determined was a stolen car.”
In 2012 alone, there have been seven officer-involved shootings in Anaheim, according to Presente.org.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
After the election, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy