Journalists remembered Ruben Salazar after LA’s protest injuries

From John d’annaCalmness

This story was originally published by CalmattersS Register about their ballots.

The spectrum of law enforcement, which shoots “less deadly” circles in crowds of protesters and striking journalists on the streets of Los Angeles, is pursuing an echo from the death of a journalist Ruben Salazar while covering protest more than 50 years agoS

For four days of protests on ice immigration arrests in the Los Angeles region, nearly a dozen journalists, including a CalMatters investigator reporter Sergio Olmos, were struck by projectiles dismissed by data composed of composed of data composed of composed of composed of composed of composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of data composed of Collected data drawn up from collected from collected data, drawn up from the collected data collected from the collected data collected from compiled from collected data drawn up from data drawn up from drawn up from collected from data compiled from collected from data compiled from data compiled from collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from data collected from Adam Rose, President of the Committee on Prints of the Los Angeles press.

The most prolonged light bruising, but one, the British journalist Nick Stern, was hit in the leg with a projectile, apparently fired by a deputy sheriff of Los Angeles County as it covered Friday night in the Paramount community.

The impact left a 2-inch opening in the leg and needs emergency surgery to remove the 40mm projectile, according to media reports.

“It hurts so much that I thought they could shoot live circles,” He told The Guardian. “I’ve been with the non-first-rated circles. They are afraid of hell, but overall they don’t break the skin. But blood made me think it’s live.”

Another journalist, Lauren Tomasi of the News9 Australia, was struck by a rubber bullet fired by a Los Angeles police officer while she was broadcast live during a protest on Sunday in front of the Los Angeles Center for Detention Center.

The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department told Calmatters in a statement that the department was examining footage of Stern’s injury and “at this point it is unclear whether our department was involved.”

The statement states that the department is committed to ensuring that media members “can fulfill their obligations safely while reflecting events, including protests, civil disobedience and public gatherings.”

The statement added that the incident in Tomasi “included another law enforcement agency rather than the sheriff’s department.”

A video posted on X by News9 Australia It shows a Lapd uniformed officer who aims and shoots in the direction of Tomasi and her crew.

When they asked for a comment, a Lapd spokesman directed Calletatters yes Message The Agency’s account states that police have fired more than 600 rounds from “less than deadly ammunition” on Saturday and Sunday while arresting 29 people.

The announcement states that the department will continue to examine footage from the body from the incidents, but does not mention the case with Tomasi or other journalists who have been struck.

NEWS9 has announced that LAPD has launched an official investigation into the Tomasi incident.

Subsequent release from LAPD states that its professional standards bureau “will investigate allegations of excessive force” but does not mention Thomasi or other media.

The history of problems

Journalists of the dangers that the news faces are not new. Over the years, dozens of journalists have been injured by police while covering disturbances in and around Los Angeles.

Rose, the defender of the LA Press journalist rights, said he had started compiling incidents after the violence during the La George Floyd protests in 2020 to try to determine if there was a model involving police meetings where journalists were injured.

He said he believed there was a model.

“There is a long history of problematic dynamics between the police and the Los Angeles press,” he said, especially during accidents with unrest where police “seem to be clear to journalists.”

He quoted the Maide Melee in 2007, in which LAPD officers tried to clear protesters at immigration rally in Park Park. More than 40 people were injured, including nine journalists, and the city paid $ 13 million to settle claims for excessive force.

Six years earlier, LAPD agreed to pay $ 60,000 to settle a case related to seven reporters injured by police, covering disorders around the democratic National Convention in 2000.

“Lapd is really concerned,” Rose said. “The police and the press are both a first answer and must have a level of professionalism and respect. When you are culturally referred to journalists, press rights are cooled and the ability of the public to be informed is harmed.”

Rose noted that California Penal Code Section 13652 was amended in 2021 to require employees “to minimize the possible accidental impact of the use of kinetic energy shells and chemical agents on observers, medical staff, journalists or other unintended goals.”

Olmos, the CalMatters journalist who was struck, reported to x that he saw officers aimed at less lethal ammunition at close range, “including eye level.”

When asked for an answer, a LAPD spokesman directed Calmatters to send questions in writing by email, but not to expect an immediate answer.

Rose said it was a little difficult to make a straight line between the more episodes and the death of Salzar, but there are enough similarities that, after 55 years, his case is still ringing as a warning tale.

“He was killed by a tears box, fired through an open door, which shows some recklessness, and this recklessness is certainly going on,” he said.

Rose noted that on Friday, freelance journalist Sean Becker-Karmitchell was hit in the head by a tear circle and that “if he was two inches lower, he would lose his eye.”

“Losing a hero”

Salazar was a colonist for the Los Angeles Times, as well as for the news director of a radio station in Spanish.

On August 29, 1970, he covered a hike in East Los Angeles from Latinos against the Vietnam War. As the protest was heated, the sheriff’s MPs tried to scatter the crowds with tear gas.

Salazar crashed into a bar called a silver dollar. A little later, a deputy fired a 10-inch tears through the led door of the establishment, hitting Salazar in the head and killing him. The death was eventually ruled by accident.

Retired journalist Frank Sotomayor joined the Times in 1970, shortly after Salazar’s death. He became a fan of Salazar after his relatives began sending him copies to his columns while he was located in Tokyo with the army.

These columns made him apply to Times.

“On the day I left the army, it was the day he was killed,” Sotomayor told Calmatters.

“He was one of the few Latin Americans in journalism at the time … For the people who knew him, they were just stunned … that something like that would happen.”

“For me, it was the loss of a hero that I always wanted to meet and never had the opportunity.”

Sotomayor, who helped the Times Project leadership for Latino Community and Culture, won the Pulitzer Award for Public Service in 1984 and later worked at the 20th anniversary of the retrospective of Salazar’s death, noted that there were still questions about the case.

“There are still people who believe Ruben was killed on purpose,” he said. “I have never dealt with whether he was on purpose or an incident, as the Sheriff’s office calls it. Why would someone fire a projectile of this type in business … It seems to be out of coincidence.”

Sotomayor noted that the type of tears that struck Salazar would not meet the description of a non-rabbit projectile today.

But this is not inferior to the danger with which journalists face, trying to cover their communities.

Last year was the most deadly year for journalists who were recorded, with at least 124 being killed in the performance of the obligations, According to the Commission for Protection of Journalists. Most died while covering conflicts in Gaza, Ukraine and other parts of the world.

This article was Originally Published on CalMatters and was reissued under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Noderivatives License.