Beverly Hills Police Fire Tear Gas At Protesters

BEVERLY HILLS, CA — Beverly Hills is under a new round of indefinite curfews following tension that erupted Friday night after Beverly Hills police fired tear gas and sponge-tipped grenades on protesters attempting to enter a residential neighborhood.

On Saturday night, the city announced the new curfew, which bans gatherings of more than 10 people in residential areas between 9 p.m. and 8 a.m. The curfew does not apply to the city’s downtown business district, silent gatherings such as candlelight vigils, and gatherings on private property.

Peaceful protests began in the city Friday night on Santa Monica Boulevard and Doheny Drive, according to Los Angeles Magazine. A group of roughly 50 calling itself Occupy BLM and carrying bullhorns and amplified music planned to march down through residential streets and end at Beverly Gardens Park near the Beverly Hills sign. Event organizer James Butler told Los Angeles Magazine that the group hoped for a night of music, dance and speeches.

“The plan was to have a conversation and then dance and play music,” he said.

Butler said he wanted to hold the event in a residential area of wealthy neighborhoods to expose people there to the conversations animating the continuing protests surrounding the death of George Floyd.

The group barely got a chance to wake anybody up before Beverly Hills police met the group on North Alpine Drive around 11 p.m. and declared the group an unlawful assembly. Through a megaphone, the police instructed the police to disperse.

The roughly 50 protesters remained, chanting, “Whose streets? Our streets!” and taking a knee. The police warned that they were about to use a Long Range Acoustic Device, a sonic weapon used for crowd control, Los Angeles Magazine reported. The crowd began to back up, but the police used the LRAD twice, the publication said.

As video footage posted to Twitter shows, plumes of smoke were followed by loud noises. Moments later, the police began shooting a barrage of tear gas canisters and sponge bullets. Los Angeles Magazine reported that the bullets ricocheted off street signs, broke nearby glass and hit protesters. One man fell, and people in the crowd cried out for a medic.

Soon after, the Occupy group ventured back onto Santa Monica Boulevard and continued to protest.

In a statement, the Beverly Hills Police Department said that the group had trespassed on private property and assaulted officers by pointing lasers in their eyes. “The Occupy protestors continued to aggress the officers and began to assault officers by pointing lasers in their faces and eyes, a crime in California,” a BHPD spokesperson told Los Angeles Magazine. “BHPD directed sponge projectiles towards protestors using lasers and those throwing objects at officers.”

The city declared a new round of curfews — after almost 10 days without them — Saturday night as part of an emergency declaration that went into effect May 30.

A proclamation signed by City Manager George Chavez decreed that "it is deemed necessary in the interest of public peace and safety to restrict the use of residential areas of the City during nighttime hours in order to enable residents to sleep," citing a protest from 10 p.m. to about 1 a.m. that "included bullhorns and amplified music and disrupted the tranquility of the residential neighborhood during hours when many people would ordinarily be sleeping."

The order defines an assembly as any group of more “having a common purpose, design, or goal, upon any public street sidewalk, alley, park, or other public place.” It defines a residential area as any area outside the business district, which includes the downtown Business Triangle and is bounded by La Cienega Boulevard, Robertson Boulevard, South Beverly Drive, Santa Monica Boulevard, and Wilshire Boulevard east of Crescent Drive.