LA officials, Occupy protesters cooperate

LOS ANGELES -- When Occupy LA demonstrators recently proclaimed a downtown intersection "our street," police watched as annoyed drivers honked horns and tried to maneuver around gyrating protesters. Officers only moved in after the third intersection takeover -- telling protesters they had to quit or face arrest. The activists turned around and marched back to camp chanting slogans.

Occupy LA, a 485-tent camp surrounding City Hall, has marched to a different beat in its drum circle after protesters, police and city officials established a relationship based on dialogues instead of dictates.

As camps in other cities degenerated into unrest that led to mass arrests, Occupy LA has remained largely a peaceful commune. Police arrive on site only when called in to investigate petty crimes. Marches have resulted in only about five spontaneous arrests -- the other 70 or so involved protesters who deliberately got arrested to make a political statement.

City leaders are now hoping that peace can withstand what could be its biggest test. The city has given campers until 12:01 a.m. Monday to clear out of the park, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said Friday, a tactic that stands in stark contrast to middle-of-the-night police raids used in other cities.

"Los Angeles has had a real history of heavy-handed tactics with police," said Richard Weinblatt, a police procedures expert and former police chief. "They're taking a very good approach with this."

The hands-off strategy marks a departure for a police force still striving to emerge from the shadow of the 1991 beating of Rodney King, the Rampart corruption scandal of the late '90s, and more recently, the 2007 crackdown at an immigrants rights rally.

This time, even before the first tent was set up on the City Hall lawn, Jim Lafferty, a lawyer who has been representing Occupy LA, said Police Chief Charlie Beck assured him protesters would be left alone if they remained peaceful.

Elected city leaders initially embraced the campers, encouraged perhaps by local unions' support of the protest. Villaraigosa handed out plastic ponchos one rainy day.

Police, meanwhile, have held off making arrests while giving protesters ample time to make their statement through civil disobedience, such as lying on the sidewalk in front of a Bank of America branch.

They've negotiated with organizers, sometimes for hours, to end actions without arrest, and assigned veteran detectives, clad in riot helmets, to man front lines against protesters instead of younger officers who may be more prone to act rashly when baited with name-calling.

Protesters have done their part to cooperate. They've readily complied with health inspectors' demands for more portable toilets, trash pickup and food sanitation. They've also worked to tamp down anarchist inciters in the camp who want to provoke authorities, as well as activists with hot tempers.

Occupiers say they realize violence is not going to win any points in their struggle for greater economic equality and could alienate many supporters.

While acknowledging that violence has been avoided in Los Angeles, some question the precedent set by official leniency. "You have these people staying out weeks at a time, and police let them break the law," said John Hawkins, who has tracked the Occupy movement in his blog Right Wing News. "The government has to enforce the law."