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LOS ANGELES – Pro-Palestine protesters are stayed put late Wednesday night and into the overnight hours despite UCLA warning demonstrators that the encampment is “unlawful” and that everyone must leave the area.
The Los Angeles Police Department appears to be taking an all-hands-on-deck approach to responding to the now-declared unlawful assembly, as the department is on tactical alert.
At 10:05 p.m., SkyFOX captured the moments where police started marching towards the direction of the encampment site. As of midnight Thursday, police have yet to break into the encampment site.
Police made their way to Westwood in riot gear Wednesday evening – a major contrast in law-enforcement presence compared to when FOX 11 documented the campus chaos Tuesday between 11 p.m. to 1 a.m., where cops appeared nowhere in sight during that time frame.
The heavy police presence comes as UCLA made global headlines for the wrong reasons after punches were thrown and fireworks were being thrown at the pro-Palestine encampments – all while law enforcement officers were nowhere to be found when FOX 11 was live at the scene for 2-plus hours and members of a private security firm were seen standing still as chaos unfolded a short distance away.
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The Federated University Police Officers’ Association (FUPOA), a union representing campus police, insinuated that the university was to blame for Tuesday’s unrest. Below was a statement released by FUPOA:
“The decisions regarding the response of the UC Police rest firmly in the hands of campus leadership. They shoulder the accountability for the outcomes stemming from these decisions, not the UC Police Department.”
UC President Michael V. Drake also issued a statement on Tuesday’s violence.
LAPD issued the following statement in response to Tuesday’s campus chaos:
(source)