Protesters block Hollywood intersection, burn flag; four arrested
Protesters blocked a tourist-filled Hollywood intersection Saturday afternoon and burned an American flag as part of nationwide marches protesting recent police killings of unarmed black men.
Four activists who were part of the crowd, three female and one male, were arrested for failing to disperse, said Sgt. Chuck Slater of the Los Angeles Police Department. Officers declared the crowd an unlawful assembly about 4:15 p.m. and ordered demonstrators to disperse.
The arrests came after dozens of protesters staged a “die-in” at the intersection of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue, lying down in the street for a few minutes. Police with helmets and batons forced the crowd out of the street.
Protesters also set fire to a flag in the middle of the intersection; officers stomped out the blaze.
Earlier in the day, protesters also gathered in Pershing Square in downtown Los Angeles and marched to LAPD headquarters. No arrests were reported.
The Los Angeles gatherings coincided with larger-scale marches in Washington and New York, where tens of thousands took to the streets in protest of recent high-profile deaths of black men at the hands of police officers who were not criminally charged.
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Times photographer Marcus Yam contributed to this report.
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