Police Presence Casts Spell on Hollywood Blvd.

A massive police presence on Hollywood Boulevard on Tuesday night was credited with preventing a repeat of last year’s Halloween melee during which thousands of revelers threw bottles at officers, smashed windows and looted stores.

The additional officers “should keep the peace here,” Mansure Zadeh, owner of the Gift Shop on the boulevard, said Tuesday evening. “Last year, there weren’t enough cops. As a businessman here, I say it’s great as long as they don’t interrupt the fun.”

Said T-shirt vendor Darrell Walker, 31: “The police got to do what they got to do. At least we know there won’t be any violence.”

Only nineteen people in the crowd that police estimated at about 25,000--far short of the 100,000 revelers last year--had been arrested by late Tuesday. They were booked on misdemeanor charges ranging from public drunkenness to driving under the influence and interfering with a police officer, police said.

Police closed to vehicular traffic streets in the area between Highland, Selma and Fountain avenues and Gower Street, and the California Highway Patrol closed ramps to the Hollywood Freeway shortly after 8 p.m. Although the streets were empty of auto traffic, torrents of people streamed down the sidewalks.

“We’re jammed up with people from Vine to Vermont,” Sgt. Art Adkins said as he stood near Hollywood and Vine.

Several passers-by jokingly complimented him, saying, “Hey, I like your costume.”

“I’ve been hearing remarks like that all night,” Adkins said. “But I don’t mind. We’re here to laugh and have fun. These people get to play monster; we get to play cop.”

About 500 officers were deployed in Hollywood, with about 200 patrolling on foot, on horseback and in cruisers until 1 a.m.

Police Chief Daryl F. Gates had to withstand a legal challenge from the Police Protective League, the police officers’ union, in order to assign the extra personnel to Halloween night duty. On a normal night, nine officers would be assigned to Hollywood Boulevard.

“I like having the police out,” said Richard Cutler, 27, who works at the Hollywood Swap Meet. “I’d rather deal with them than with gang bangers. I’m staying out until about 11.”

Lou Kalogerakos, a salesman at the Rock Shop, said he felt safer, “but I don’t know if they need 400 cops. It just seems to me that there are too many.”

Carol and James Coleman, who were taking their three children trick-or-treating, left the street before last year’s melee and planned to leave early Tuesday night.

“I feel a little safer with the police here,” Carol Coleman said.

But her husband said police “are the cause of the problem. They get bored after the crowd gets here, and they start to get anxious. They wind up starting a lot of problems.”