Tense but Quiet Day Follows School Brawl : Inglewood: Half of the students and many teachers stayed home after violent conflict between blacks and Latinos.

In the aftermath of a brawl between black and Latino students at Inglewood High School, no disturbances were reported on campus Wednesday but tensions remained high. Half of the students and many teachers stayed away from classes, and a beefed-up security crew confiscated a number of weapons from students on their way into school.

In class, students wrote essays on the causes of Tuesday’s fights. Supt. George McKenna, who spent most of the day on campus, said school psychologists, parents and members of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference will hold workshops on conflict resolution today with selected black and Latino students.

Meanwhile, an aide said County Supervisor Kenneth Hahn will ask the county Human Relations Committee to investigate the campus disturbances at next Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting. The Inglewood school board will also take up the disturbances at its meeting next Wednesday.

Ethnic pride turned to ethnic violence at the high school Tuesday when black students walked out on a Cinco de Mayo celebration to retaliate against Latinos who left a black history assembly in February.

After Tuesday’s walkout, insults escalated into a series of fistfights that involved dozens of students, prompting administrators to end the school day early and call in Inglewood police. Police continued to patrol the area around the school Wednesday.

Security guards reported seizing far more weapons than usual Wednesday morning, including guns, knives and a crowbar. District spokesman Maurice Wiley was unable to determine how many weapons were confiscated.

About half of the school’s 2,100 students returned to campus Wednesday morning. Wiley said teacher absences were also higher than normal, but he did not know specific numbers.

Among the absentees was Principal Lawrence Freeman, who called in sick.

Freeman said in an interview Tuesday that he was seriously considering retirement.

“How many times can you get your heart broken?” the 67-year-old educator asked. “I think our race (blacks) should be ashamed of itself. These blacks better get busy. They need to stop fighting and start competing.”

In interviews Tuesday and Wednesday, students said blacks and Latinos have not clashed in the past at Inglewood High, although the two groups are socially separate and tensions do exist in the student body, which is 53% black, 43% Latino, 2% white and 2% other.

“Mostly it’s blacks around blacks and Mexicans around Mexicans, but I didn’t know there was prejudice until (the fighting broke out),” said Gonzalo Curuchet, 15.

“We don’t always get along with the black people here,” said Alex Quintanilla, 18. “They think they’re superior to us. We work so hard to learn English. We work so hard to get jobs. We work so hard in our lives and they call us names.”

Black students said they think Latinos get favored treatment at the school. They said Freeman enforces the dress code more strictly for black girls, only has Latino girls working in the front office and gave more support to the Cinco de Mayo celebration than to Black History Month.

“They got a trip to Olvera Street,” Maneka Hubbard, 16, said of her Latino classmates. “They got a dance. They even named our cafeteria El Casa Maria.”

Black students said school officials would not allow them to select a Black History Month queen. Tuesday’s walkout occurred while Freeman was distributing flowers to the contestants for Cinco de Mayo queen.

Freeman said Tuesday that nobody ever asked him for a Black History Month queen. He denied that favoritism exists at the school.

“Don’t try to read too much into this,” Freeman said. “The whole thing is a bunch of punks who walked out and started this. Don’t give it the dignity of racial strife. It’s a bunch of non-thinking children doing the wrong thing.”

McKenna agreed Wednesday that the racial problems are not as widespread as they appear.

“I think 95% of the kids are surprised this occurred and have no idea what happened or why,” he said.

McKenna said he has not known Freeman to exhibit favoritism, “but there may be the perception that in making one group feel welcome he has made another group feel unwelcome.”

Administrators were not the only ones assessing the reasons for Tuesday’s clashes.

Chaka Jones, 17, attributed the fighting to “a lot of built-up hostilities” and said: “It doesn’t matter who threw the first punch. The question is why did punches continue to be thrown?”

Students said tensions between the two groups escalated in February when a large group of Latino students walked out of a black history assembly that featured Duke Ellington music, a tap dancing performance and brief history lessons about prominent blacks.

When Latinos staged a Mexican folk dancing demonstration and other activities in honor of Cinco de Mayo in the gym Tuesday, a group of between 10 and 15 black students walked out. More joined in. Soon both black and Latino students were leaving.

Outside the gym, students said, insults were exchanged and sporadic fighting began. When administrators tried to break up one fight, another would begin. After school was dismissed, the disturbances moved outside and many students rushed into the street.

“Blacks were fighting Hispanics and Hispanics were fighting blacks,” said Johnnie Thomas, the district’s security chief. “Then all hell broke loose.”