Protests broke out in Anaheim, California Wednesday night after a video of an altercation between a group of teenagers and an off-duty police officer went viral.
The video shows the plain-clothes officer grabbing a teenager, who he says threatened to shoot the officer. The officer and the teen are followed by a group of teenagers. At one point, the struggle between the teen and the officer escalates, and the group becomes more agitated. One teen tries to pull the teen away from the officer’s grasp before throwing a punch at the officer.
The officer then pulls out a handgun and fires the weapon, not hitting anyone, and the group runs away.
Situation escalated around 1:45:
Two of the teens were arrested after more police came.
The around 300 protesters shouted “hands up, don’t shoot” and “no justice, no peace”:
Demonstrators lined the block in Anaheim shouting “no justice no peace,” as police blocked the intersection pic.twitter.com/INmixM69F6
— Melissa Etehad اتحاد (@melissaetehad) February 23, 2017
Some demonstrators threw rocks and kicked police cars, while others broke windows or residences and cars, the Los Angeles Times reports. There was also protests outside of the house of the LAPD officer in the video:
Riot cops protecting alleged LAPD officer in #Anaheim pic.twitter.com/XRfESPuwER
— Gabriel San Román (@gsanroman2) February 23, 2017
The officer’s home and vehicle were vandalized.
Twenty-four people were arrested on misdemeanor charges of failure to disperse.