INSIDE: Small gatherings celebrate verdict, but doubts remain about progress being made on social justice.
Shep Crawford was driving to Grand Park in downtown Los Angeles on Tuesday afternoon unsure of what the world might look like when he got there, with the verdicts soon to be read in the case of Derek Chauvin, the Minneapolis police officer accused of killing George Floyd last year.
Then he heard it: Chauvin was guilty on all three counts. Crawford, the senior pastor at Experience Christian Ministries in South Los Angeles, shouted with joy in his car.
All the anxiety that had built up around this moment suddenly vanished.
His daughter called him minutes later, shocked.
“I want to get to a point where she doesn’t find it weird or unusual that we get justice,” Crawford said. “This is a moment. We have to make sure it continues to be a movement.”
Crawford gathered with other faith leaders from around L.A. at the top of Grand Park on Tuesday afternoon, one of many jubilant, small gatherings that popped up around the region in response to the three guilty verdicts.
At another gathering in the late afternoon, about 40 people waved signs as honking cars passed by at the corner of Florence and Normandie avenues in South L.A. Music played and the celebratory crowd cheered.
Posters calling for justice for Floyd covered the poles of nearby street lights. In chalk, people wrote on the sidewalk: “Black Lives Matter,” and “George Floyd.”
“Today is a small victory of just one killer cop being convicted,” said Marcus Wright, 34, of South Los Angeles. “The movement doesn’t stop until we stop dying at the hands of police.”
The scene Tuesday came nearly three decades after violence erupted at that same intersection, when another verdict in a police brutality case — the acquittal of four LAPD officers seen beating Rodney King on video — led to the Los Angeles riots.
Floyd’s killing galvanized millions of people to hit the streets in protest. In L.A., street battles erupted between police and demonstrators. A year later, the fallout of the response is still settling, with the Los Angeles Police Commission considering reforms after several reports faulted LAPD’s tactics confronting the protesters last May and June.
Still, on Tuesday, some demonstrators said the Chauvin verdicts were just a small step to greater police accountability.
“This isn’t a huge win,” said Cameron Roy, 29, of Inglewood. “So many cops have gotten away with murdering the people they say they protect. We can’t win until we’re all safe, and those cops face justice for their violence.”
Some had reservations that justice would be fully served.
“This ain’t justice,” said Byron Jackson. “He (Chauvin) is going to get the minimum punishment. And he’s not going to a real jail; they’ll put him in Disneyland.”
As the Chauvin trial wound to a close Monday, law enforcement agencies from across Southern California said they were entering a state of readiness, preparing for more protests and unrest if Chauvin was acquitted.
The Los Angeles Police Department announced a citywide tactical alert at around 12:30 p.m. Officials called the alert precautionary. The city of Los Angeles announced they were shutting down vaccination sites — including one at Dodger Stadium — as a precaution.
For weeks, L.A. County Sheriff Alex Villanueva and LAPD Chief Michel Moore had urged residents to protest peacefully. Both said they were prepared to call on the California National Guard for assistance like they did last year in the face of intense protests. Last week, the sheriff and police chief joined a group of around two dozen faith and community leaders to plead for calm.
Other cities that saw protests last year — including Long Beach, Beverly Hills and Santa Monica — also said they were taking steps to put more police on the streets in anticipation. As of the late afternoon, there were no major demonstrations in Orange County, where sheriff’s department officials said they had around 150 deputies ready to deploy if needed.
Outside Getty House, the official residence of L.A. mayors in Hancock Park, around 50 protesters with Black Lives Matter flags chanted after the verdicts. As they often have since last year’s protests, they called on Moore to be fired.
Elsa Hutchinson was there with daughter Diane and 18-year-old grandson Amir Greenidge. Like others, she celebrated the result of the trial but had misgivings about what it meant for changes to the justice system in the U.S.
“I’m extremely happy (the verdict) went the way it did,” Hutchinson said. “But we can’t just put our hands up and say that we’re doing better.”
BLM organizers continued to call on Mayor Eric Garcetti to shift funding away from LAPD and toward homelessness and mental health. She called for LAPD to be defunded.
“We’re here to demand a moral budget, which must mean divesting from policing,” said Tabatha Jones Jolivet, of BLM’s L.A. chapter.
The mayor’s house has been a site of showdowns between protesters and police in the past, but on Tuesday, LAPD’s presence was light. Just four officers stood off to the side.
At Grand Park in Los Angeles, pastors said they would continue to press for more changes to American policing.
Standing on the steps just southeast of Grand Avenue, within sight of the towering columns and glass walls of the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion, Pastor Elton Johnson of Metropolitan Baptist Church downtown said the movement to end biased policing wouldn’t end Tuesday.
“We still have work to do,” he said.