ALRIGHT...THIS IS A BLOG, NOT A NEWSPAPER, AND THIS IS AN EMAIL I WANT TO SHARE WITH YOU BASED ON A TWITTER POST I MADE LAST NIGHT, WHEN I SAW WHAT APPEARED TO BE EVERY COP CAR IN TOWN (INCLUDING CULVER CITY) ROLLING DOWN WASHINGTON BLVD IN VENICE, ALONG WITH OVERHEAD HELICOPTER. You can see the original Twitter tweet on the right hand side of this blog.
ZD's TWITTER POST FROM 15 HOURS AGO (LATE LAST NIGHT):
WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING IN VENICE NOW? TONS OF LAPD CARS FLYING DOWN WASHINGTON BLVD. Have NEVER seen anything like it. Helicopter, too.
Every LAPD car in city must be in Venice NOW! Wonder what it is? Have never seen so many cop cars fly in.(Washington/Lincoln area)
REPLY TWEET FROM SOMEONE:
@zumadogg Major car accident - cop hit a car turning right *without rolling lights/sirens. t-boned her. The accident happened in front of my apt. I was on the porch of my front door on Venice Blvd.
More interesting, when I asked a Sheriff at 7-11, afterward who had just left the scene, he gave me a VERY DIFFERENT answer as to why all those cop cars and SUVs were flying down the street in such high concentration. He told me the reason all those cop cars were blazing down the street, flying in like I HAVE NEVER SEEN BEFORE IN MY LIFE was because someone was threatening people with a shot gun and was tazed. And that's what the ambulance was for, I was told.
Not exactly THIS?:
VENICE, Calif. (CBS) An overnight crash involving a Los Angeles Police Department squad car has left one person seriously injured. An overnight crash involving a Los Angeles Police Department squad car has left one person seriously injured.
An overnight crash involving a Los Angeles Police Department squad car has left one person seriously injured.
The crash occurred around 12:20 a.m. Friday at the intersection of Venice Boulevard and Glyndon Avenue in Venice.
The squad car jumped the curb and slammed into a sign and a tree.
Investigators said two officers were responding to a call, when the driver of a BMW ran a red light and plowed into the police cruiser.
That driver was rushed into surgery.
One officer was treated at the scene for an arm injury and the other suffered bumps and bruises.
The crash is now under investigation.
From Zuma's email inbox:
Zuma,
I saw your name on twitter in conversation talking about the crash that happened last night at the intersection of Venice and Glyndon. I wasn't there, a friend was, but still pretty indignant about the whole thing, especially with how it's been reported on. You have followers and a blog and maybe people listen to you on this sort of thing, so I thought I'd alert you to the shadiness of the thing (it doesn't sound like the person who tweeted you was out on the sidewalk) and if you found it objectionable you might post about it.
By my friend's report there were about 15 cop cars and two undercover cars (not sure if those were included in the tally) and all of that side of Venice was blocked off. Girl was making a right onto Venice from Glyndon, and a cop who was speeding at about 70mph hit her. The cop did not have his lights or his siren on- so his speeding was illegal. The cops blocked off that whole side of Venice and tried to tell people it was a "crime scene", but backpedalled and said that was only a way of speaking when challenged.
It looks like the cop who hit the girl was speeding illegally, and she may be dead or in really bad shape. But the shady stuff began when all those officers showed up and cordoned off the scene and told people they weren't allowed to watch. Some of these people were on the balconies of the apartments, some came down onto the sidewalk- and the cops tried to get them all to go inside and go away. The cops were bullying the people until somebody stepped up and reminded the cops about the existence of constitutional rights, etc. That same person then encouraged everyone (about 2 dozen people) standing out there to tweet, blog, etc about the incident. I'm new to twitter and I'm not good at navigating the internet, but when I tried to look up the accident what I found made me really angry. On twitter too- lapd and LosAngelesCP both tweeted the unconscionable article by cbs2: http://cbs2.com/local/Crash.LAPD.Car.2.1252206.html
The other article I found on it is better but still slanted: http://www.scpr.org/news/2009/10/16/woman-2-lapd-officers-injured-car-accident/ This article is slanted in tone toward the police account, but at least not untrue.
The first article? Whoever the unnamed "investigators" are, they have some explaining to do as to why they (allegedly) lied to the press. But perhaps I am unkind and they are merely moronic. But they say the young woman ran a red light...and in the SCPR article the named officer says there is a stop sign there. And that's easy enough to check. neither article mentions the swarm of officers at the scene (way before any ambulance), nor the attempts to intimidate witnesses.
There was an amusing verbal exchange with one of the officers who stuck around, with someone asking whether he wanted a nice red armband to go with his black uniform. The people who live right there could give you a better accounting, but hopefully people blogged it/tweeted it and I just don't know how to find it. The people at the scene had the distinct impression that the reason the cops wanted them all out of the way was so they could arrange the evidence more to their liking.
Also, they were going to have Internal Affairs investigate...they did agree, at the scene, that there should be an independent investigation by the Sheriff's Dept at least...but I wonder whether they followed through with that.
Sorry to go on, but I hope some of this may be useful and can guide you toward some of the first-hand accounts.
ZUMA UPDATE ON POSSIBLE THEORY: First I saw a helicopter flying overhead with the spotlight near Lincoln & Washington. THEN, it took off toward the area being discussed where the accident took place. THEN, all of the sudden a bunch of cars come racing in.
A Sheriff told me it was in response to someone threatening people with a shot gun. Perhaps the helicopter was looking for that incident; and perhaps one of the cars was zippin' over to check it out when the accident happened (even though police said the cop wasn't responding to a call at the time of the crash). SO THEN, the 12-15 police vehicles that raced to the scene was about the accident. It's all based if you believe the Sheriff who told me it was about the shotgun threat (forgetting to tell me about the car crash part) when you add it up. BECAUSE WHY WAS A HELICOPTER SEARCHING FOR SOMEONE A GOOD TWENTY MINUTES BEFORE THIS ACCIDENT HAPPENED IN THE SAME AREA THE HELICOPTER WAS FLYING OVER? At first I thought it was because they may have been looking for the accident involving the cop...BUT LAPD DISPATCH WOULD HAVE KNOW THE LOCATION OF THE CAR. (I'm sure they have GPS devices and would be notified of a crash.) SO I DOUBT THE HELICOPTER WAS FLYING AROUND FOR 20 MINUTES LOOKING FOR THE ACCIDENT. SO PERHAPS THE COP WAS INDEED RESPONDING (WITHOUT LIGHTS) TO SOMETHING THE HELICOPTER WAS LOOKING FOR?
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