LA Story: Officers Spend 3,000 Hours Trying to Stop Graffiti at Abandoned Towers—but It's Not Enough

Jason Redmond

There’s an abandoned high-rise project in downtown Los Angeles, because of course there is. And in lawless LA, where embattled soft-on-crime district attorney George Gascón holds sway – unchallenged by uber-progressive Governor Gavin Newsom – the criminals will come out to play.

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And so unsurprisingly, they now have street artists,” vandals, and other miscreants holding court over 53 stories despite the efforts of the understaffed LAPD.

But they’re not having much luck:

Los Angeles Police Department officers have spent at least 3,000 hours on duty at the abandoned Oceanview Plaza site in Downtown LA where the unfinished high rise towers have attracted street artists, vandals, and others, and the need for round-the-clock security has begun to stress the already-understaffed police department.

"This has strained our deployment," Chief Michel Moore said Tuesday.

The construction site spans two city blocks in the City of Angeles, and officers have made at least 18 recent arrests for crimes like illegal gun possession and felony vandalism.

Evidently, the developer started the project in 2015 but ran out of money in 2018, and construction came to a halt. Well, for developers, it came to a halt – but not for LA’s underground night crew:

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LAPD’s response? Tighter security and a dialogue on urban culture. 

Chief Moore said they’ve had to resort to more overtime to address the situation:

"We have called in some officers on an overtime basis, so that we can provide for these added patrols or station them at that site to deter vandals and others from gaining access to it while also ensuring that we meet the minimum deployment requirements for stations across the city," he said.

Core patrol functions, such as responding to 911 calls, have not been affected, according to Moore.

Oh sure, 911 calls have not been affected. Except the response time to such calls is already so bad that “leaders” have proposed a host of incidents that officers will no longer respond to, including:

Under the influence calls (alcohol and/or drugs) where there is no other crime in progress 

Person dumping trash

Code 30 Alarm Response (except 211 silent alarm) 

Syringe Disposal, Defecating/Urinating In Public

Drinking in Public; Suspicious circs-possible dead body, where no indication of foul play

Have they never heard of the broken windows policy or quality of life crimes?

That’s where we are under progressive, one-party leadership in the formerly Golden State – don’t call us unless you have a gun in your face, and even then, don’t call unless shots have already been fired. 

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Defund the police, criminal justice reform, no bail – all these progressive fixes have been abject failures as we see our country enter the third-world zone. You read about the cartel shootouts in Mexico – where American tourists are now routinely caught in the crossfire – and you think that might as well have been Chicago, LA or Baltimore; same c**p is going on.

There’s a simple way to solve these problems – hold people accountable for their actions. Somehow, a plethora of American politicians and activists have forgotten that simple rule, and this is what you get.

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