A year ago tensions between the press and police erupted in Los Angeles

A year ago tensions between the press and police erupted in Los Angeles

　　Transcript¹

　　At a homeless encampment, police cracked down on protesters and journalists. Press advocates say that night of chaos² was the capstone on tensions that had been building for years.

　　RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

　　About 200 journalists were detained or arrested over the past two years while on the job here in the U.S. Many were covering social justice protests following the murder of George Floyd. NPR's David Folkenflik and Marc Rivers report on how tensions between police and the press erupted on one chaotic³ night in Los Angeles a year ago today. And a warning - you will hear the sound of rubber bullets being fired in this piece. Here's Marc.

　　MARC RIVERS, BYLINE⁴: Activists⁵ gathered at Echo Park almost as soon as the story broke late last March.

　　(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

　　UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Breaking news. It appears the crackdown has finally begun tonight to clean up one of LA's largest homeless camps.

　　RIVERS: Over the course of a day and a half, protests picked up steam...

　　(SOUNDBITE OF PROTEST)

　　RIVERS: ...Much of it directed at police, who had orders to clear the park and then the streets.

　　(SOUNDBITE OF PROTEST)

　　UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTER: (Chanting) LAPD.

　　UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS: (Chanting) You won't win.

　　UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTER: (Chanting) LAPD.

　　RIVERS: Lexis-Olivier Ray was among the reporters who rushed to Echo Park. He's with the local site, LA Taco. We recently revisited the scene with Ray and other reporters.

　　LEXIS-OLIVIER RAY: That was kind of my beat - housing, homelessness, cops, the intersection⁷ of all three. It was, like, one of the most covered events, stories that I've ever reported on, for sure.

　　DAVID FOLKENFLIK, BYLINE: Police tried to direct reporters to a staging ground outside the park and away from the most intense protests. Kate Cagle is a reporter for Spectrum⁸ News 1 in LA.

　　KATE CAGLE: How do I tell a story that now I don't even have access to?

　　FOLKENFLIK: Many of the nearly 200 people at the encampment did not want to leave, despite promises of housing and other social services. Reporters came to capture what happened when police swept the camp and to cover the protests, but they got caught in the middle. Officers hauled Cagle off moments before she was to go on the air.

　　(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

　　CAGLE: Wait. I'm with Spectrum News 1. They have my name. Wait. I have to stay with my crew.

　　I have a clip of me holding up my press pass next to my face, saying, like, hey, I'm press. This is my crew. We just want to go. And they said, no, you have to stay.

　　RIVERS: Police officers zip-tied Cagle's hands behind her back. A reporter who covers criminal justice for the LA Times was held that same way for more than an hour. Lexis-Olivier Ray was confined for even longer. In all, police detained about 200 people there, but at least 16 journalists.

　　FOLKENFLIK: And that's more than a quarter of all journalists detained or arrested across the nation last year. Officers formally arrested two other reporters and a social media news blogger, holding them at a police station. Police also shot two photojournalists at Echo Park with what are called less-lethal rubber bullets. One has covered combat for the LA Times; the other, a freelancer⁹, was hit twice.

　　(SOUNDBITE OF GUNFIRE)

　　FOLKENFLIK: Those shots left a bloody¹⁰ welt the size of a baseball. Adam Rose chairs the press rights committee for the LA Press Club.

　　ADAM ROSE: These are things that would chill what we would consider part of this constitutional right and the need - not just a right, but a responsibility - to inform the public of how police were executing these sweeps and clearing out what they declared as unlawful assemblies.

　　(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

　　UNIDENTIFIED OFFICER: Back up. Back up. All of you, back the [expletive] up.

　　RIVERS: Officers gave the order to disperse¹¹, but journalists didn't realize it applied¹² to them. Rose started tracking allegations of police mistreatment of the press in September 2020. That's when LA County sheriff's deputies tackled KPCC reporter Josie Huang as she taped them making an arrest. They arrested her, too, even though she repeatedly identified herself as a reporter.

　　FOLKENFLIK: Rose found a pattern around the state - reporters detained and handcuffed, shot with rubber bullets, tear-gassed, their equipment seized or destroyed - in all, reporters prevented from reporting.

　　ROSE: In fact, it turns out that over the course of a 12-month period in California, there were at least 50 incidents where police violated the rights of members of the press in some way, shape or form.

　　FOLKENFLIK: During protests or riots, officers have often let reporters behind police lines to witness events. At the least, it's a guarded recognition of the job journalists do. At Echo Park, that recognition collapsed¹³.

　　STACY SPELL: I mean, there were, like, tensions on top of tensions.

　　FOLKENFLIK: Captain Stacy Spell heads the Los Angeles Police Department's media relations division. Spell and other LAPD officials will not comment directly on that night in Echo Park due to legal challenges.

　　RIVERS: Even so, Spell says police officers face tough choices in handling reporters during protests.

　　SPELL: I want to make sure that people, if they want to gather stories, if they want to inform the public, that they have the ability to do that.

　　RIVERS: Of course, anyone with a smartphone can post footage online.

　　SPELL: When you have those, for lack of a better term, bad actors who are now blending in with a crowd, you know, representing themselves as members of the press, but they're really reflecting their own personal interests and not the interests of either a news organization or the interests of the public.

　　RIVERS: Ray asked why the police get to make such distinctions. Ray doesn't have an official LAPD press badge, never applied for one. And when we met, he wore a red baseball cap with an LA Taco logo perched atop his afro.

　　RAY: A lot of times, it feels like the cops don't believe that I'm a reporter, you know? They think that I'm a protester. And I think that definitely has a lot to do with my appearance, you know, not just, like, the color of my skin but also the way I dress and, you know, kind of carry myself.

　　FOLKENFLIK: A May 2021 internal police memo¹⁴ said Ray's conduct at protests, quote, "blurs¹⁵ the lines between functioning as the press versus¹⁶ functioning as an activist⁶." The memo provided no evidence for that characterization.

　　RAY: Oh, it's completely false.

　　(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

　　UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Start the car. Start the car.

　　FOLKENFLIK: When celebrations over the LA Dodgers¹⁷ World Series championship got out of hand months earlier, police officers rushed Ray.

　　(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

　　RAY: I'm a member of the press - member of the press.

　　(CROSSTALK)

　　FOLKENFLIK: That's Ray shouting repeatedly, member of the press.

　　RAY: I've never even been to a protest as a protester. I don't consider myself to be a protester. That was really frustrating¹⁸ - really rubbed me the wrong way.

　　RIVERS: Captain Spell is himself Black, and he later called Ray to talk, seeking to build trust. Ray says he appreciated that but remains¹⁹ shaken.

　　RAY: Leaving the house was, at some points, like, a little bit scary for me, for sure, and took a while to get over that, I think.

　　RIVERS: Ray says he carries himself differently now. He's more guarded. Spectrum News' Kate Cagle says she had always thought her professionalism would be respected and protected by cops in times of tumult²⁰. But not anymore.

　　CAGLE: When I saw the police officers, I no longer felt like they were providing safety for me.

　　RIVERS: That they would take care of you.

　　CAGLE: That they would take care of me. I felt like we're on our own.

　　FOLKENFLIK: In 2020, California Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill giving reporters more protections after law enforcement officials objected. Last fall, Newsom reversed course and signed a similar bill into law. Journalists say they're heartened but remain wary²¹, with strong memories of Echo Park.

　　I'm David Folkenflik.

　　RIVERS: And I'm Marc Rivers, NPR News, Los Angeles.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 chaos   

n.混乱，无秩序

参考例句：

• After the failure of electricity supply the city was in chaos.停电后，城市一片混乱。
• The typhoon left chaos behind it.台风后一片混乱。

3 chaotic   

adj.混沌的，一片混乱的，一团糟的

参考例句：

• Things have been getting chaotic in the office recently.最近办公室的情况越来越乱了。
• The traffic in the city was chaotic.这城市的交通糟透了。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 activist   

n.活动分子，积极分子

参考例句：

• He's been a trade union activist for many years.多年来他一直是工会的积极分子。
• He is a social activist in our factory.他是我厂的社会活动积极分子。

7 intersection   

n.交集，十字路口，交叉点；[计算机] 交集

参考例句：

• There is a stop sign at an intersection.在交叉路口处有停车标志。
• Bridges are used to avoid the intersection of a railway and a highway.桥用来避免铁路和公路直接交叉。

8 spectrum   

n.谱，光谱，频谱；范围，幅度，系列

参考例句：

• This is a kind of atomic spectrum.这是一种原子光谱。
• We have known much of the constitution of the solar spectrum.关于太阳光谱的构成，我们已了解不少。

9 freelancer   

n.自由职业者

参考例句：

• He has great interest in working as a freelancer.他对做个自由职业人很感兴趣。
• It's not always easy to make it as a freelancer.做个自由职业人，要能时常感觉满足，可不容易。

10 bloody   

adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染

参考例句：

• He got a bloody nose in the fight.他在打斗中被打得鼻子流血。
• He is a bloody fool.他是一个十足的笨蛋。

11 disperse   

vi.使分散；使消失；vt.分散；驱散

参考例句：

• The cattle were swinging their tails to disperse the flies.那些牛甩动着尾巴驱赶苍蝇。
• The children disperse for the holidays.孩子们放假了。

12 applied   

adj.应用的；v.应用，适用

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• This cream is best applied to the face at night.这种乳霜最好晚上擦脸用。

13 collapsed   

adj.倒塌的

参考例句：

• Jack collapsed in agony on the floor. 杰克十分痛苦地瘫倒在地板上。
• The roof collapsed under the weight of snow. 房顶在雪的重压下突然坍塌下来。

14 memo   

n.照会，备忘录；便笺；通知书；规章

参考例句：

• Do you want me to send the memo out?您要我把这份备忘录分发出去吗？
• Can you type a memo for me?您能帮我打一份备忘录吗？

15 blurs   

n.模糊( blur的名词复数 )；模糊之物；（移动的）模糊形状；模糊的记忆v.（使）变模糊( blur的第三人称单数 )；（使）难以区分

参考例句：

• The electron clouds are clearly visible as blurs surrounding the invisible nuclei. 电子云就象环绕着看不见的核的一片云雾。 来自辞典例句
• The letter had many blots and blurs. 信上有许多墨水渍和污迹。 来自辞典例句

16 versus   

prep.以…为对手，对；与…相比之下

参考例句：

• The big match tonight is England versus Spain.今晚的大赛是英格兰对西班牙。
• The most exciting game was Harvard versus Yale.最富紧张刺激的球赛是哈佛队对耶鲁队。

17 dodgers   

n.躲闪者，欺瞒者( dodger的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a crackdown on fare dodgers on trains 对火车逃票者的严厉打击
• But Twain, Howells, and James were jeeringly described by Mencken as "draft-dodgers". 不过吐温、豪威尔斯和詹姆斯都是被门肯讥诮地叫做“逃避兵役的人。” 来自辞典例句

18 frustrating   

adj.产生挫折的，使人沮丧的，令人泄气的v.使不成功( frustrate的现在分词 )；挫败；使受挫折；令人沮丧

参考例句：

• It's frustrating to have to wait so long. 要等这么长时间，真令人懊恼。
• It was a demeaning and ultimately frustrating experience. 那是一次有失颜面并且令人沮丧至极的经历。 来自《简明英汉词典》

19 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

20 tumult   

n.喧哗；激动，混乱；吵闹

参考例句：

• The tumult in the streets awakened everyone in the house.街上的喧哗吵醒了屋子里的每一个人。
• His voice disappeared under growing tumult.他的声音消失在越来越响的喧哗声中。

21 wary   

adj.谨慎的，机警的，小心的

参考例句：

• He is wary of telling secrets to others.他谨防向他人泄露秘密。
• Paula frowned,suddenly wary.宝拉皱了皱眉头，突然警惕起来。