Several protesters burned an American flag. Others lighted paper models of pigs aflame and stomped them out on the ground. Within a minute of the flag s being burned, one LAPD officer began firing rubber bullets into the crowd. Twenty officers mounted on horses quickly advanced, swinging batons, flanked by police on foot who fired concussion grenades and volleys of rubber bullets. Protesters retreated down First Street, some throwing whatever they could find, a few sticks and glass bottles, but largely empty plastic water bottles, at the riot-clad police officers.
Several eyewitness accounts, however, contradict the official story.
No one threw anything at a cop, says one protester, who identified himself as Max. We were destroying things that we made, and for some reason that threatened them. Another protester, who asked not to be named, agrees. I saw the first shot, he says. People were talking shit to the cops, but the attack was not provoked.