Medics at UCLA Protest Say Police Weapons Drew Blood and Cracked Bones

Published

4 months ago

May 20, 2024

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Inside the protesters’ encampment at UCLA, beneath the glow of hanging flashlights and a deafening backdrop of exploding flash-bangs, OB-GYN resident Elaine Chan suddenly felt like a battlefield medic.

This story also ran on USA Today. It can be republished for free. related coverage from 2020 Less-Lethal Weapons Blind, Maim and Kill. Victims Say Enough Is Enough. Read More We Want to Hear From You

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Police were pushing into the camp after an hours-long standoff. Chan, 31, a medical tent volunteer, said protesters limped in with severe puncture wounds, but there was little hope of getting them to a hospital through the chaos outside. Chan suspects the injuries were caused by rubber bullets or other less lethal projectiles, which police have confirmed were fired at protesters.

It would pierce through skin and gouge deep into peoples bodies, she said. All of them were profusely bleeding. In OB-GYN we dont treat rubber bullets. I couldnt believe that this was allowed to be [done to] civilians students without protective gear.

The UCLA protest, which gathered thousands in opposition to Israels ongoing bombing of Gaza, began in April and grew to a dangerous crescendo this month when counterprotesters and police clashed with the activists and their supporters.

In interviews with KFF Health News, Chan and three other volunteer medics described treating protesters with bleeding wounds, head injuries, and suspected broken bones in a makeshift clinic cobbled together in tents with no electricity or running water. The medical tents were staffed day and night by a rotating team of doctors, nurses, medical students, EMTs, and volunteers with no formal medical training.

At times, the escalating violence outside the tent isolated injured protesters from access to ambulances, the medics said, so the wounded walked to a nearby hospital or were carried beyond the borders of the protest so they could be driven to the emergency room.

Ive never been in a setting where were blocked from getting higher level of care, Chan said. That was terrifying to me. Chan holds some of the items she carried with her at the protest: a headlamp, a tourniquet, a glow stick. She donned scrubs that day with handwritten phone numbers for her emergency contact in case of arrest. (Molly Castle Work/KFF Health News) Volunteer medics said they made do with the materials they had, such as using a chunk of cardboard to splint a protesters sprained ankle. (Elaine Chan) Volunteer medics set up medical tents within and around the encampment at UCLA to support injured protesters.(Elaine Chan)

Three of the medics interviewed by KFF Health News said they were present when police swept the encampment May 2 and described multiple injuries that appeared to have been caused by less lethal projectiles.

Less lethal projectiles including beanbags filled with metal pellets, sponge-tipped rounds, and projectiles commonly known as rubber bullets are used by police to subdue suspects or disperse crowds or protests. Police drew widespread condemnation for using the weapons against Black Lives Matter demonstrations that swept the country after the killing of George Floyd in 2020. Although the name of these weapons downplays their danger, less lethal projectiles can travel upward of 200 mph and have a documented potential to injure, maim, or kill.

The medics interviews directly contradict an account from the Los Angeles Police Department. After police cleared the encampment, LAPD Chief Dominic Choi said in a post on the social platform X that there were no serious injuries to officers or protestors” as police moved in and made more than 200 arrests. Police officers, including some reportedly armed with shotguns loaded with less lethal projectiles, clash with protesters at UCLA. The California Highway Patrol said it would investigate how its officers responded. The footage, filmed by independent journalist Anthony Cabassa, was posted to the social platform X on May 2. (Anthony Cabassa)

In response to questions from KFF Health News, both the LAPD and California Highway Patrol said in emailed statements that they would investigate how their officers responded to the protest. The LAPD statement said the agency was conducting a review of how it responded, which would lead to a detailed report.

The Highway Patrol statement said officers warned the encampment that non-lethal rounds may be used if protesters did not disperse, and after some became an immediate threat by launching objects and weapons, some officers used kinetic specialty rounds to protect themselves, other officers, and members of the public. One officer received minor injuries, according to the statement. Email Sign-Up

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Video footage that circulated online after the protest appeared to show a Highway Patrol officer firing less lethal projectiles at protesters with a shotgun.

The use of force and any incident involving the use of a weapon by CHP personnel is a serious matter, and the CHP will conduct a fair and impartial investigation to ensure that actions were consistent with policy and the law, the Highway Patrol said in its statement.

The UCLA Police Department, which was also involved with the protest response, did not respond to requests for comment.

Jack Fukushima, 28, a UCLA medical student and volunteer medic, said he witnessed a police officer shoot at least two protesters with less lethal projectiles, including a man who collapsed after being hit square in the chest. Fukushima said he and other medics escorted the stunned man to the medical tent then returned to the front lines to look for more injured.

It did really feel like a war, Fukushima said. To be met with such police brutality was so disheartening. Jack Fukushima, a UCLA medical student and volunteer medic, said he saw police shoot at least two protesters with less-lethal projectiles during the encampment raid on May 2, 2024.(Molly Castle Work/KFF Health News)

Back on the front line, police had breached the borders of the encampment and begun to scrum with protesters, Fukushima said. He said he saw the same officer who had fired earlier shoot another protester in the neck.

The protester dropped to the ground. Fukushima assumed the worst and rushed to his side.

I find him, and Im like, Hey, are you OK? Fukushima said. To the point of courage of these undergrads, hes like, Yeah, its not my first time. And then just jumps right back in.

Sonia Raghuram, 27, another medical student stationed in the tent, said that during the police sweep she tended to a protester with an open puncture wound on their back, another with a quarter-sized contusion in the center of their chest, and a third with a gushing cut over their right eye and possible broken rib. Raghuram said patients told her the wounds were caused by police projectiles, which she said matched the severity of their injuries.

The patients made it clear the police officers were closing in on the medical tent, Raghuram said, but she stayed put.

We will never leave a patient, she said, describing the mantra in the medical tent. I dont care if we get arrested. If Im taking care of a patient, thats the thing that comes first. Sonia Raghuram, a UCLA medical student, volunteered as a medic during a pro-Palestinian protest at UCLA, where she treated patients who told her they were wounded by police projectiles.(Molly Castle Work/KFF Health News)

The UCLA protest is one of many that have been held on college campuses across the country as students opposed to Israels ongoing war in Gaza demand universities support a ceasefire or divest from companies tie to Israel. Police have used force to remove protesters at Columbia University, Emory University, and the universities of Arizona, Utah, and South Florida, among others.

At UCLA, student protesters set up a tent encampment on April 25 in a grassy plaza outside the campuss Royce Hall theater, eventually drawing thousands of supporters, according to the Los Angeles Times. Days later, a violent mob of counterprotesters attacked the camp, the Times reported, attempting to tear down barricades along its borders and throwing fireworks at the tents inside.

The following night, police issued an unlawful assembly order, then swept the encampment in the early hours of May 2, clearing tents and arresting hundreds by dawn.

Police have been widely criticized for not intervening as the clash between protesters and counterprotesters dragged on for hours. The University of California system announced it has hired an independent policing consultant to investigate the violence and resolve unanswered questions about UCLAs planning and protocols, as well as the mutual aid response.

Charlotte Austin, 34, a surgery resident, said that as counterprotesters were attacking she also saw about 10 private campus security officers stand by, hands in their pockets, as students were bashed and bloodied.

Austin said she treated patients with cuts to the face and possible skull fractures. The medical tent sent at least 20 people to the hospital that evening, she said.

Any medical professional would describe these as serious injuries, Austin said. There were people who required hospitalization not just a visit to the emergency room but actual hospitalization. Charlotte Austin, a surgery resident in Los Angeles who volunteered as a UCLA medic, says the injuries she witnessed were serious. There were people who required hospitalization not just a visit to the emergency room but actual hospitalization, she says.(Molly Castle Work/KFF Health News)

Police Tactics Lawful but Awful

UCLA protesters are far from the first to be injured by less lethal projectiles.

In recent years, police across the U.S. have repeatedly fired these weapons at protesters, with virtually no overarching standards governing their use or safety. Cities have spent millions to settle lawsuits from the injured. Some of the wounded have never been the same.

During the nationwide protests following the police killing of George Floyd in 2020, at least 60 protesters sustained serious injuries including blinding and a broken jaw from being shot with these projectiles, sometimes in apparent violations of police department policies, according to a joint investigation by KFF Health News and USA Today.

In 2004, in Boston, a college student celebrating a Red Sox victory was killed by a projectile filled with pepper-based irritant when it tore through her eye and into her brain.

Theyre called less lethal for a reason, said Jim Bueermann, a former police chief of Redlands, California, who now leads the Future Policing Institute. They can kill you.

Bueermann, who reviewed video footage of the police response at UCLA at the request of KFF Health News, said the footage shows California Highway Patrol officers firing beanbag rounds from a shotgun. Bueermann said the footage did not provide enough context to determine if the projectiles were being used reasonably, which is a standard established by federal courts, or being fired indiscriminately, which was outlawed by a California law in 2021.

There is a saying in policing lawful but awful meaning that it was reasonable under the legal standards but it looks terrible, Bueermann said. And I think a cop racking multiple rounds into a shotgun, firing into protesters, doesnt look very good.

This article was produced by KFF Health News, which publishes California Healthline, an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation.

[Clarification: This article was updated at 6:50 p.m. ET on May 16, 2024, to clarify that the LAPDs review is focusing only on its own role in the protest response and not that of other law enforcement agencies.] Molly Castle Work: mwork@kff.org, @mollycastlework

Brett Kelman: bkelman@kff.org, @BrettKelman Related Topics California Public Health States Arizona California Florida Georgia Massachusetts New York Utah Contact Us Submit a Story Tip

Entertainment

Artist behind ‘disturbing’ sculpture says it’s not intended to cause upset

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2 hours ago

September 22, 2024

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Artist behind 'disturbing' sculpture says it's not intended to cause upset

The artist who created a sculpture which has been called “disturbing” and “shocking” says he’s been “surprised” at the backlash but welcomes difficult conversations it might inspire.

Jason deCaires Taylor told Sky News: “I don’t strive of my artwork to divide people or cause upset. But I do try to talk about issues that are pertinent and relevant to our current times.”

The 50-year-old artist has a history of producing political work but says this one contained “no political intentions at all” and is based on the painting which inspired Shakespeare‘s tragic heroine Ophelia.

The Alluvia – which is made from recycled glass and steel and features LEDs which light up at night – was installed in the River Stour, in Taylor’s hometown of Canterbury in Kent around a week ago.

However, comments posted on Canterbury City Council’s official Facebook page have included accusations that the work is “tone-deaf” and “offensive”.

One wrote: “I can’t be the only person who finds this deeply offensive. She looks like a drowned woman. How did the council not see the link to women as victims of crime or the sad fact so many drown off the Kent coast as refugees.”

Another said: “I find this sculpture absolutely appalling. It’s not just offensive, it’s downright disturbing. The imagery of a submerged figure, reminiscent of a drowning victim, is both morbid and utterly tone-deaf given the tragic drownings that occur along our coastlines. What on earth were the council thinking?”

Others stood up for the work, with one commenting: “More people seem to be “disturbed”, “offended” and “shocked” by this than they do by images of actual drownings which are happening daily along our coasts. Rather than wasting your hate on an artwork that is designed to provoke, why not put some of that energy into something constructive?”

Another wrote: “It’s a beautiful piece of art and nowhere near as disturbing as the previous sculptures that it has replaced. What kind of world do we live in when anything that offends or “triggers” someone, must be removed??”

The sculpture had replaced two similar female forms, also created by Taylor, which had been in the water since 2008 but which had been damaged due to dredging.

‘If it fosters care and sympathy, that’s good’

Taylor told Sky News: “I was surprised… 99.9% of all the feedback that I’ve received has been very positive… But at the same time, I appreciate everybody takes something different from everything they see.”

While he says there is “no connection” between the work and the ongoing migrant crisis taking place further along the Kent coast, he hopes it could inspire empathy for what’s happening out in the Channel.

He said: “It’s an extremely tragic situation, and I don’t think ignoring it is the solution. If [this work] can foster any kind of care and sympathy for that situation, then I think that’s a good thing.”

More than 21,000 people arrived in the UK in small boats between January and September, according to government figures, with at least 45 people dying in Channel crossings this year.

Taylor also said the fact the subject is a young woman is because it draws reference from Sir John Everett Millais’s celebrated painting, on display at Tate Britain.

‘Art without questions is pointless’

Some of Taylor’s past sculptures have raised issues around the climate crisis, Brexit and the plight of those risking their lives on the perilous migration route from West Africa to Spain.

Taylor says: “Art should ask questions. They should make people think about things that should elicit emotions, that’s really critical.

“If things were ignored and if you tried to please everybody with all your artwork, I think you’d make something very benign and quite frankly, pretty pointless.”

He also feels our age of information overload could be part of the reason for the negative feedback.

“We’re so inundated with images and media, with having our phones interrupting us and screens everywhere we look that people look for divisiveness and things that cause clickbait. I think there is an element of people sort of seeking out controversy.”

Taylor said the majority of negative comments online had come from people who had not been to Canterbury and seen the work in real life, with one call for the statue’s removal coming all the way from Orkney.

Responding directly to calls for his work to be taken out of the river, he said: “People are perfectly in their rights to have [an] opinion. But I would urge them to go and see it first.”

‘A dead body doesn’t light up at night’

Chair of Canterbury Commemoration Society Stewart Ross, the charity that commissioned the work, told Sky News: “Some people find it offensive and shocking, we have no objection to that. All public art is open to discussion”.

Comparing calls for the work to be removed to the destruction of art during the Reformation, he said: “I feel strongly about this [call for censorship]. It’s what the Taliban do. If you don’t like it, don’t look.”

Mr Ross said the “confected anger” around the sculpture was “unnecessary” and that the charity was simply “trying to do its best,” adding: “People have been comparing it to a dead body, but I have yet to meet a dead body that lights up in the night”.

Taylor, who has been working as an artist for over 25 years, has sculptures in marine locations around the world including Australia, Mexico, Grenada and Norway. Prices for his sculptures start at around £1,300.

He first donated the two original Alluvia figures to the city of Canterbury in 2008.

Technology

Middle Eastern funds are plowing billions of dollars into hottest AI start-ups

Published

2 hours ago

September 22, 2024

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Middle Eastern funds are plowing billions of dollars into hottest AI start-ups

Sovereign wealth funds out of the Middle East are emerging as key backers of Silicon Valley’s artificial intelligence darlings.

Oil-rich nations like Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar have been looking to diversify their economies, and are turning to tech investments as a hedge. In the past year, funding for AI companies by Middle-Eastern sovereigns has increased fivefold, according to data from Pitchbook.

MGX, a new AI fund out of The United Arab Emirates, was among investors looking to get a slice of OpenAI’s latest fundraise this week, two sources told CNBC. The round is set to value OpenAI at $150 billion, said the people, who asked not to be named because the discussions are confidential.

Few venture funds have deep enough pockets to compete with the multibillion-dollar checks coming from the likes of Microsoft and Amazon. But these sovereign funds have no problem coming up with cash for AI deals. They invest on behalf of their governments, which have been helped by rising energy prices in recent years. The Gulf Cooperation Council, or GCC, countries’ total wealth is expected to rise from $2.7 trillion to $3.5 trillion by 2026, according to Goldman Sachs.

The Saudi Public Investment Fund, or PIF, has topped $925 billion, and has been on an investing spree as part of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s “Vision 2030” initiative. The PIF has investments in companies including Uber, while also spending heavily on the LIV golf league and professional soccer.

UAE’s Mubadala has $302 billion under management, and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority has $1 trillion under management. Qatar Investment Authority has $475 billion, while Kuwait’s fund has topped $800 billion.

Earlier this week, Abu Dhabi-based MGX joined a partnership on AI infrastructure with BlackRock, Microsoft and Global Infrastructure Partners, aiming to raise as much as $100 billion for data centers and other infrastructure investments. MGX was launched as a dedicated AI fund in March, with Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala and AI firm G42 as founding partners.

UAE’s Mubadala has also invested in OpenAI rival Anthropic, and is among the most active venture investors, with eight AI deals in the past four years, according to Pitchbook. Anthropic ruled out taking money from the Saudis in its last funding round, citing national security, sources told CNBC.

Saudi Arabia’s PIF is in talks to create a $40 billion partnership with U.S. venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. It also launched a dedicated AI fund called the Saudi Company for Artificial Intelligence, or SCAI.

Still, the kingdom’s human rights record remains an issue for some Western partners and start-ups. The most notable case in recent years was the alleged killing of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018, an event that triggered international backlash in the business community.

It’s not just the Middle East spraying money into the space. French sovereign fund Bpifrance has inked 161 AI and machine learning deals in the past four years, while Temasek out of Singapore has completed 47, according to Pitchbook. GIC, another Singapore-backed fund, has completed 24 deals.

The flood of cash has some Silicon Valley investors worried about a SoftBank effect, referring to Masayoshi Son’s Vision Fund. SoftBank notably backed Uber and WeWork, pushing the companies to sky-high, valuations before going public. WeWork spiraled into bankruptcy last year after being valued by SoftBank at $47 billion in 2019.

For the U.S., having sovereign wealth funds invest in American companies, and not in global adversaries like China, has been a geopolitical priority. Jared Cohen of Goldman Sachs Global Institute said there’s a disproportionate amount of capital coming from nations like Saudi Arabia and UAE, and a willingness to deploy it around the world. He described them as “geopolitical swing states.”

WATCH: OpenAI is the indisputable leader in AI supercycle

UK

Ex-Harrods director reveals how ‘paranoid’ Mohamed al Fayed created toxic culture at store

Published

2 hours ago

September 22, 2024

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Ex-Harrods director reveals how 'paranoid' Mohamed al Fayed created toxic culture at store

A former Harrods director told Sky News he does not see how security at the department store “wouldn’t have known” about Mohamed al Fayed’s behaviour towards women.

Five women have alleged they were raped by Fayed, who died last year at the age of 94, with several others alleging sexual misconduct.

A legal team representing alleged victims confirmed on Saturday morning they have “had over 150 new inquiries” since the airing of a BBC documentary on Fayed.

The Harrods’ ex-director, who reported directly to Fayed, said: “There was security everywhere, all the phones and offices were bugged, with cameras everywhere.

“I just put it down to paranoia, wanting to know he was getting his pound of flesh from us. The nature of the man was to set everyone against each other, to set directors against each other.

“Whether Fayed’s own offices or stuff had surveillance, I wouldn’t know. But to get into his suite of offices you had to have an appointment, PAs had to arrange it, it was very secure.”

He added: “The only thing I was aware of was that someone said he had lots of PAs and they were all blondes. I thought that he just wanted to surround himself with pretty women.”

The former director, who spoke to Sky News on the condition of anonymity, said the culture at Harrods was toxic.

“It was very much keep your head down, no one helped each other. It wasn’t a team as you knew Fayed was trying to catch everyone out.

“He was always trying to make fun of people in front of others, which he thought was very funny.”

Harrods said in a statement on Thursday it was “utterly appalled” by the allegations of abuse and apologised to Fayed’s alleged victims.

The department store has also set up a page on its website inviting former employees to come forward if they have allegations.

Meanwhile, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has defended Sir Keir Starmer after it emerged the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) declined to bring charges against Fayed while the prime minister was director of public prosecutions.

The CPS considered bringing charges against the former Harrods chairman in 2009 and 2015 but concluded there was not “a realistic prospect of a conviction”.

The minister told Sky News that tackling violence against women was a “personal priority” while Sir Keir was head of the CPS as director of public prosecutions between 2008 and 2013.

“I don’t know the details of what happened in 2009, there sometimes can be issues with the evidence that’s presented by the police, whether that can lead to a conviction,” Ms Phillipson said.

“The first time that I ever knew who Keir Starmer was when I saw him on television as director of public prosecutions, talking about the personal priority that he attached to tackling violence against women and girls, so he’s got a personal commitment to it.

“He turned the CPS around while he was leading it to focus on that. But, clearly, if there have been issues that should be considered, that should happen.”

A Downing Street spokesperson said Sir Keir did not handle Fayed’s case, adding it “did not cross his desk”.

The CPS also provided early investigative advice to the Metropolitan Police in 2018, 2021 and 2023 following allegations made against Fayed.

However, a full file of evidence was never received by the CPS in each of these instances and they were given no further action by police.

Former Victims’ Commissioner Dame Vera Baird accused the CPS of only taking “cases they could win”, saying the organisation was “a den of negativity for all sexual offence allegations and for the people who made them”.

She told Sky News: “They have always been valued for the proportion of cases they win. So you do 20 [cases] and you [win] 15 – 75%, that’s good. But if you only do 10 because 10 are really, really safe, then you get nine of them – that is a super rate of conviction.

“Their interest mitigated for all of that time against the interests of people who severely needed to have the help of the criminal justice system to get over the awful way that they were treated by their assailants. And now it’s very clear that Mr Fayed was one of those.“

She also said the CPS’s treatment of women may have affected its decision to not take charges against Fayed.

“Women who come forward with complaints of this kind are underestimated and undervalued, and to some extent seen as a liability who [is] likely to be volatile or emotionally not very well, largely because of the way they’ve been treated,” she said.

But Dame Vera defended Sir Keir for his “ahead of the game” approach to violence against women while he was director of public prosecutions.

“They were doing their best and for instance, the CPS was the first ever government organisation to have a violence against women and girls strategy.

“Keir initiated a report by a very highly-regarded lawyer about how the CPS should systematically get away from the myths about prosecution and about sex offences, that it impeded them from taking cases forward. That was a very strong thing to do.”