USA: The official Black Lives Matter chapter of Los Angeles conducted a “Smash and Grab” event on Thursday, raising concerns in the community as Los Angeles is struck with a string of damaging “smash and grab” robberies targeting businesses.
The event was supposedly merely intended as a political protest to “smash white capitalism” and “grab justice,” but its connotations with recent robberies in California are hard to ignore.
The demonstration shut down Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills for two hours on Thursday, with community residents already admitting to arming themselves amid a rise in Black Lives Matter riot and criminal activity in the area. BLM has taken to identifying Beverly Hills as a “conservative” and white area, despite the left-wing political inclinations of many of the “progressive” celebrities that live there.
“Today is a smash and grab. It is a different kind of smash and grab — don’t nobody go and grab Gucci purses, ok? We are smashing white capitalism and we are grabbing some justice. We are smashing and grabbing in the name of our people — we know that every year, the reason we do this is because our people are killed by white capitalism,” said Melina Abdullah, co-founder of the Black Lives Matter Los Angeles chapter, at the event.
The Los Angeles Police Department arrested 14 youths earlier this month for alleged involvement in smash and grab robberies across the county, accusing them of stealing more than $330,000 from retail stores in organized and sophisticated criminal fashion.
Los Angeles police union officials have begin to dissuade tourists from visiting the city, citing the rapidly rising levels of crime and lawlessness and frankly admitting law enforcement has been stripped of the capacity and will to arrest repeat offenders terrorizing the public. Scenes of the city’s streets are closely reminiscent of a third world country, with the authorities nowhere to be seen as homeless drug users seize entire city sidewalks.
