Councilman Joe Buscaino June 7, as a mayoral candidate, just finished speaking to a crowd of about 100 people at a press conference on the Venice Boardwalk when a person experiencing homelessness, reportedly had a knife fall out of their pocket.
Two eyewitnesses, as reported by the Yo! Venice website gave differing accounts of what happened.
Nico Ruderman, who was standing near Buscaino said he was watching the woman, “Angel” who started moving toward the councilman. Ruderman said he noticed she was wielding a 6- to 8-inch knife.
Another witness said it appeared the knife had fallen out of the woman’s overalls, onto the ground, where a member of the audience stepped on the knife so as to keep it away from the woman.
Los Angeles Police Department officers arrested and handcuffed Angel. Other LAPD officers hustled Buscaino out of the immediate vicinity. One of the LAPD members was injured while trying to apprehend the woman and remove the knife from her hand, receiving minor lacerations to his hand.
The woman was detained. It is expected that she could be released on zero bond.
Chris Venn of San Pedro Neighbors for Peace and Justice responded to this incident saying that it didn’t appear as though this woman was going to attack Buscaino. Venn and his group who were protesting at the event in support of the homeless said, “Don’t criminalize our neighbors.”
In a written statement he went on to say, “In CD15 the plight of poor people and their descent into houselessness is being met with weekly sweeps on Beacon Street in San Pedro, Wilmington and Watts. Encampments on Gulch Road, E Street in Wilmington and the intersection of Lomita and McCoy in Harbor City face sweeps every month. Garbage trucks and skip loaders with hydraulic grappling claws destroy tents, individual’s clothing, blankets, I.Ds and important paperwork.”
While the Buscaino press conference was backed up with pre-printed signs saying “Save Us Joe” this sentiment is not mirrored in his own district.
Venn continued, “The problems facing the unhoused communities in CD15 are exacerbated by neglect and those politicians like Joe Buscaino who seek to use the crisis of houselessness as a way to get elected.”
According to the Los Angeles Homeless Service Authority in 2020 (the last year the count was taken) the number of homeless people in Council District 15 finding shelter was only 14.7%.
Clearly Buscaino is using the homeless crisis as an issue to grandstand on to get city-wide recognition while hiding the discontent within his own district.
The criticism in CD15 is that along with the neglect of the unhoused “is the inhumane neglect via the absence of port-a-potties, hand washing stations, dumpsters, trash barrels, drug counseling and mental health care, ”Venn said.