"Reporters say they were struck with less-lethal rounds fired by law enforcement. Advocates worry it will inhibit vital journalism."
"Sergio Olmos has covered hundreds of days of protests in his career as a journalist. He estimates he’s been hit dozens of times by what are known as less-lethal rounds — a broad category that includes rubber bullets, plastic bullets and pepper balls. Still, he says he’s never seen police so trigger-happy with these munitions.
“It was the most amount of less-lethals I’ve seen used in a single day protest,” he told The Washington Post, regarding law-enforcement responses to Sunday’s protests in Los Angeles against immigration raids in the area.
So, it wasn’t a surprise when a Los Angeles Police Department officer shot what he believes to be a 40mm sponge grenade into his torso. “I got hit in the chest and it’s a moment of, ‘What the f---?’” he said in an interview Monday. “And then I was like, ‘Oh, f---, that hurt.’” He put his camera down momentarily, to check that he was okay.
Olmos, 35, an investigative reporter for the nonprofit news organization CalMatters, was in the protest crowd shooting video on his iPhone. He was at the intersection of East Temple and North Alameda streets, just blocks from a complex of federal buildings, when police shot into the crowd and hit him. In a video posted on X and provided to The Post, an LAPD officer appears to raise his firearm and point it at the crowd. When Olmos is hit, he drops his phone momentarily."
Scott Nover and Jeremy Barr report for the Washington Post June 9, 2025.
Advertisement 
