University police issued a call for mutual aid Wednesday night, bringing officers from the Los Angeles Police Department and the California Highway Patrol to campus as pro-Palestinian protesters occupied and blocked the Student Services Building at California State University, Los Angeles.
But while police prepared to enter the building and remove protesters, top university officials never gave them permission to move in, according to two law enforcement sources with knowledge of the incident.
Around 9 p.m., The Times saw police stationed at the university’s public safety station, not far from the student services building.
Two law enforcement sources said officers from the Los Angeles Police Department and the Centers for Health Protection remained there before eventually leaving. At some point during the night, protesters scrawled pro-Palestinian slogans on the windows. A video from ABC7 showed glass doors shattered, cubicles ransacked and people pushing photocopiers out of the building.
It’s unclear why police failed to take action.
On Friday, university spokesman Erik Frost Hollins said law enforcement sources had an incorrect understanding of the series of events but would not elaborate to avoid revealing tactical information.
University officials instructed staff inside the eight-story building to shelter in place after 50 to 100 protesters entered around 4 p.m. Wednesday, according to Frost Hollins.
About 60 staff members were inside for about two hours before security personnel established an exit route. Many left, but about a dozen stayed voluntarily, including Cal State Los Angeles Chancellor Berenecea Johnson Eanes, whose office is in the building.
At around 5 p.m., pro-Palestinian student groups posted on social media that Ines said she would negotiate with them. Later, they issued a post claiming she failed to follow up.
Most protesters left voluntarily by 1 a.m. Thursday, university officials said. University police who entered that morning found only a handful of people inside, law enforcement sources said.
Enes said in a statement released Thursday that university officials have been in “ongoing formal and informal communication” with members of the pro-Palestinian encampment that have been on campus for more than a month.
“As long as the camp remains nonviolent, I commit the university to continued dialogue,” she wrote.
Damage to the building will impact student services, including “admissions, records, accessible technology, basic needs, freshman and family engagement, Dreamer resources and educational opportunity programs,” she said.
Those involved in the destruction will be “held accountable,” she wrote, adding: “The camp has crossed a line. Those in the camp must leave.”
The pro-Palestinian group said in a press release Thursday that Ines “refuses to continue negotiations or make meaningful progress toward meeting the student group’s demands. This is patently dishonest after the commuter campus delayed negotiations until the end of the spring semester.” The behavior is also the practice of trying to wait for students rather than actively working to reach an agreement.
Among other things, the groups demanded that the university divest from defense companies, remove law enforcement from campus, and issue a statement supporting an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
They stressed that university administrators were free to leave the building after the takeover on Wednesday night “and were escorted out if they wished, which has been communicated multiple times both directly and on Instagram.”
On a nearly deserted campus on Friday, the Student Services Building was cordoned off and security personnel milled in front of the building.
The camp is the main hub of activity, with a perimeter solidly constructed of crates and construction mesh, as well as pro-Palestinian signs declaring the area a “liberated zone” and demanding “give up tuition fees instead of bombs.”
A woman who said she was a UCLA student and asked not to be named sat in a welcome tent outside the camp. After Ians last night declared protesters had “crossed a line”, she said she didn’t know what would happen next for the group.
“We are ready for anything,” she said.
She said she believed Ians was confusing those who committed acts of vandalism at the student center with protesters at the encampment. She said they had no plans to disband despite the president’s warnings.
“We will stay here until the president meets our demands,” she said, adding that Eins had been too slow to negotiate with the group.
