Photojournalist struck with baton, detained amid LA immigration protest

Freelance photojournalist Sean Beckner-Carmitchel was pushed, struck with a baton and detained by police while documenting anti-deportation protests in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025. He was ultimately released without being charged.

Protests in LA began in early June in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. Raids at Home Depots in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a July 11 court order temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.

On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating a court order protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.

In a declaration filed in connection with a Los Angeles Press Club lawsuit against the city, Beckner-Carmitchel said he covered the protest and subsequent march, and was carrying a professional camera and had his press credential on a lanyard attached to his pants.

He wrote that approximately 100 demonstrators gathered outside the detention center and protested “in a spirited, non-violent way.”

“At some point, I saw the LAPD officers form a line in the street in front of the MDC and start screaming at the protesters to ‘Move back’ as officers marched with their batons drawn,” Beckner-Carmitchel wrote. “As the LAPD line moved toward the protesters, I saw officers shove quite a few people to the ground. I did not hear any instructions for media. I saw LAPD officers strike multiple journalists with batons, and shove and push journalists in the street in a span of a few minutes.”

During a pause in the officers’ advance, Beckner-Carmitchel wrote that he approached the police line and asked to speak to a supervisor or public affairs officer, but was told to move back. He tried again, saying that he wanted to remind them of the penal code that protects journalists covering protests, given that multiple members of the press had already gotten hurt.

“An LAPD officer responded by shoving me and hitting me in my ribs on my left side with his baton. I still have sore ribs a day later and a small bruise,” he wrote.

The use of force continued for nearly an hour before officers formed a kettle, a tactic used to surround and control a crowd, around a small group of journalists and demonstrators.

Beckner-Carmitchel asked for a supervisor or public information office nearly a dozen times and was cuffed while live on YouTube, with an officer telling him he could “bitch” however he wanted. He was held for one to two hours, he wrote, and when asked for his identifying information, he “pointedly told the officer that my ID was in my wallet in my right pocket, beneath my press pass.”

He was then given a card that read, “Detained during an illegal assembly. Failed to disperse after multiple dispersal orders.” A lieutenant eventually approached him to ask if he was media and, when he said yes, to show her his press credentials.

“Lt. Stelter lectured me and the other journalists who had been detained that we were at fault because we stayed in the crowd of protesters,” Beckner-Carmitchel wrote, adding that he was released without charges. “When I was in the process of being uncuffed and allowed to leave, I began filming again, and an officer told me I was still under detainment and was not permitted to film.”

Two journalists without physical press badges were taken to a police station and later released.

The LAPD did not respond to an emailed request for additional comment. In a statement posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”

“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it continued. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”

Beckner-Carmitchel disputed the department’s characterization of the protest. “From my vantage point, I did not see the protesters act violently or throw anything at officers when the officers arrived,” he wrote in his declaration. “I did not hear any declaration of an unlawful assembly or dispersal order at this point. As the LAPD line moved toward the protesters, I saw officers shove quite a few people to the ground.”

The LA Press Club filed a motion Aug. 13 to hold the city of Los Angeles in contempt for violating the temporary restraining order it had obtained as part of its lawsuit, citing the Aug. 8 assaults and detentions of Beckner-Carmitchel and other members of the press.

“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”

In an Aug. 14 post on social media, Beckner-Carmitchel wrote that he had been diagnosed with a rib fracture, likely as a result of being struck with a baton on Aug. 8.

“It hurts a *lot* and I pride myself on being a pretty tough soldier in the journalism industry. But I’ll likely be out of commission for at least a few days,” he wrote. “Extremely frustrating that there are things I could be writing about, photographing or filming and instead I’ll be sitting on my couch.”