santa ana

A young protester gripped at the collar of his shirt, a desperate attempt to keep his airway clear as a Department of Homeland Security agent dragged him into a federal building in Santa Ana Friday, according to a statement he released to a social justice organization.

The protester, a 21-year-old who asked to only be identified as K, had been hit by a nonlethal round fired by an agent only feet away. He saw his blood pooling beneath him – “dark and thick,” and wider than his head.

K pleaded with agents to call an ambulance, he said in the statement. Instead, the agents taunted him, “laughing at the fact that I would never get to see out of my left eye again,” he said.

Rue El Amar, a friend of K’s, read the statement on his behalf during a press conference Tuesday, held by Dare to Struggle, a social justice organization that K is involved with, in front of the Santa Ana city jail.

Demonstrators had gathered in front of federal offices in Santa Ana Friday to protest the fatal shooting in Minnesota of Renee Good. K was injured and another protester, Skye Jones, was taken into custody.

Video footage of the incident shows three agents approaching the group before one agent tries to take a young person into custody, prompting at least three demonstrators to try to intervene.

The video then shows at least one agent firing nonlethal rounds at the crowd, before aiming and shooting a protester in the face. K drops to the ground after being shot, holding his face as the crowd retreats.

K remained in the hospital as of Tuesday afternoon, as they await a police report that can identify what type of metal was in the rounds used. His doctors are concerned about neurotoxins from the bullet, he said.

Rue El Amar holds a sign during a press conference about a young protester who was left blind in one eye after a Department of Homeland Security agent fired a less-lethal round at demonstrators.

(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)

“I pleaded with him, call an ambulance,” El Amar read. “I thought I was going to bleed out on the floor of the federal building with the DHS officer holding my head down to the ground like a trophy.”

K is now completely blind in his left eye, his tear duct was destroyed and the “flaps of my eye are barely holding on,” he said. Doctors found pieces of plastic and glass in his skull as well as metal in his stomach lining, and “pulled a piece of plastic the size of a nickel from my eye,” he said.

A piece of metal is lodged only millimeters from his carotid artery, which could have killed him. Doctors were unable to remove some of the shrapnel from his skull and he “will have to live with metal pieces there for the rest of my life,” he said.

“I focused on the voices of the people, the voices of my friends and comrades, I believe that’s what kept me alive, hearing them continue the fight despite how aggressive our oppressors were,” K said.

Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary with the Department of Homeland Security, previously told The Times that a “mob of 60 rioters threw rocks, bottles and fireworks at law enforcement officers outside of the federal building.”

A spokesperson for the Santa Ana Police Department said the only violence they were aware of that night were demonstrators tossing orange cones at the agents.

Connor Atwood, a member of Dare to Struggle who was present during the incident, said he didn’t witness bottles or rocks being thrown toward agents. Some firecrackers were set off near the sidewalk but away from the building entrance, he said.

Jones, who also spoke during the press conference, was arrested during the incident and held for nearly three days until being released yesterday, they said during the press conference. Jones said they weren’t told the charges against them until the morning of their release.

Jones said they hope Friday’s incident makes people “open their eyes” to the violence committed by immigration against against “innocent civilians who are just trying to protect their neighbors and friends,” they said.

“When confronting those who enforce ICE terror, they will snatch us out of a crowd. They will shoot us point blank with pepper ball bullets, and they will throw us to the ground,” Jones said. “Repression is inevitable when demanding justice, so we must not cower at it.”

Staff Writer Ruben Vives contributed to this report.

My name is Jon Halperin. I booked and managed Chain Reaction from 2000 to 2006. It started by accident while I was running a one-person record label. I went to the club to see the band Melee perform and the prior talent buyer for the club had just quit that day. I told owner Tim Hill I’d do it (having only booked three shows ever at a coffee shop). We slept on it, and I was hired the next day.

I joined Ron Martinez (of Final Conflict). He was booking the punk and hardcore shows. I booked the indie, ska, emo, screamo and pop punk stuff. We made a great team. Best work-wife ever.

Story time. My friend Ikey Owens (RIP) hit me up and told me that he and the guys from At the Drive In were going to be starting a new band. I’d booked Defacto (their dub project) before, and we agreed to throw them on a show and just bill it as “Defacto.” There were maybe 200 people there to see the first show for a band that would soon be known as the Mars Volta.

That wasn’t out of the ordinary. Chain Reaction had many artists grace that stage that went on to bigger things: Death Cab for Cutie, Avenged Sevenfold, Maroon 5, Fall Out Boy, Panic at the Disco, Taking Back Sunday, Pierce the Veil, My Morning Jacket. The list goes on and on.

Jon Halperin, who booked Chain Reaction from 2000 to 2006, stands in front of the club during its heyday.

(From Jon Halperin)

I used to make a deal with the kids. Buy a ticket to “X” show, and if you didn’t like the band, I’d refund you. I never had to. I knew my audience and they trusted my curation of the room. … It was by the kids, for the kids, except I was 30 at the time. I had to think like a teenager. My friend Brian once called me “Peter Pan.”

Halfway through my reign, social media became a thing. There was Friendster and a bit later MySpace. YouTube stated just a few years after. But those first few years of me at the venue, it was word of mouth. It was paper fliers dropped off at coffee shops and record stores. It was the flier in the venue window. It was Mean Street Magazine and Skratch Magazine.

I’d tease the press when they wanted to review a show. If you don’t show up with a pen and paper, you aren’t getting in (sorry, Kelli).

Most music industry went to the Los Angeles show, but smart industry came to us. Countless acts got signed following their shows. You’d often see the band meeting with a label in the parking lot near their tour van.

It was a dry room when I was there. No booze or weed whatsoever. We made only one exception to the weed rule. An artist in a band with Crohn’s disease who traveled with a nurse. Not saying bands didn’t drink backstage, on stage, in their vans (we rarely had buses), but what we didn’t see didn’t happen.

Touche Amoré performing at Chain Reaction in 2010.

(Joe Calixto)

We were often referred to as the “CBGB’s of the West,” and for a lot of bands, locals and touring acts alike, we were just that. We were the epicenter. There were other venues of course, but for some reason, we were the venue to play. Showcase Theater in Corona was edging toward its demise. Koo’s Cafe in Santa Ana was done. Back Alley in Fullerton wasn’t active. Galaxy Theater [in Santa Ana] was still, well, the Galaxy. There was no House of Blues Anaheim. Bands would drive a thousand miles to play one show at Chain Reaction. We were where the local bands started as first of four on a bill and would be headlining us within a year. We were their jumping-off point. We were where the kids came out. The real fans, many of whom started bands themselves.

Thankfully, there are other smaller venues out there today fostering the all-ages scene: Programme Skate in Fullerton, the Locker Room at Garden AMP [in Garden Grove], Toxic Toast in Long Beach, the Haven Pomona, but it’s just not the same. It was a moment in time. A time that will be forgotten in a few decades, but for today, my social media is being inundated with memories of a room that was a second home for thousands of kids.

Zero regrets. It was the best and worst times of my life. Working a day gig and then heading to the venue nearly every day of the week was rough. Relationships and friendships were hard, being that I couldn’t go out at night. I couldn’t get a pet. I was constantly tired. But I wouldn’t trade those six years for the world.

RIP, Chain Reaction.