Federal prosecutors Tuesday accused members of a Latino street gang of a violent campaign to drive African American rivals out of their South Los Angeles area neighborhood, resulting in at least 20 killings in the last three years. [Emphasis added] - LA Times
I have blogged numerous times about the sometimes murderous black/brown rivalry in LA - see The Underclass is at War, Race Wars in LA and Hate Crime in Black and Brown. This latest round of prosecutions, in which some 60 accused Latino gang members were arrested for their part in the attempted ethnic cleansing of the Florence-Firestone neighborhood of Los Angeles, is yet another example of the interracial tensions attendant on the demographic transformation of southern California.
The murders have taken place against the background of a massive demographic shift in that community. Formerly populated mainly by working class whites, by the 1980s Florence-Firestone was 80% black. Now it is some 90% Latino. The efforts of the Florencia 13 street gang were aimed at completely eliminating black gang influence in the area, but in the process innocent blacks were attacked as well.
Needless to say, if this was a case of a white gang assaulting and murdering blacks - especially in these numbers - the level of media scrutiny, impassioned oratory and (white) hand-wringing would know no bounds. However, at the moment, LA area civil rights protesters seem to have more important things on their minds then the racially-motivated killings of blacks. A recent scuffle between a white school security guard and several black students in the southern California city of Palmdale seems to have captured their attention. At least one demonstration has already been held and another is reportedly planned for next month.
(For a description of the Palmdale events, which seem ludicrously trivial on the surface, see here, here and here.)
(Interestingly, Palmdale, which is said to be experiencing heightened racial tension, is yet another example of the changing face of California, with its formerl majority white population now outweighed by a Latino plurality of 47%.)