The 1965 Watts Riots and Mechanisms of Injury

Quoting from the Governor's Commission report on the Watts Riots: In the ugliest interval, which lasted from Thursday through Saturday, perhaps as many as 10,000 [African-Americans] out of a population of 650,000 [African-Americans] in LA county, two thirds of which live in the area of the riot took to the streets in marauding bands. They looted stores, set fires, beat up white passersby whom they hauled from stopped cars, many of which were turned upside down and burned, exchanged shots with law enforcement officers, and stoned and shot at firemen. The rioters seemed to have been caught up in an insensate rage of destruction. By Friday, the disorder spread to adjoining areas, and ultimately an area covering 46.5 square miles had to be controlled with the aid of military authority before public order was restored (Commission, 1965, p.1). As will be shown below, this description is appropriate for the South Central Los Angeles civil disturbance. However, the degree of violence was much greater as shown by the number of injuries and deaths. The civil disturbance extended over a much wide area, fire burnt down more structures', and many more arrests were made (Table 7). Not only was the South Central Los Angeles civil disturbance more violent than the 1965 Watts Riots, it was the most violent in the last twenty-five years (Table 8). Given the problems with determining the cause of death and whose injuries were actually civil disturbance related, this data should be viewed in a very general way.

Medical Care for the Injured

Continue to Gun Shot Wounds and Assaults

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