A Haircut, A Man Shot, and A Squad of Pigs: A Day in Panorama City
By: Iván Salinas
Photo by Iván Salinas
June 18th, 2020. Another day of scorching summer heat. I was too broke to get a haircut at the barber shop, so Madi cut my hair. I sat on the toilet seat and it took her about thirty minutes. The entire bathroom floor was covered with my hair; actually, the entire bathroom. I cleaned it up as fast as I could. We got in the shower. It took us another thirty minutes to soap and rinse off. We dried ourselves and as we dressed we made plans for the rest of our afternoon: maybe, go for a walk and take photos along the way. I like the lighting at sunset over Panorama City. We were also craving tacos from the truck at the corner of Sepulveda and Nordhoff.
At some point during this time frame a man had gotten shot a couple of houses down the street, at least that’s what had happened according to the pig sergeant who was to inform us later that night. We never heard a gunshot. The sound of water rushing out of the showerhead may have blocked it.
My parents rented the room next door to a young couple who had just had their newborn, but we were also renting the remaining two bedrooms from the actual landlord of the house. Our backyard is divided by a wood picket fence that separates it from a construction site that the same landlord owns, too. My family moved here in 2018. Before that, we had lived in different apartment units throughout Van Nuys. The worst one was on Erwin Street: way overpriced and too close to the Pig Station. I hated that place. But we later found this house for rent at an amount my family could afford.
Before Madi cut my hair, we were in our bedroom and I’d heard yelling outside the bedroom window. I thought it came from the construction site behind us. I heard the newborn’s cries, too. I didn’t know the baby’s name until that day.
By the time we were dressed and ready to head out, I suggested we go to the backyard and smoke some weed; I loved how the view of the streets was enhanced during our walks. It would also allow some time for our golden retriever, Rocket, to run around the house for a bit, too. He had been living with us for about a month a half at that point.
While we were in the backyard, the neighbors asked us if we’d call the cops because they were outside on the front porch. Who the hell called the pigs?
I winced at them and quickly went back inside. We hadn’t heard any sirens, so I didn’t think it was as serious as it sounded. I approached the front door and looked through the glass in the middle of the door. I could see an LAPD car blocking the right driveway and a female pig pointing a gun towards my house. There was another pig car in the middle of the street, but no traffic coming from any lane. The entire avenue looked deserted, taken over by uniforms. I looked around trying to figure out what they could possibly be looking for that’s making them point their guns in this direction? From the right side of the street I saw a pig walk down with a large weapon. I couldn’t figure out if it was a shotgun or tear-gas.
I heard a voice coming from our side of the house. It was my neighbor, Alfredo. He was wearing a black tank-top, shorts and sandals. He walked up to the pig that was now aiming her gun at him--He later told me that wasn’t the first time he was in this kind of situation. While he talked to them, Madi and I had to make a decision. We either went out or stayed inside. I could hear that Alfredo was telling the pig another family lived inside this house and he wasn’t the primary person to talk to, he just rented a room there with his wife.
I still lived with my parents but they weren’t inside the house while this was happening. I am glad they weren’t. However, that meant I had to open the door and talk to the pigs.
A few weeks back, the protests following George Floyd’s death erupted in LA, and the numerous black and brown folx who had lost their lives for police brutality kept rising. Many more black and brown people had been killed by pigs and this could have been another instance where I met the same fate. If I didn’t open the door, they would have jumped through the gate, no doubt about it. And they would have stormed without any of us knowing what or who they were looking for.
So we decided to open the front door, but our dog had to stay inside, so we locked him in my bedroom. When I did so I put my hands where they could see them. They looked at us for a couple of seconds, then one of the pigs oinked, “These are not the suspects.” No, I guess we are not. I wondered what the actual suspects looked like. Our skin colors are light-brown and white.
They shouted at us to come out of the house. Madi shouted back, “ok, but we just want to know what’s going on.”
“There’s an armed man that may be hiding in the lot behind your house, so if you can please step out we can check out the area.” They made it sound like we had a choice.
We put our masks on and walked out to the front porch. The neighbors came outside, too. They weren’t wearing a mask. Yesenia held her one-month-old baby with a white towel wrapped around him. When we all walked up to the pigs at the curb they quickly began to ask questions.
For the entirety of the day the only pig we spoke to for the most part was Pig Richard. His body towered over all of ours, he was a white man at least 6’5 tall. He asked if there were more people in the house. He wasn’t wearing a mask or any type of covering over his face. Many of the pigs weren’t either. I answered his question, told him there was just a golden retriever in the room.
“Is he violent? Would he bite someone if we were to go in?” He oinked.
“No. He’ll lick you though,” Madi said.
He explained that they were answering a call about a man who had just gotten shot. The ambulance had just left and they were looking for the suspect who they believed was still in the area. They weren’t entirely sure where the suspect could be located but there was a chance it could be somewhere in the construction site behind my house. So, I told him the truth: we hadn’t heard anything, no gunshots, but I did hear someone yelling earlier; I had just gotten a haircut, and we were about to go for a walk like we do every other day.
Behind him, I could see an entire squad of pigs with riot gear arrive. There were at least twelve of them in one truck--with more on the way--and more pigs had blocked off Van Nuys boulevard on the east and Noble street to the west while a helicopter flew in circles above us.
They set their perimeter and it became their stage. Their performance “to keep us safe” had just begun.
Pig Richard first briefed us on what they were going to do, which was to go inside the house and look in every corner of it--even though we weren’t the supposed suspects. Only if they decided the area was all clear they would then let us back inside. We were all on the curb already, and it’s not like we were going to stop them anyway.
We watched the entire pig squad move into my house wearing their riot gear. For the past weeks leading to that day, that’s how they were dressed in every BLM protest across the country. I wasn’t going to take a chance to end up dead at the hands of the pigs.
I was sure the pig squad was going to go into the room where I stored all my music gear, the room that smelled dank 24/7. If this was ten years earlier, I probably would have been arrested for possessing a schedule 1 drug even though they didn’t answer the call of a neighbor complaining about the smell.
My golden retriever was in the bedroom. I hope they’d hear Rocket bark so they wouldn’t go in the room. I prayed they wouldn’t shoot him even though we warned them there was a dog.
While they did their supposed search, I texted a group chat of friends about what was happening. I told them we were all ok so far. I sent them a photo, I told them I would keep them updated. Several of them responded with messages of support. They told me to keep an eye out, to get close and record their every move. My phone’s battery was at 5 percent but Madi had her phone.
My parents called me and told me they were at the corner of Van Nuys and Plummer, where the pigs had blocked off traffic. They weren’t letting anyone in. I briefed them. I told them we were safe, too, but I didn’t feel safe. The pigs didn’t make me feel safe flashing their guns at us, telling us to get out of their way, storming into my place in full riot gear. At this point, no one had seen the wounded person. At this point they were the only ones with guns disrupting our home. Seeing them do this wasn’t as surprising, it just finally hit home, and I didn’t think it would. You’re never prepared for when they show up.
Before this day I hadn’t really talked to the neighbors living on the other side of our living room. We’d just overheard their occasional fights and answered the door whenever they paid rent. It was the first time I’d seen their newborn.
“What’s his name?” I asked the parents.
“Jacob” Alfredo said, and he turned so we could take a better look at the baby. He was calm, resting on his dad’s shoulder under the towel so it kept him cool under the hundred degree heat. He never cried the entire time we were outside.
The couple asked us if we were working. We were full-time students then, taking classes over zoom, working part-time myself delivering food with Postmates. Alfredo told us he had just gotten his hours cut at a factory where they make parts for airplanes. Yesenia hadn’t worked in almost an entire year. She also mentioned that when she was younger she wanted to be a pig, but she became a nurse instead.
My dad had just gotten fired from his job at a Valet Parking company. My mom thankfully kept her job as a caretaker, but she had to sell home-made crepes during the weekends so we could make rent.
Neighbors in the houses and apartment units next to us came out to the curb, looking from behind their gated driveways, curious, as they saw an entire pig-squad go into my house. One white lady came out of her townhouse and wore a bright purple mask. She was in her early thirties and asked us what was going on. Alfredo answered, but it was hard to make out the words because of the noise of the helicopter above us.
“Oh, I don’t speak Spanish” she said.
“We all speak English” I responded.
She then told us that she had seen another neighbor drunk on her front porch the other night, screaming sometime around midnight. Madi and I lived next door to the neighbors she was referring to, who are asian, and they are very friendly and like to have family reunions. We have never heard something like that happening, which made me think this lady was racist. But, the neighbors across the street have gotten into fights late at night after their parties. They’re Mexican. And at the house next to Alfredo and Yesenia’s room, they would play salsa music almost every weekend at the start of the pandemic. They’re from Ecuador. But it’s cool cause every now and then we also had our parties.
Yanira and Alfredo were taking pictures while we talked to the neighbor. They got close and talked to a female pig near them. She said her shift ended in five minutes and she was stuck here. Because she’d seen them take photos with their phone she told them they could get inside the patrol car and take a look inside. “It’s not caged,” she said. They declined the offer--it could have been a trap.
A few more minutes went by and the entire pig squad came out with no suspect arrested yet. They hadn’t given up their search, but we were allowed to go back inside. I was expecting to see the whole place trashed, but Pig Richard walked us through what they had done and ordered us to confirm that nothing had been touched or displaced by them. We looked around and everything was where we left it. He then briefed us with more information.
The reason why they targeted our house, aside from the possible suspect hiding in behind the backyard, was because the call they received said the person that shot him ran into a white house with a blue dodge. The exterior of my house is white. The car my dad owns is a blue Dodge. We were definitely the suspects at first, apparently we just didn’t look like them.
But while they were searching the perimeter they found another house with the exact same description, which is where they were more sure that the suspect was hiding, so they were going to check out that place next. He stepped out speaking to his walkie talkie and the entire pig squad followed. They oinked west.
I heard Rocket whimpering. I opened my bedroom door and he immediately clung to us. We looked at the room and noticed he was the only one that caused damage. He ripped apart Madi’s wallet and a Grassroots Journalism book. He almost ate some of her birth control pills. We were just glad he was ok.
The sun was starting to settle. It was closer to 5 pm. The heat got more intense. I put my phone to charge. I went outside, up to the gate of my front porch. The street was still blocked and my parents still couldn’t get through. I called them again to tell them we were back in the house. Yesenia came out from her room and asked if we had seen anything. I told her what Pig Richard had briefed us on and they were now looking into the other house.
“Oh yeah, where all the sketchy people live. They’re either on that side or drinking at the liquor store in the corner,” she said.
A few weeks earlier I had made conversation with a neighbor across from us to tell him about the little crepe business my mom had going. He was making carne asada. I told him I noticed they were new to the neighborhood. “It’s nice here...except for all the homeless people at night.”
When my family first moved here, the house had just been remodeled, just like the rest of the other houses around us. Exactly next door to the house the pigs were targeting next, began a fenced lot of deserted land that used to be homes. Only debris, beer cartons, and random clothes were left. Someone tagged “Trap House” on the wood fence. People living in mobile homes decided to move next to that lot. It was lawful of them to stay there. There were no parking limits imposed and not many houses around, nor any schools. It was the perfect spot. One of these mobile homes was also a mobile mechanic shop. They were the first to move in, then more mobile homes joined until they took up the entire space. When my girlfriend and I walked past them we either were just stared at or they kept minding their own business. They couldn’t see our smiles behind our masks and would ignore my “hola, que tal?” One of them also spray-painted bikes. I never saw them as a threat. If I were living in a mobile home, struggling just as much to keep myself alive, I probably wouldn’t have the most friendly attitude either. My family was one rent bill away from getting kicked out of where we lived. But to assume that they had anything to do with what happened that day was just that, an assumption, and a wrong one too. The “drunks” at the liquor store were a usual group of day laborers. They hung out with the unhoused lady that made a home out of a bus stop bench. They all hung out more often there now that the pandemic took away most of their gigs. One time I walked to the liquor store and passing by this group of men, the youngest one of them said, “la muerte me la pela, la muerte es mi carnal.” It’s a sketchy thing to overhear, for sure, but true nonetheless. If you don’t mess with any of these vatos they won’t pay attention to you either--at least that’s true for men.
Shortly after Yesenia made her comment we heard a gate smash open and heard the classic line: “Police! Open up!” All the pigs standing near us were watching attentively. We watched with them. There were loud thuds and I could hear more yelling, but our entire view was blocked until one man in handcuffs came out. And then another man, and then a woman, and two more men. They were all handcuffed. They were all darker in skin color. The pigs lined them up against a wall on the curb and the rest of the officers had their guns drawn on them. It looked like they were about to be executed. They probably felt ashamed as we were watching them, most likely terrified for what was coming next. In the twelve years I’ve lived in the valley, this was not the first time I saw this kind of scenario. This time it was right next door to me rather than passing by and seeing pigs restraining someone that is already on their knees. I don’t think these people had anything to do with it, but the pigs arrested them.
I took out my girlfriend’s phone and zoomed in. I was capturing the same kinds of images seen all across the entire country. Panorama City was just another neighborhood where immigrant black and brown people were arrested.
The pigs had them handcuffed for a long time. I heard some Spanish mixed with English from behind the wall, when I got closer to where they had them handcuffed.
The sun went down. The street lights came on. They reopened the streets and my parents were back home. I couldn’t hear what the pigs were telling them, but so far no one had gotten shot. No one was beat up. But I did see two of the same handcuffed men get taken by the pigs.
By night time I saw Pig Richard again. He called my girlfriend and I so he could speak to us. The red lights lit up his face the same color. He told us that the people arrested were involved in a gang. The empty field next to that house was a common problem and they had previously contacted the owner to sell the property and houses could be built. That way “more nice citizens like you could move in.” And those nice people renting from greedy-ass landlords that would raise up the rent and overcrowd the fuck out of the northeast valley.
Pig Richard thanked us for our cooperation and left us his business card in case we had any more questions. He also mentioned that they would be patrolling more often around the area to check up on us. Fucking great. More gangs are moving in.
- - -
Photo by Iván Salinas
One year after the incident, the renovation of the empty field has been underway. Signs of parking limitations have been imposed along the curb. Most of the mobile homes left before they were swept by LA Sanitation or given a fine. The only one remaining was the mobile mechanic shop. He took clients for as long as possible, using both sides of the street as his working area while condos were getting built by more men working to feed themselves and their families. For a few weeks I saw pigs riding their bikes on the sidewalks, but it didn’t last. What’s more permanent are the structures of new condos a couple houses down to be filled with “nice citizens” or the apartments at the Van Nuys/Plummer intersection with people that are moving from some other fucking place unaware that their so-called home could’ve been a public space, instead, or simply more affordable units for a low-income community. Not a single green space has been considered in the area, even though the neighborhood council people complain about being “park poor” and they don’t care much to do anything about it. Every year it keeps getting hotter. LAPD is still a criminal gang. The panorama is (un)changing.
Photo by Iván Salinas
