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These beautiful young Chicano demonstrators were part of the peaceful crowd of 10,000 that police attacked with truncheons and teargas. I took this photo as the massive crowd was listening to the band Rage Against the Machine. The free concert took place in a large "free speech" area outside the convention Hall.

Later on a small handful of "Black Bloc" protesters on the very fringe of the crowd taunted the police by attempting to scale a security fence built around the Staples Center. These protestors also threw objects at the police, who used the incidental melee as an excuse to forcefully shut down the concert and violently clear the entire area of thousands of peaceful dissidents.

Photograph by Mark Vallen ©