The surge in homicides in Los Angeles since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic has played out almost entirely among Latino and Black victims, according to a Times analysis of Los Angeles Police Department data.
The figures reflect wide disparities in public safety across the city, experts say, as well as compounding trauma for communities of color hit hard by past gang violence and devastated at disproportionate rates by the economic and social upheaval of the last 18 months.
Police attribute much of the latest violence to gangs, but the impact has been felt by victims old and young, homeless and housed, sitting in their cars and working a shift.
“It speaks to the two Los Angeleses,” said Jorja Leap, a UCLA professor and longtime government consultant on L.A. gangs. “I am deeply concerned.”
Kevin “Twin” Orange, a gang intervention worker for the city, said the pandemic is fully to blame, because it undercut so many programs designed to stop violence. …
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