It all began with an anonymous tip that a man was selling illegal fireworks from an alley in South LA.

What unfolded next literally sent shock waves through a community. LA Times LAPD reporter Kevin Richter wrote about the details of an LAPD Inspector General report that was recently released. It examines the decisions that were made in a 12-hour window that led to the LAPD blowing up a South LA neighborhood. 

In an interview for “LA Times Today,” Rector broke down the findings of the report. The incident occurred on June 30, 2021. Police were in the area to deal with the sale of illegal fireworks.  

"They discovered a rather large cache of fireworks in the backyard of one of the homes there and realized they had quite a large volume of fireworks on hand and brought in more resources. As additional personnel arrived, they determined there were some handmade fireworks as well that they thought were much more volatile. As they carted away boxes and boxes of commercial fireworks, they brought in the LAPD bomb squad to assess the homemade fireworks. [They] ultimately determined that they needed to detonate those homemade devices on scene in a special vehicle that's designed to maintain explosives," Rector explained.

Before they detonated the fireworks, officers went around the block to clear residents out of the area. For people who did not want to leave their homes, Rector said the police told them to stay indoors.

"They were clearing the block and setting up a perimeter. The bomb squad was going about its work, determining the scale of explosives. What they were doing was cutting into the devices, looking at the material inside of samples of each type. And they estimated the weight of explosive material in those devices. The weight being important because the containment vessel was only designed in a certain volume of explosives. And then they put the explosives, the containment vehicle and closed it up, and exploded it," Rector said.

The containment vehicle did not contain the explosion.

Several homes were damaged from the blast and 17 people were injured. Rector explained what the investigation uncovered about the events leading up to the explosion.

"What the Inspector General's report that recently came out concluded was that rather than weigh the material, one of the bomb technicians on scene sort of eyeballed it and then did his own calculations in his head.

He said that he even upped the weight that he considered it to be, to be on the safe side. Another key finding of the Inspector General's report was that a second bomb technician on scene repeatedly raised concerns about the volume of explosives going into this vehicle. He was ignored, according to reports. At one point, right before the detonation, that same technician had raised concerns about the proximity of members of the community and members of the media that were ready to film this detonation. Thankfully, he was listened to that time, and they moved the perimeter back some degree. Nonetheless, once the blast erupted out of the containment vessel in the neighborhood, 17 people were injured. Some of them pretty severely. They were displaced from their neighborhood. Some of them still aren't back," Rector said.

Rector detailed how the LAPD will ensure a similar situation does not happen in the future. 

"They analyze what occurred. So did the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to determine what went wrong. They concluded that these were some of the failures, that the calculation was done without scale, etc. The department said that it has revamped its entire bomb squad with police leadership there, that it is bringing in new members of the squad and upping training. And it has established new protocols that explosives must be weighed and that they no longer may be detonated in residential areas," he said.

Rector spoke with members of the community that were affected by the explosion.

"Myself and my colleague, Brittny Mejia who co-authored this story with me, spoke to a lot of residents. They are sort of flabbergasted that this was allowed to occur without proper weighing of the explosives. One resident said it was sheer egotism among the bomb squad. They are angry. They want to know, for starters, who the bombs technicians are. The LAPD, to this day, has not named them. Many of them are still displaced. They do not know when they will be able to get back into their homes. Some of the homes were badly damaged. There may be litigation waiting in the wings here. Many of the residents are none too pleased with the findings of the report, and they're still frustrated with the situation today,” Rector said.

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