{"id":192533,"date":"2026-02-25T04:50:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T04:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/192533\/"},"modified":"2026-02-25T04:50:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T04:50:08","slug":"san-pedro-market-take-overs-by-youth-galvanize-efforts-to-address-safety-issues-press-telegram","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/192533\/","title":{"rendered":"San Pedro market \u2018take overs\u2019 by youth galvanize efforts to address safety issues \u2013 Press Telegram"},"content":{"rendered":"

Responding to incidents involving gatherings of sometimes unruly crowds of juveniles in San Pedro, Los Angeles Councilmember Tim McOsker met this week with representatives from the community, the Los Angeles Police Department, parents, store owners and school officials, to discuss how best to stop and prevent the activity going forward.<\/p>\n

The meeting came after a Feb. 12 incident in which large numbers of teens caused what was described as a significant disturbance at the Vons grocery store at Gaffey and 13th streets in San Pedro, prompting a response by the LAPD.<\/p>\n

McOsker, in a Tuesday phone interview, described the incident as involving a \u201clarge number of kids\u201d who documented the activity on social media.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey took over parts of the store,\u201d resulting in \u201cvandalism and theft,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was very alarming to me and to others.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The Vons grocery store on the corner of Gaffey St. and W. 13th St. in San Pedro on Tuesday, February 24, 2026. (Photo by Drew A. Kelley, Press-Telegram\/SCNG)\n<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The Vons grocery store on Gaffey Street in San Pedro on Tuesday, February 24, 2026. (Photo by Drew A. Kelley, Press-Telegram\/SCNG)\n<\/p>\n

Show Caption<\/p>\n

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The Vons grocery store on the corner of Gaffey St. and W. 13th St. in San Pedro on Tuesday, February 24, 2026. (Photo by Drew A. Kelley, Press-Telegram\/SCNG)\n<\/p>\n

Expand<\/a><\/p>\n

Earlier in the month, McOsker added, a fight involving juveniles also broke out during the town\u2019s First Thursday event.<\/p>\n

With LAPD, Port Police and community members assisting, he said, that incident \u2014 which also attracted a large crowd of young spectators \u2014 broke up.<\/p>\n

The incident at Vons, 1221 S. Gaffey St., wasn\u2019t the first to occur there, McOsker said, adding that problems there have \u201cebbed and flowed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI reached out to Vons and to LAUSD school police and LAPD, community members,\u201d he said. \u201cWe had a meeting yesterday (Monday) at Dana Middle School; the principal was gracious enough to host us. This is not a recent issue. The Vons at 13th and Gaffey has had challenges in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

The meeting, the council member said, was a chance to discuss how best to address the issue with best practices and make sure stores and parking areas are safe.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe meeting was productive, with thoughtful ideas shared by all parties that we are currently exploring internally,\u201d an Albertsons Vons Company spokesperson said in a written statement. \u201cWe plan to regroup after spring break with those that attended the meeting.<\/p>\n

\u201cCustomer and associate safety is our top priority,\u201d the statement added, \u201cand we are committed to ensuring our stores remain safe and welcoming environments for everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Members of the company\u2019s team were included in the meeting.<\/p>\n

San Pedro business owner Mona Sutton, the lead community partner to LAPD and chair of the Community Police Advisory Board, agreed with McOsker that the problem isn\u2019t new.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been brewing for a while,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

McOsker, for his part, said many of the youth do not respond to authorities who intervene to stop the behavior \u2014 though he also didn\u2019t generalize to all young people in San Pedro.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have great kids in this community,\u201d McOsker said. \u201cThis is not endemic to Dana or the kids in San Pedro.\u201d<\/p>\n

But while the recent incident \u201cdidn\u2019t have the same feel\u201d as some of the large-scale \u201csmash-and-grab\u201d organized events, McOsker said, it still \u201cfelt like unruly mob behavior.\u201d The youth were shoplifting, he said, grabbing things off shelves.<\/p>\n

Given that a fight also occurred so recently at First Thursday, near the vacant courthouse property, McOsker said, \u201cthere is a dangerous set of behaviors that strike me as something we had to get on top of.\u201d<\/p>\n

Police were called to the scene at Vons at around 3:30 p.m. Feb. 12, with scuffles also reportedly spilling into and breaking out in the parking lot. The original police call came is as a \u201cpossible ADW (assault with a deadly weapon),\u201d according to LAPD spokesperson Kevin Terzes, but no weapons were found and no arrests were made after police responded. The activity involving a \u201clarge group\u201d of juveniles, who were warned of trespassing, then broke up.<\/p>\n

It appears no formal report was filed on the incident, Terzes said.<\/p>\n

Discussions within the community, McOsker said, will continue. Additional security will be provided at the next First Thursday in March, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve had two public safety meetings in a row,\u201d he said, \u201cand there will be more. It\u2019s the nature of youth being influenced by some of their peers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rules need to be established and communicated, McOsker said.<\/p>\n

\u201cVons managers attempted to calm the situation down,\u201d said Sutton, who saw the Feb. 12 incident come up on an email alert, and went to the store and called McOsker. Store personnel tried to \u201cget the kids out of the store\u201d but when that didn\u2019t work, Sutton said, the situation escalated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Responding to incidents involving gatherings of sometimes unruly crowds of juveniles in San Pedro, Los Angeles Councilmember Tim…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":192534,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[7,723,131,133,132,47,137,100,1492,1439],"class_list":{"0":"post-192533","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-long-beach","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-crime","10":"tag-long-beach","11":"tag-long-beach-headlines","12":"tag-long-beach-news","13":"tag-los-angeles","14":"tag-los-angeles-county","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-public-safety","17":"tag-san-pedro"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=192533"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192533\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/192534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}