Prius Drives Through Hollywood Protest, Driver Detainment Sparks Social Media Outrage

As protests continue to pop up all around the country in the wake of the Kentucky AG’s decision not to charge the officers who shot Breonna Taylor in her death, a situation in Hollywood, California took a contentious turn when the driver of a Prius went through a crowd of protestors and was later detained by LAPD.

The incident, the latest in a series of ones since protests ramped up this week, was one of two that occurred in Hollywood Thursday night. The first, according to ABC 7, involved a pickup truck near Sunset and Seward, where a pickup truck went through a group of people, injuring two. The second involved a Prius, which attempted to weave through a crowd of protesters at Cahuenga and Hollywood Boulevards.

Video of the incident showed several protesters then appearing to surround the car and chase it on foot as it tried to leave the scene, before a black pickup truck of other protesters managed to catch up and cut the Prius off, as a green Mustang also pulled up behind it. People then exited both vehicles and attempted to extract the driver of the Prius and cause damage to the exterior of the car. The Prius managed to flee the scene and was eventually pulled over on Santa Monica Boulevard, where the driver was detained by police.

Reporters from NBC LA later took to social media to confirm that police only detained the driver and did not make an arrest. However, that didn’t make things less tense on social media, as many decried the protesters and the police, stating it was wrong for the Prius driver to be the one the cops sought, especially after the protesters were blocking the intersection.

However, others defended the protesters, noting that things had been peaceful until the driver tried to move through the crowd.

“...Prius Driver should be prosecuted for assault with a deadly weapon the way he plowed through those protestors,” one person wrote. “Those in the truck were holding his [expletive] accountable.”

There were also those who noted that while the driver was detained, he was treated very differently than some of the people who have become the names of the Black Lives Matter movement, like Taylor, George Floyd and Jacob Blake.

“They did not throw the WHITE GUY on the ground, like we always see them do to People of Colour. Quite a difference in Arrests and I am White. This is [expletive],” one wrote.

Protests are expected to likely continue throughout the coming days.