Tense exchange between LAPD deputy chief and police critic goes viral

As the Martin Luther King Jr. Kingdom Day Parade wound to an end in Leimert Park, activist Jason Reedy said he tried to “bird-dog” LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell over a recent increase in police shootings.

One of the police department’s most outspoken critics, Reedy, often confronts LAPD and city officials face to face in public forums. After jawing with members of McDonnell’s security detail, Reedy got into a heated exchange with Alan Hamilton, a deputy chief who runs the detective bureau. In a back and forth partially caught on video, Hamilton was heard suggesting that Reedy had “molested” children.

Reedy, 38, an organizer with the grassroots collective, the People’s City Council, said the accusation is baseless and part of a “disgusting” campaign by LAPD officials to silence him.

Hamilton has since claimed his remarks were taken out of context, and said he meant that Reedy was merely bothering young officers at the scene, not abusing kids.

The drama unfolded at last week’s parade. City politicians and police officials use the event to mingle with community members, who gather to see performances by high school marching bands, taekwondo students and mariachis.

Reedy said he was there with his family, but left them at one point to confront L.A. Mayor Bass over her support of the Police Department. When he spotted McDonnell near the tail end of the parade, he recalled, he began screaming at the chief about the fact that LAPD officers had opened fire on citizens nearly 50 times last year — the highest annual total in a decade.

Activist Jason Reedy speaks at a Los Angeles City Council meeting on Dec. 9, 2022.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

At some point, McDonnell left and Reedy said he began arguing with Hamilton.

Reedy posted the videos of the encounter to his followers on X, where it has racked up tens of thousands of views. The clips also began circulating privately among some LAPD officers.

In the footage, Reedy is confronting Hamilton while holding his phone in the senior official’s face.

“I gotta watch the kids to make sure the kids don’t get molested,” Hamilton said in the video.

Reedy then uses a derogatory term for police officers and asks what Hamilton means.

“I know your past, man,” Hamilton says. Another clip of the exchange posted by Reedy ended with Hamilton hopping into a van with other officers and slamming his door shut.

Hamilton told The Times that he did not mean “molesting” in a criminal sense, and suggested, without offering evidence, that Reedy had manipulated the recording using AI in a way that favored his narrative — something Reedy roundly disputed.

A regular at Police Commission and City Council meetings, Reedy and other outspoken police critics and social justice advocates have in recent months blasted the LAPD for what they have seen as a heavy-handed response to this summer’s pro-immigration protests, collaboration with federal authorities, and unwillingness to confront racism and sexism within its ranks.

His tactics reflect a new, more confrontational dynamic between public officials and activists who seek to capture encounters that will resonate on social media.

Reedy said felt compelled to corner the mayor and police chief at the MLK parade because it was the only way to get them to answer for the department’s actions.

But his advocacy has made him the target of false accusations, he said. One officer called him a “murderer” and “domestic abuser.” And in years past, senior police officials have publicly suggested he was an unfit parent for bringing his young son to Police Commission meetings.

Still, Reedy said, for someone of Hamilton’s rank to refer to him as a child abuser crossed the line and potentially put him at risk of retaliation in his community. The fact that he’s the primary caretaker of his two young children made the comments all the more disturbing, he said.

“It’s not true so it doesn’t affect me like that, but even someone like me I do care what people in the community think,” said Reedy.

Hamilton said Reedy’s footage didn’t show the stream of vitriol toward him that Reedy unleashed on him, questioning his Blackness and commenting on his mixed Asian heritage.

“That guy called me everything under the sun,” Hamilton said.

Hamilton said he had hung around in order to shield some of the younger Black officers present — whom he referred to as “his kids” — from Reedy.

He denied accusing Reedy of inappropriately touching children, saying that he used the term “molesting” as a euphemism for accosting the younger officers.

LAPD Deputy Chief Alan Hamilton listens during a news conference on Dec. 4, 2025, in Los Angeles.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

“I was referring to the kids in uniform, the 20-year-old officers” he said. “I said, ‘Stop molesting them…’ It’s unfair. These officers coming in today have nothing to do with the historical issues that we have in this department.”

Hamilton said he and Reedy have traded words with each other in the past, and he felt the need to stand up for lower-ranking officers at last week’s scene.

“I don’t think Jason Reedy’s afraid of me, and I’m certainly not afraid of Jason Reedy,” Hamilton said.

Asked whether the encounter with Hamilton had made him second-guess his approach to confronting public officials, Reedy responded simply: “Nah.”