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1 February 2024
LOS ANGELES (KTLA) – Vandals have sprayed graffiti on 27 stories of a downtown Los Angeles skyscraper that’s been sitting vacant for several years.
Construction on Oceanwide Plaza, a $1 billion mixed-use retail and luxury apartments project with three towering unfinished structures, stalled in January 2019 after the Beijing-based developer lacked the funds to complete it, the Los Angeles Times reported.
It is unclear exactly how those responsible for the graffiti covering much of the building’s exterior gained entry to the site or when they began their daring and illegal project.
One witness, Daron Burgundy, said the taggers had been blasting the building with spray paint for the last three nights.
“I could see people up on the balcony were tagging and everything,” Burgundy, who is a street photographer, told Nexstar’s KTLA. “Last night, there was a crew on one of the floors, and people were coming out and getting detained by LAPD and getting cited and released. People were still in there tagging while the cops were down here.”
Video posted to the Citizen App just before midnight on Jan. 30 shows what appears to be a person on the balcony of one of the buildings working on the graffiti.
Aerial footage of the buildings captured by KTLA shows phrases like, “set the pace” and “amen” spray-painted on the outside, as well as other tags like, “SINKOE,” “XN28,” “ROSEK” and “AMI.”
Burgundy said that he’s surprised it’s taken this long for taggers to hit the buildings because the construction site has been vacant for years, adding that he heard people were coming from out of state to tag the structures.
“LAPD mentioned that there might be an Instagram post floating around and apparently it was inviting people to come. It’s been wild to watch,” he said. “It’s kind of interesting. It’s not so luxury around here anymore.”
The Los Angeles Police Department has not yet announced any arrests in connection with the graffiti or trespassing on the construction site.
LAPD’s Central Division, however, did say that personnel had met with a representative of Council District 14, which is run by Kevin de León, to discuss securing the sprawling development and adding additional security measures.
“The measures will be implemented immediately, and the graffiti will be removed,” LAPD said on X, formerly Twitter.
KTLA has reached out to Councilmember de León’s office about what those security measures might entail and whether there is an estimate on the cost of removing some 27 stories of graffiti from the construction site.