BikinginLA

More details are emerging in the shooting death of Dijon Kizzee as he was riding his bike in South LA on Monday.

The Lancaster resident was shot at least 18 times by LA County Sheriff’s deputies as he attempted to flee a traffic stop for an undisclosed vehicle code violation.

Relatives note that he never pointed a weapon at the deputies, and no effort was made to de-escalate the situation.

US Congresswoman Maxine Waters, who represents the area where the shooting occurred, called out the sheriff’s department for a pattern of abuse.

Whatever details the sheriffs leak or reveal over the coming days about why Dijon Kizzee was shot dead in Westmont, we know for a fact that a Black man stopped while riding his bicycle should not be dead today,” Waters, D-Los Angeles, said in a statement. “I stand with the community in condemning unaccountable rogue sheriffs and police officers who continue to hunt and murder unarmed people of color in our communities.

“It’s past time for the attorney general of CA, Xavier Becerra, to intervene and investigate the pattern of abuses at the L.A. (County) Sheriff’s Department,” she said. “The department is out of control and has lost the confidence of the community it is supposed to protect. There will be no peace in our streets until the LASD cleans house.

Kizzee’s family retained famed civil rights attorney Ben Crump — the lawyer representing Breonna Taylor, George Floyd and Jacob Blake, among other victims of police shootings — who asserts Kizzee was shot 20 times in the back as he tried to run away.

Security video from the scene appears to back up that claim; while difficult to make out, it looks like Kizzee is running away and some distance from the deputies when the fatal shots were fired.

Residents of the area, and others from throughout Los Angeles, expressed understandable sadness and outrage over the killing.

LA Times readers weren’t happy about the shooting, either, though one seemed to be just as unhappy with scofflaw bicyclists.

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Apparently, the proposed rapid bus line on Colorado Blvd in Eagle Rock is not the only Metro project that could result in removing much needed bike lanes.

https://twitter.com/pjrocks/status/1301231676752683008

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Stop whatever you’re doing — okay, reading this — and take a few minutes to read this great illustrated memoir of a woman’s time in a guerrilla bike brigade supporting Seattle BLM protests.

Thanks to Pops and Megan Lynch for the heads-up.

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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

An Illinois woman faces a hate charge after telling three Black bike riders they needed a permit to be on a public pier, then smacking one rider to stop him from filming her, and claiming she’d been attacked by them even though she was the aggressor throughout.

But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.

A man on a bicycle attacked an Asian couple in New York, yelling “You are Chinese, God hates China, China has virus” before spitting at them and throwing his bike at the man.

A mountain bike-riding man attacked a Vancouver traffic control flagger with some sort of undisclosed weapon, before fleeing the scene.

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Local

According to Streetsblog’s Joe Linton, Los Angeles installed 37.5 miles of new and improved bike lanes during the last fiscal year, though there’s still nothing even remotely resembling a bicycle network in the city. However, those are lane miles, rather than centerline miles, so it actually works out to less than 19 miles of roadway.

 

State

An Irvine site profiles our old friend and Orange County bike advocate Bill Sellin, founder of the Bicycle Club of Irvine.

Authorities have arrested the heartless cowards who fled the scene after critically injuring a 66-year old San Diego bike rider last month; 29-year old Mauricio Flores and 50-year-old Jessica Bailey were taken into custody outside a Lake Isabella Vons store. Their van’s Georgia plates had been changed at least twice, first to California government plates, then to Vermont license plates, in an apparent attempt to coverup the crime.

Riverside will shut down its ebike bikeshare system next month, after vandalism and Covid-19 undercut ridership and revenue for the two-year old program.

Seriously? A 77-year old Napa man was seriously injured when he was struck by a driver while walking his bike in a crosswalk — yet police don’t seem to think the driver did anything wrong. Except maybe crashing into a man and his bike walking in a crosswalk directly in front of him.

 

National

More evidence bicycling is a miracle cure, as a new study shows older people who ride bikes walk more efficiently than those who walk for exercise.

Trek’s chief financial officer says be patient, there are a lot more bicycles on the way to restock empty stores.

Streetsblog says it will take a different form of advocacy to get Americans on ebikes. Although the current bike shortage might argue otherwise.

If you can get past their paywall, the Wall Street Journal offers easy biking escapes in New York, Chicago, Atlanta and Los Angeles.

Vehicle miles are down significantly in Colorado, but traffic deaths are up slightly. It’s a sad commentary when a slight increase in bicycling and pedestrian deaths is considered good news.

There’s a special place in hell for whoever stole the Schwinn American bicycle an Oklahoma City woman received 63 years ago for her 11th birthday, and has never been without since.

A second grader has created a historical bike tour of the Massachusetts town where she spends summers with her grandparents.

Heartbreaking story from South Carolina, where a man was killed and his dog critically injured when they were struck by a driver while on a bike tour from New York to the Florida Keys; a crowdfunding campaign to send them both home has raised $4,200 of the $5,000 goal.

No surprise here, as a witness contradicts the account of a veteran New Orleans police officer who killed a bike rider; officials claimed the victim ran the red light, while the witness said the cop was speeding and hit the victim while he was still standing on the curb with his bike.

 

International

The bike boom is surging in Mexico City.

Ontario, Canada officials still haven’t identified the victim in the bike-on-bike crash we mentioned yesterday, posting photos of his bike and other personal items in hopes someone will recognize them. Yet another reminder to always carry some form of ID that won’t get lost or stolen following a crash; I wear a Road ID every time I leave my home, let alone ride my bike. Speaking of which, if you know anybody who works there, tell ’em they should sponsor this site, as often as I plug them on here. 

Donations of bicycles and laptops are helping migrant workers in Ontario keep in touch with their families and the community, despite the coronavirus lockdown.

Montreal officials are caving to angry residents and ripping out a bike lane in favor of parking spaces that had been removed to make room for it.

A pair of Welsh drivers played the universal Get Out of Jail Free card, claiming they couldn’t see the bike rider they killed because the sun was in their eyes. Never mind that if you can’t see, the correct solution is to pull over to the side of the road until you can, not keep driving until you hit something. Or someone.

It takes a major schmuck to steal a British doctor’s bicycle while he was working a 13-hour shift. Then again, the same could be said for whoever stole firefighter’s bicycle while he was working.

 

If you’re going to steal a bike, make sure no one sees you — when you take it, or when you ride it later. If you’re going for a drunken early morning bike ride while carrying meth and weed, put a damn taillight on it.

The bike, that is, not the weed.

And evidently, lions aren’t just king of the jungle.

https://twitter.com/QTAnon1/status/1300721316719452160?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1300721316719452160%7Ctwgr%5Eshare_3&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Froad.cc%2Fcontent%2Fnews%2Fcycling-live-blog-2-september-2020-276945

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Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask, already.