The ''Los Angeles Vanguard'' was a weekly newspaper established in 1976 and published in

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

Dave Lindorff Dave Lindorff is an American investigative reporter, filmmaker, a columnist for ''CounterPunch'' and a contributor to '' Tarbell.org,'' ''The Nation,'' ''FAIR'' and ''Salon.com''. His work was highlighted by Project Censored 2004, 2011 and 2012. ...

was a founder and editor, along with journalists Woodrow "Tommy" Thompson, Dorothy Thompson, Ben Pleasants, Ron Ridenour, and Jim Horowitz. A number of the ''Vanguard'' founders had previously written for the ''

Los Angeles Free Press The ''Los Angeles Free Press'', also called the "''Freep''", is often cited as the first, and certainly was the largest, of the underground newspapers of the 1960s. The ''Freep'' was founded in 1964 by Art Kunkin, who served as its publisher unti ...

''. While writing for the ''Vanguard'', Lindorff was given the Grand Prize of the

Los Angeles Press Club The Los Angeles Press Club is an American journalism organization founded in 1913. It honors journalists through its annual National Arts and Entertainment Journalism Awards and SoCal Journalism Awards. The Board of Directors includes the organi ...

for his reporting as well as an award for Best Article in a Weekly. According to Lindorff, the ''Vanguard'' was infiltrated by an undercover member of L.A.'s

Public Disorder Intelligence Division The Public Disorder and Intelligence Division (PDID) was a unit of the Los Angeles Police Department between 1970-1983 that mobilized undercover officers to monitor the activity of local activist organizations suspected of criminal activity. Creat ...

(PDID) squad, under

Daryl Gates Daryl Gates (born Darrel Francis Gates; August 30, 1926 – April 16, 2010) was the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) from 1978 to 1992. His length of tenure in this position was second only to that of William H. Parker. As Chief ...

. The lawsuit ''CAPA v. Gates'', with the

Coalition Against Police Abuse The Coalition Against Police Abuse (CAPA) is a currently active community organization in Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, larg ...

(CAPA) as one of two dozen or so plaintiffs, later sued the

Los Angeles Police Department The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), officially known as the City of Los Angeles Police Department, is the municipal police department of Los Angeles, California. With 9,974 police officers and 3,000 civilian staff, it is the third-large ...

(LAPD) on

First Amendment First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...

grounds, exposing unlawful harassment, surveillance, and infiltration of the progressive movement in Los Angeles by LAPD agents — and a link to a right-wing outfit called the

Western Goals Foundation Western Goals Foundation was a private domestic intelligence agency active in the United States.Staff writer (Jan. 2, 1989)"Western Goals Foundation."''Interhemispheric Resource Center/International Relations Center''. Archived frothe original./r ...

, which was assembling the collected spy dossiers and making them available to law enforcement nationwide and to the federal spy agencies that were feeling hamstrung by the post-

Watergate The Watergate scandal was a major political scandal in the United States involving the administration of President Richard Nixon from 1972 to 1974 that led to Nixon's resignation. The scandal stemmed from the Nixon administration's continual ...

reforms limiting such spying. The lawsuit against Gates and the LAPD proved successful. A police commission ordered the disbandment of the PDID, which took place in January 1983."Infiltrating the Public," ''

TIME Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...

'', (26 December 1983)
Archived
at the

Wayback Machine The Wayback Machine is a digital archive of the World Wide Web founded by the Internet Archive, a nonprofit based in San Francisco, California. Created in 1996 and launched to the public in 2001, it allows the user to go "back in time" and see ...

. The ''Vanguard'', meanwhile, published for 14 months before shutting down in the summer of 1977.

References

External links

The Los Angeles Vanguard Archive
Park Center for Independent Media Alternative weekly newspapers published in the United States Newspapers published in Greater Los Angeles Newspapers established in 1976 Weekly newspapers published in California {{California-newspaper-stub