National Guard in LA to help quell violence

The mayor of Los Angeles said on Saturday that the National Guard will be deployed overnight to help local law enforcement quell violence in the nation’s second-largest city.

Mayor Eric Garcetti says he asked California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Saturday to send 500 to 700 members of the Guard.

Crowds of demonstrators have torched police cars, vandalized and burglarized stores and clashed with lines of officers.

Hundreds of people have been arrested since Friday night - footage shows dozens of detainees lined up after beoing detained by police.

The protests in Los Angeles follow similar action in several other U.S. cities, brough on by the death in Minneapolis of George Floyd, a handcuffed black man who pleaded for air as a white police officer pressed a knee on his neck.