An employee with the Los Angeles City Attorney’s office says he was attacked by an individual outside City Hall on Friday, prompting the office’s Chief of Staff Kathleen Kenealy to warn employees against walking in the area alone.
The victim of the attack was Rob Wilcox, who is also running for City Controller.
Wilcox says an “extremely agitated and angry” man approached him on Friday and began shouting slurs. The man then physically attacked him. Wilcox fled but the man followed, continuing to assault him. Wilcox attempted to flag down a car for help, but none would stop. He ran to the nearby Joy Picus Child Development Center and banged on the door, but no one came.
“I’m fine, but around noon today near City Hall East, I was attacked,” Wilcox tweeted Friday. “I was shoved and kicked. Unfortunately, the attacker was not apprehended. Sadly, this is all too common in our city today. I was lucky, I’m OK, so many others are not. We can do better than this LA!”
“The individual attacker was not apprehended and may still be in the area,” Kenealy wrote in her memo to staff. “We have reported the incident to LAPD, and we will step up our efforts to insist that LAPD and [General Services Department] find solutions to better protect our staff as they come and go from our offices.”
Public safety concerns have been growing for years around the Civic Center, where a large number of homeless encampments have been set up. In 2019, Los Angeles city employees complained that they felt unsafe walking to work. LAPD increased patrols in the area in response to those complaints.