Students and community members filed a lawsuit against California Highway Patrol and Los Angeles Police Department on Thursday for their alleged use of excessive force against protesters during the police sweep of the first Palestine solidarity encampment last May.

The four plaintiffs – some of whom are students – filed the lawsuit with legal support from the greater Los Angeles area chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. The lawsuit seeks damages for alleged assault, battery, negligence, conspiracy and several violations of California civil code by CHP and LAPD.

The lawsuit alleges that officers shot demonstrators with 40 mm “kinetic energy projectiles” which caused severe injuries to the plaintiffs’ heads, hands and several other body parts without lawful justification. At least one of the plaintiffs’ injuries required surgery following the sweep, the lawsuit said.

“Plaintiffs bring this case to demand accountability for CHP’s and LAPD’s violent attack on a diverse group of protestors at UCLA who participated in the Palestine Solidarity Encampment,” the lawsuit said.

Pro-Palestine protesters set up an encampment in Dickson Plaza on April 25, 2024 to demand that the UC divest from companies associated with the Israeli military. The encampment was attacked by counter-protesters April 30 and was subsequently swept by police May 2, resulting in over 200 arrests.

The lawsuit said that one plaintiff, Abdullah Puckett, a doctoral student in anthropology, was conducting research inside the encampment when CHP began tearing down barricades. Puckett alleged that officers shot him with rubber bullets in the arm and ribs as he began retreating with his hands up.

The injuries he sustained caused Puckett difficulty breathing and sleeping for weeks, as well as prolonged pain and emotional distress, the lawsuit alleged.

[Related: Hundreds of protesters detained after police breach pro-Palestine encampment at UCLA]

Kira Layton, a fourth-year art student and another plaintiff, said in the lawsuit that UCLA officers shot her in the hand with a rubber bullet, shattering several bones in her hand, requiring hospitalization, surgery and rehabilitation therapy.

“It stopped my life completely,” Layton said during a Monday press conference. “I couldn’t work, I couldn’t go to school. I had to move out of the apartment I was living in to stay with my mom. I couldn’t sleep.”

Layton said in the press conference that after she was hit, she approached the impromptu medical station inside the encampment to search for an exit so she could go to a hospital, but no one knew how to get out of the area. The only thing they had to help Layton with the pain in her hand – which she said had swollen to the size of a baseball – was Advil, she added.

Layton said that when she came back to school this fall after receiving surgery and physical therapy for her hand, she experienced panic attacks and began failing classes.

“I’m still terrified every time I see police, especially on campus,” Layton said. “The fear I experienced that night is something that is still with me, and since that day, police have continued to show up to our campus in riot gear to brutalize and arrest students.”

The other two plaintiffs – community members who were at the encampment for support – were also hospitalized after being struck with rubber bullets, experiencing prolonged pain and inability to work.

CHP declined to comment, and LAPD did not respond in time to request for comment.

Rebecca Brown, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said in the press conference that there was no warning given to the protesters that force would be used during the sweep. The lawsuit said that in a briefing that night, LA Fire Department Assistant Chief Joseph Everett said he contacted hospitals, which were ready for an influx of patients.

The four plaintiffs also said they have since reconsidered their participation in future protests due to concerns of further violence.

In addition to assault, battery, negligence and conspiracy allegations, the lawsuit also claimed CHP and LAPD acted in violation of California’s Tom Bane Civil Rights Act, which prohibits any person from interfering with the exercise of rights, including freedom of assembly. It also said that CHP and LAPD violated the Ralph Civil Rights Act, which says that people within California have the right to be free from violence based on political affiliation, sex, race, color, religion or national origin.

The lawsuit also alleged that because the plaintiffs are all LA taxpayers, they have the right to prevent the illegal waste of public funds, which they said occurred by “unlawfully deploying kinetic energy projectiles on peaceful protests.”

The plaintiffs are requesting compensatory damages for the pain they experienced, as well as an order enjoining CHP and LAPD from unlawfully policing protected demonstrations from a jury trial.

“If we do not stand against the oppression that others like the Palestinians face abroad, those methods of repression will be used against us here in America,” Puckett said in the press conference. “We cannot allow them to continue to use these tactics with impunity. Not at UCLA, not in LA County, not in America and nowhere else in the world.”