Film Opens
With Wave
Of Violence
In Several U.S. Cities, Incidents Accompany 'Boyz N the Hood'
By John Lancaster
Washington Post Staff Writer
The opening of the movie "Boyz N the Hood" was accompanied in several U.S. cities by gunfire and violence that left one man dead and more than 30 wounded Friday night and last night, prompting several theaters to cancel the critically acclaimed film on inner-city life.
The violence, which erupted in cities from Los Angeles to Chicago to Racine, Wis., comes just a few months after incidents linked to the showing of "New Jack City," which also dealt with crime and drugs in the inner city. Violence also has been associated with "The Godfather Part III" and "Colors," a movie about gang life in Los Angeles.
Movie executives generally have dismissed as coincidental any link between urban-crime films and outbreaks of violence at theaters. But the number of incidents accompanying Friday night's opening of "Boyz N the Hood" caused enough concern in Hollywood that John Singleton, the film's 23-year-old writer and director, called a news conference yesterday to defend the movie.
Singleton said his "heart goes out to the families of the people that were hurt last night," Reuters reported. But Singleton, whose sometimes-violent film has been described as containing a pacifist message, added, "I didn't create the conditions which make people shoot each other."
Officials at Columbia Pictures, which distributed the movie to 800 theaters nationwide, could not be .reached for comment yesterday, but the Associated Press quoted an anonymous Columbia executive as
See SHOOTINGS, A11, Col. 1
Washington POST SUNDAY 7/14/$1
Violence Accompanies Opening of 'Boyz N the Hood'
SHOOTINGS, From Al
saying, "Who will show these mov-
ies anymore?"
The fatal shooting occurred fol-
lowing a late Friday showing of the
movie in Riverdale, Ill., a suburb of
Chicago, at the Halsted Outdoor
Drive-In. Police said they found the
victim, 23-year-old Michael Booth,
after responding to a report of gun-
shots at the drive-in about 2:20
a.m. yesterday.
Booth was pronounced dead a
short time later at a local hospital,
and police are investigating the pos-
sibility of a link between the shoot-
ing and the movie, said Riverdale
Police Sgt. D. Shillings.
Several of the worst incidents
occurred in the Los Angeles area,
which has been plagued by gang-re-
lated violence.
In Universal City near Los An-
geles, panicky movie-goers ran
from the Cineplex Odeon theater
when three shots were fired shortly
after the lights dimmed Friday, ac-
cording to Sgt. Larry Lincoln, a
spokesman for the Los Angeles
County Sheriff's Department.
Three people were wounded inside
the theater and two others were
shot nearby, but none of the injuries
appeared serious, he said.
Lincoln said the theater had an-
ticipated problems, and sheriff's
deputies had been hired with pri-
vate funds to provide extra security
for the movie. "In the past, it's just
been the experience of Los Angeles
County that. Imovies of this na-
inevitably attract gang
members, who also have a propen-
sity towards violence," Lincoln said.
The Cineplex Odeon complex has
canceled future showings of the
film, news services reported.
Other episodes of movie-related
violence included a drive-by shoot-
ing that critically wounded two peo-
ple outside a theater in downtown
Minneapolis; a minor riot and loot-
ing spree by 600 patrons of a the-
ater in Racine, Wis.; the wounding
of a 19-year-old woman at a theater
in Sacramento, Calif.; the shooting
of four people in a possible gang
fight in Upland, Calif., near Los An-
geles; another gang fight in Tus-
caloosa, Ala.; three stabbings in
New Bern, N.C.; a shooting and
three stabbings in Detroit and a
melee involving more than 100 peo-
ple in Tukwila, Wash. Violence also
was reported at theaters in Massa-
chusetts, Texas and Nevada.
Police in Washington and its sub-
urbs reported no problems in the 18
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The rash of violence may have
been unusually widespread, but it
was hardly the first time theater
crowds have gotten out of hand in
recent years.
One recent episode occurred in
March, when a crowd estimated at
1,500 went on a two-hour looting
rampage through the trendy West-
wood district of Los Angeles after a
theater oversold tickets for "New
Jack City." The movie also was
linked to a fatal shooting in Brook-
lyn and a gang fight at a theater
lobby in Las Vegas.
Similarly, an innocent bystander
was shot to death and three others
were injured in a wild shootout be-
tween two groups of youths during
a showing last Christmas night of
"The Godfather Part III" at a the-
ater in Valley Stream on Long Is-
Jand. The mayor subsequently de-
manded that the owners of the Sun-
rise Multiplex Cinemas install metal
detectors at the theater entrance.
In 1988, authorities warned of
the potential for violence surround-
ing the movie "Colors," starring
Robert Duvall and Sean Penn. One
apparent gang member was shot to
death while waiting in line to see
the movie in Stockton, Calif.
But while theater operators try
to anticipate movies that might pro-
vcke violence, they cautioned that
content is not the only factor. At
the Rapids Plaza Cinema in Racine,
for example, Friday night's melee
erupted after theater managers
canceled the show and tried to re-
fund money to ticket holders.
They did so because 200 people
had barged into the already crowded
theater through a side door without
paying, and the crowd was over the
legal limit. But the refunds took so
long that patrons rioted, smashing
candy counters, stealing cash and
injuring at least one employee, offi-
cials said.
A theater spokesman said yes-
terday there were no plans to can-
cel the film.
Staff writers Carlos Sanchez and
Carla Hall contributed to this report.
...R1 SUNDAY, JULY 14, 1991 A11
Los Angeles police aid injured youth after scuffle outside theater Friday night.
Fatal Shooting in NW
An unidentified man who ap peared to be in his early twenties was shot and killed last night in the 1900 block of Ninth Street NW, D.C. police reported.
Witnesses said the victim was pursued by his assailant for more than a block before he was shot in the head around 11:30 p.m. They said bullets ricocheted off several objects during the chase, which began near Eighth and S streets NW.
Washington Post SUNDAY- 7/14/91
14-Year-Old Car Passenger Slain in NW
Shooting, Believed to Be Drug-Related, Occurred Near the Site of Similar Killing
By Brian Mooar and Gabriel Escobar
Washington Post Staff Writers
A 14-year-old youth was shot to
death early yesterday while riding
in a car near Sherman Circle in
Northwest Washington.
The burst of gunfire, fired from
another moving vehicle, cut two
holes in the back of a blue 1981
Mercury Lynx as it sped away from
the 700 block of Decatur Street
29, who was in her car with her
three children when a stray bullet
struck her in the head.
Police officers investigating yes-
terday's shooting, which occurred
about 4:45 a.m., said it was fortu-
nate the street was nearly deserted
at the time because several rounds
apparently were fired at the vehicle
as it was being driven through the
residential area.
The driver of the Lynx fled nearly 13 blocks, west on Decatur and north on Georgia Avenue, before as in the upper body, fatally wound-stopping to flag down a police of
One bullet struck Donnell Thom
ing him, while the other skipped off a headrest before piercing the front
The shooting, which police said
appeared to be drug-related, was
the second in a week in which pas-
'sengers in one moving car fired at
another.
It was that type of incident that
on Tuesday killed Marcia Williams,
ficer in front of Morton's department store in the 5600 block of Georgia Avenue. A third person
was in the car at the time of the
shooting, police said.
The gunshot victim was uncon-
scious when paramedics pulled him
from the vehicle's back seat. He
was taken to Washington Hospital
Center, where he was pronounced
dead at 5:29 a.m., officials said.
Neighbors of the young victim
said he had grown up in the neigh-
borhood-the 500 block of Buchan-
an Street three blocks from the
shooting-and had moved in with
his grandparents in a different
neighborhood about a year ago.
Family members declined to be in-
terviewed.
Residents of the usually quiet,
middle-class Sherman Circle neigh-
borhood said they were jolted
awake by the repetitive crack of
semiautomatic gunfire and the
screeching of tires as the car sped
away.
The shooting, coming just three
days after the slaying of Williams
and about 10 blocks away, left many
residents shaken.
"Not only do you have to pay at-
tention to just driving, now you
have to worry about this," neighbor-
hood resident Retna Pullings said,
motioning to the street where the
shooting occurred.
Pullings, a criminal defense law-
yer, left her home about 6:30 a.m.
to drop off a load of laundry at the
dry cleaner, but she stopped her car
to find out what was wrong when
she saw the bright yellow police
tape surrounding the crime scene.
"Any of us could be the next vic-
tim. Maybe my child," she said såd-
ly.
Curious residents in suits and
sweats and nightgowns, walking
dogs and riding bikes, slowly.p
raded by the scene and stopped p
watch investigators as they gath
ered evidence. Each appeared
shocked, sad or angry when told
fatal shooting had occurred.
On Georgia Avenue, a resident
who identified herself only as Ca-
milla shook her head in disgust
when she heard that another person
had been killed by gunfire in her
area of the District.
"It's really getting wild; it's get-
ting crazy," Camilla said.
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