Art or threat? Video criticizes LAPD after Ezell Ford shooting

SOUTH LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- An anti-LAPD music video rages against the police in response to the fatal police shooting of Ezell Ford in South Los Angeles. Is the video a threat to the safety of LAPD officers?

Critics fear it is calling for revenge over the fatal police shooting of an unarmed man. But the maker of the video tells a different story.

Officially, LAPD command staff isn't commenting on the music video, but the union that represents the rank and file says the video is, in essence, a threat to police officers.

Meanwhile, the creator of the song and the video says he's merely using his art to express his frustrations over what's become a very controversial police shooting.

The song is called "F Tha Police," and the obscenity-laced lyrics take aim directly at the LAPD. But the creator of the song and the video says his lyrics are not to be taken literally.

"I'm an artist, so I use music to express my feelings," said Ceebo Tha Rapper.

Ceebo is a South LA-based musician who released his controversial video earlier this week. He says it was inspired by the recent police shooting of his friend, Ezell Ford, an unarmed man who was killed by LAPD officers after a confrontation in South Los Angeles last week.

"We know that we can't go at war with the police and throw rocks and shoot guns at them or anything like that, we understand that," said Ceebo. "But we do know that we have a right."

At one point, people in the video can be seen making hand gestures that look like pistols. The Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union that represents more than 10,000 LAPD officers, says the video could inspire others to take revenge on officers.

"What about when you guys are jumping out with real, actual live guns in our faces and screaming, sweating, looking very angry? You know, we're the ones that should be scared. We should feel threatened," said Ceebo.

Some feel that songs like these don't do anyone any good.

"My concern is for the safety of those that are out there every day," said Cheryl Dorsey is an author and who spent 20 years as a member of the LAPD. "If I were a few years dumber and I heard that, I might want to act on it, and so that's what concerns me, is that someone might hear that and might take it to heart, literally, and then go out and do something."

Others feel like focusing on the song only clouds the larger issue.

"It doesn't necessarily mean that they are just going out and they're going to attack police officers, commit violence acts. I haven't seen any evidence of that," said Earl Ofari Hutchinson, the host of the Hutchinson Report on KTYM radio.

Friday morning's broadcast featured a panel discussion on how the LAPD has handled the Ford shooting.

"The bottom line is it's going to have to be a real, real coming to grips with how these things happen, why they happen, and not just what happened in the past or the present, but how it can be done differently and even better in the future," said Hutchinson.

The Ford shooting investigation is ongoing.