City of Los Angeles prosecuting businesses that violate safer-at-home orders

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Los Angeles city prosecutors are going after more than a dozen businesses that have failed to comply with local stay-at-home orders, City Attorney Mike Feuer said Tuesday.

Feuer said his office has initiated 10 additional prosecutions, on top of four that were announced earlier, of non-essential businesses that have stayed open despite orders to close.

Those businesses were given warnings first before the charges were filed, Feuer said.

"All non-essential businesses need to comply," Feuer said. "There can be no exceptions. Because the quicker that compliance is complete, the sooner all Angelenos can get back to work and resume our normal day-to-day routine."

Those businesses included a print shop, a spa performing massages, a beauty supply store, smoke shops and bait shops, Feuer said.

Mayor Eric Garcetti said the city has citizen volunteers who are visiting businesses, either based on tips or their own observations, that may be violating orders to close or enforce social distancing. The volunteers have visited some 1,400 locations, he said. Los Angeles police officers have also visited about 1,200 of those and referred 79 of them to the City Attorney's Office for misdemeanor consideration.

Anyone who wishes to report a Los Angeles business possibly violating the mayor's orders can fill out a form here.

Feuer said his office has also been successful defending the stay-at-home order against court filings by gun-rights advocates who want to keep gun shops open.

"The mayor's order is clear," Feuer said. "All non-essential businesses must close."