Video posted to social media showed dozens, possibly hundreds, of teens and young adults running around the mall, with multiple fights occurring in groups as they moved around.
Torrance police say the fight was reported around 4 p.m. It took several hours for officers to disperse the crowds, as the city issued warnings asking the public to steer clear of the mall.
They say there may have been as many as 1,000 juveniles at the mall.
Police say there was a report of gunfire but no known serious injuries were reported or victims located.
Witnesses told Eyewitness News some of the fights seemed to have started around the AMC movie theater. Sunday was National Cinema Day and theaters around the country were offering $4 ticket specials.
"It was just everybody just running, going to the movie theater," said witness Connor Swan. "Everybody was just jumping on top of people. It was just chaos."
Jenna, a manager at the BJ's restaurant at the mall, said it was a chaotic scene and they had to lock their doors to prevent more people from entering.
"Just everyone was running up and down the AMC stairwell," she said. "It was mass chaos."
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Because of the size of the crowd, Culver City police were sent to assist Torrance PD with crowd control. Multiple patrol cruisers and dozens of officers were at the mall.
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There were other brawls involving young people and movie theaters around the country on Sunday.
There was no sign they were directly related to each other, but the discounted tickets for National Cinema Day attracted large crowds of young people to those locations.
Brawls involving juveniles were reported Sunday at movie theaters in the Bay Area, Stockton, Indiana, Boston, upstate New York and New Hampshire among areas.