another day in the neighborhood

Thursday, March 27, 2003, at 08:42AM

By Eric Richardson

A couple minutes ago I look out my window and see an LAPD helicoptor maybe 200 feet away (probably 30 feet above the level of our building). That's kind of unusual during the day, so it catches my interest. He looks like he's circling the Vermont/29th intersection, so I look over that direction. A black guy runs around the corner, and I think "LAPD's probably chasing that guy." Five seconds later an LAPD car rounds the corner, catches up to the guy, pulls alongside him, and opens his door. At this point they get sort of screened by the Autozone, put I assume he pulled his gun on him, and took him in that way. Four or five cars quickly descend on the scene. Now, seven minutes later, there's absolutely no sign that this just happened.