Nearly 1,500 police officers stormed the Occupy Los Angeles camp in the early hours of this morning, driving peaceful protesters from a park around City Hall and arresting more than 200 who defied orders to leave.
Similar raids in Philadelphia resulted in 52 arrests.
In both cities officers invaded the Occupy Wall Street encampments under cover of darkness as they began operations to close some of the longest-enduring protest sites since crackdowns ended similar occupations elsewhere in the country.
In LA riot police fired beanbags from shotguns to subdue the final three protesters in a makeshift tree house outside Los Angeles City Hall. No serious injuries were reported.
Officers flooded down the steps of City Hall just after midnight and started dismantling the two-month-old camp two days after a deadline passed for campers to leave the park.
Police in helmets and wielding batons and guns with rubber bullets converged on the park from all directions with military precision and began making arrests after issuing several orders to leave.
There were no injuries and no drugs or weapons were found during a search of the emptied camp.
The raid in Los Angeles came after demonstrators with the movement in Philadelphia marched through the streets upon being evicted from their site.
More than 40 protesters were arrested after refusing to clear a street northeast of City Hall, said Philadelphia Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey.
They were lined up in handcuffs and loaded on to buses.
Six others were arrested earlier after remaining on a street that police tried to clear.
Members of the National Lawyers guild had legal observers on hand.
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