Posted By: ledzepnews 20th January More than pages of previously unseen police files obtained by LedZepNews provide new details on a notorious riot that took place in Tampa, Florida on June 3, following the premature end of a Led Zeppelin concert due to heavy rain.
Through a records request, LedZepNews obtained a collection of 25 police reports that were made following the concert and the subsequent riot by officers from the City of Tampa Police Department. The records provide a fascinating series of snapshots of the riot, showing how police spent a relatively relaxed afternoon arresting fans for drug offences before a riot broke out at 9. Once the riot began, police reports show escalating tension inside the stadium with multiple reports of violence against police and glass bottles thrown by concert attendees.
LedZepNews has used the collection of unseen police reports, press coverage from the time as well as audience recordings of the abandoned concert and existing coverage of the event to piece together this definitive timeline of the day.
We have not named any of the concert attendees and have chosen not to publish any of the original police reports as many of the concert attendees identified in the files were teenagers or in their early twenties at the time they were arrested nearly 50 years ago.
Fans who had been waiting outside the stadium were allowed into the venue at Police reports from the afternoon before the concert note that the weather was clear.
