Story 1: The Lunatic Left Agitators and Activists and The Failure of Government Schools, Housing and Welfare State On Display In Ferguson, Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Oakland, Philadelphia, Seattle, St. Louis, Washington, D.C. — Dumbed Down — Hands Up — Don’t Shoot — Just Loot — Progressive Parade Plays With Traffic On U.S. Highways — Race Riot Route — Videos
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Just Tell Us The Truth…
Protesters Turn Out in U.S. Cities Following Ferguson Decision
Rallies Largely Peaceful, Though Some Vandalism Occurred in at Least One City
By
THOMAS MACMILLAN,
ALEJANDRO LAZO and
CAMERON MCWHIRTER
Protests broke out in a number of U.S. cities following the decision on Monday by a grand jury not to indict a Ferguson, Mo., police officer in the shooting death of a black teenager.
Marches and rallies had been planned in many of the nation’s largest cities, from New York to Chicago to Houston, regardless of the jury’s finding.
In New York, hundreds of demonstrators gathered in Union Square in Manhattan. When the grand jury decision was announced, word quickly spread through the crowd. In a few minutes, most were holding one fist up in the air as they observed a moment of silence that lasted nearly five minutes.
The only audible sound was the shutter of press cameras. Some demonstrators were in tears.
WSJ’s Ben Kesling reports from the scene in Ferguson, Mo., after a grand jury declined to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the shooting of Michael Brown Photo: Getty Images
Then, with the cooperation of New York Police Department officers, the protesters began a spontaneous march, moving north along Sixth Avenue, blocking traffic. Protesters occupied several blocks as they marched toward Times Square.
“I feel like I don’t have an outlet for my anger,” said Monica Thompson, 29 years old, a social worker who lives in Harlem. “There’s not been an indictment. There’s an acceptance that black and brown lives don’t matter.”
A police helicopter hovered overhead as protesters marched and a large police presence accompanied the protest. No arrests were reported as of 10:30 p.m.
A sense of anger pulsed through the crowd. “They don’t know what they just started,” said Precious Etsekhume, 22, referring to the government and police. “They are going to regret every bad decision they made.”
At a New York news conference, the Rev. Al Sharpton , who has worked to bring attention to the case since Ferguson officer Darren Wilson shot unarmed teenager Michael Brown, called for a federal investigation into the shooting, saying he had no confidence in local prosecutors.
Mr. Sharpton said the grand jury’s decision was expected but was “still an absolute blow to those of us that wanted to see a fair and open trial.”
Mr. Sharpton appeared with the family of Eric Garner, a New York City man whose death was caused by an apparent police chokehold, according to the city’s medical examiner. Mr. Garner’s family didn’t speak.
In Oakland, Calif. police and protesters clashed violently after groups of protesters blocked a major Bay Area freeway for hours, set piles of trash ablaze on city streets and looted retail shops in the city’s downtown area.
WSJ’s Ben Kesling reports from Ferguson, Mo., on the growing protests after a grand jury declined to indict Officer Darren Wilson for the shooting of Michael Brown. Photo: AP
After marching relatively peacefully for more than an hour, the crowd gathered near City Hall grew to stretch more than two city blocks, and became increasingly unruly, vandalizing buildings and smashing windows of a Chase Bank branch as they marched through downtown and then through the city’s increasingly gentrifying Lake Merritt neighborhood.
About 500 protesters ran up a freeway on ramp near a Trader Joe’s grocery store, the Oakland Police Department said, bringing traffic to a halt for hours on Interstate 580. Several arrests were made, Oakland police said, and the freeway was eventually reopened.
But clashes continued both near the freeway and in the city’s downtown, where the protests had originated. By midnight, protesters had ignited large fires on a street in downtown Oakland and looters could be seen breaking into several stores.
Inside a Metro PCS store, one woman tossed packages through a smashed glass door to gathered crowds. Down the street, young men hurled beer bottles at people passing bye.
Close to the city’s police headquarters, protesters confronted officers in full riot gear and gas masks, linking arms and advancing toward the police shortly after midnight. The police, in turn, advanced toward the protesters and some in the crowd threw water bottles and other objects at the officers.
“This is an unlawful assembly,” a policeman announced via a speaker system. “You may be arrested and subject to removal by force if necessary.”
A man in the crowd wearing a sweatshirt and carrying a bullhorn answered back with his own announcement.
“The Oakland Police Department is now under citizen’s arrest,” he said. “By the power invested in the people of California, the Oakland Police Department is now under arrest. We are arresting you for violating our civil rights.”
Clashes continued into the early morning as police steadily moved up the street arresting and confronting protesters.
D’Andre Teeter, 70, from Berkeley, said before the grand jury’s decision was announced that anything less than an indictment for murder would be an “outrage.”
”We are out here to say this has to stop, and we think the whole country must come to a halt regardless of the outcome of the grand jury’s decision,” he said.
Across the bay in San Francisco, a crowd of a few dozen people gathered in the Mission District to await the grand jury decision. Carrying signs reading “Justice 4 Mike Brown,” they booed and chanted, “The people say guilty! The people say guilty!” when the news came that Officer Wilson wouldn’t be indicted.
In downtown Atlanta, a handful of civil-rights activists gathered outside the Richard B. Russell Federal Building to address the media after the verdict was announced. Markel Hutchins, an African American minister, choked back tears at one point when describing how frustrated he was by the decision.
“If you don’t look like Michael Brown, or have a son or grandson or cousin that looks like Michael Brown, you will never understand why we feel the way we feel tonight,” he said.
With unseasonably chilly temperatures that swept into the area Monday night, most of downtown Atlanta was desolate and no major disturbances were reported. Civil-rights leaders said they planned a peaceful protest Tuesday evening.
In Philadelphia, the city’s police department was monitoring the situation and watching social media, said a spokesman for Mayor Michael Nutter. The mayor earlier told reporters he recognizes the public’s right to demonstrate but urged people to do so nonviolently.
According to the Associated Press, several hundred protesters marched through downtown Philadelphia, yelling, “No justice, no peace, no racist police!” A similar protest of about 50 people in Pittsburgh was short-lived, with activists saying they plan to regroup Tuesday at the federal courthouse, the AP reported.
Law-enforcement officials in Los Angeles said they had prepared for potential unrest in the nation’s second-largest city, but a small protest march that started in Leimert Park in south L.A. blocked traffic along its route but otherwise remained peaceful.
As they marched on foot and on bicycles, the few dozen protesters carried signs, blew whistles and shouted: “If you’re sick of the murdering police, outta your house and into the street.” At one point, a few protesters briefly made their way onto a section of the I-10 freeway before police moved them back.
Cue Jnmarie, a 50-year-old pastor, said he met with police twice to prepare for the response to the grand jury’s decision. He said he is pushing for public policy changes, and doesn’t support violence. He said community organizers and religious leaders there aimed to do more than “blow off steam” about Michael Brown’s death.
”This is not just happening now,” he said. “It has been happening, and it’s part of the culture.”
Mr. Jnmarie described himself as a victim of racial profiling in Los Angeles and said the community is angry. “Police protect and serve everyone except people of color,” he said.
”We do everything in our power to facilitate lawful, peaceful demonstrations as long as they don’t become violent or destructive,” said Andy Neiman, spokesman for the Los Angeles Police Department.
In Seattle, where a protest march also was reported to be nonviolent, the police department said it hadn’t made any major preparations for protests. The department prefers to take a “rather toned-down approach to that sort of thing,” said Patrick Michaud, a Seattle police detective with the force’s public affairs unit.
In Baltimore, two groups said they would wait until Tuesday afternoon to march through downtown, regardless of the grand jury’s decision. “We want the time to have the largest gathering possible,” said Sharon Black, local representative of one of the groups, the Peoples Power Assembly. “It’s difficult to get a large, large group out in the middle of the night. We want our message to be heard.”
Ferguson and Other Cities React to Grand Jury Decision Not to Indict Darren Wilson
Journalists with The New York Times in Ferguson, Mo., are following a grand jury’s decision not to indict Darren Wilson, a white police officer, in the shooting death of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager. On Monday night, the scene in downtown Ferguson grew increasingly unruly as the night wore on with the police using tear gas to disperse crowds who were throwing rocks and shattering store windows. Some businesses were looted, the police said. Protests also broke out in other cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Oakland and Seattle.
Follow Tuesday’s live updates and other ongoing coverage here.
A photograph of Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson presented as evidence to the grand jury.Credit via St. Louis County Prosecutor’s Office
Among the many things found in Darren Wilson’s grand jury testimony are several references to the way he felt intimidated by Michael Brown. Though Officer Wilson is himself a large man – nearly 6’4″, around 210 pounds, according to his own testimony — he repeatedly described Mr. Brown as aggressive, big, and threatening, often in vivid language. Here are a few excerpts from his description of the altercation at the window of his patrol car:
“I tried to hold his right arm and use my left hand to get out to have some kind of control and not be trapped in my car any more. And when I grabbed him, the only way I can describe it is I felt like a five-year-old holding onto Hulk Hogan.”
“I felt that another one of those punches in my face could knock me out or worse. I mean it was, he’s obviously bigger than I was and stronger and the, I’ve already taken two to the face and I didn’t think I would, the third one could be fatal if he hit me right.”
“After seeing the blood on my hand, I looked at him and was, this is my car door, he was here and he kind of stepped back and went like this. And then after he did that, he looked up at me and had the most intense aggressive face. The only way I can describe it, it looks like a demon, that’s how angry he looked. He comes back towards me again with his hands up.”
A police officer from the nearby suburb of University City was shot overnight, but it was unclear if it was related to the grand jury’s decision in the Ferguson case, the St. Louis County police said early Tuesday.
The officer was shot in the arm was expected to be “okay,” the police said in a Twitter post. The police were searching for a suspect.
The officer was shot at the intersection of Canton Avenue and Lamb Avenue in University City, a police spokesman said.
12:42 A.M.Protesters Block Interstate 44 in St. Louis
Photo
Protesters shut down Interstate 44 at Grand Avenue in both directions in St. Louis on Monday.Credit J.B. Forbes/St. Louis Post-Dispatch, via Associated Press
12:33 A.M.Sounds of Gunfire and Alarms on Ferguson Streets
Photo
Fire roared through a Little Caesar’s restaurant on Monday night in Ferguson, Mo.CreditTannen Maury/European Pressphoto Agency
There were numerous stretches of Ferguson late Monday night where all was calm, all was well. Stores with “I Love Ferguson” signs in the windows. The red bows and holiday lights wrapped around the light poles downtown still perfectly intact.
But there were pockets that felt like a city under siege.
A Little Caesars Pizza shop was in flames. There were shattered windows at El Palenque Mexican restaurant, and at a UMB Bank branch. Thick smoke poured from the busted front entrance of a Walgreens pharmacy. Men stepped in but quickly stepped out, complaining that it was too hard to see anything because of the smoke. The sound of gunfire occasionally rang out in the distance, and the acidic smell and aftertaste of tear gas filled the air. One man exited the store and jokingly asked if anyone wanted cigarettes.
At the intersection of North Florissant Road and Hereford Avenue – “Ferguson, a city since 1894,” reads the sign at the corner – firefighters worked on putting out the Little Caesars blaze, but there were no police or fire officials at Walgreens. The fire inside continued to burn. Spectators drove up to the store, as did news crews. All the while, the pharmacy’s high-pitched security bell echoed, the soundtrack of the evening’s drama.
“Not often you get to see anarchy, huh?” one man taking pictures outside Walgreens said.
Protesters in Oakland blocked a highway on Monday night in response to the grand jury’s decision in Ferguson, Mo.Credit Jim Wilson/The New York Times
In Oakland, Calif., protesters blocked a portion of Interstate 580, forcing cars to stop. One man said he had been sitting in his car for about 45 minutes. “I knew there would be protests, but I didn’t think it would get this hectic with shutting down the freeway and all the cops,” said the man, Alex Perez, 28, of Oakland. He was trying to get home, but said he was sympathetic to what the protesters were trying to do. “It was unwarranted for a kid to get shot.”
Demonstrators outside the White House on Monday.Credit Jabin Botsford/The New York Times
Photo
A gathering in downtown Seattle.Credit Evan McGlinn for The New York Times
12:29 A.M.Flight restrictions at Lambert-St. Louis International
Inbound flights to Lambert-St. Louis International Airport were not being permitted to land late Monday as a safety precaution, officials said. The Federal Aviation Administration issued a temporary flight restriction, or TFR, affecting inbound flights, the airport said in a post on Twitter.
Demonstrators reacted on Monday night in Los Angeles to the grand jury’s decision not to indict Office Darren Wilson in the fatal shooting of Michael Brown.Credit Ringo Chiu/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Late on Monday night, a crowd of about 200 people had blocked traffic on Crenshaw Boulevard, a main thoroughfare through South Los Angeles. The crowd swelled to over 250 as it marched north, then turned east on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, a central strip that cuts through South Los Angeles toward downtown Los Angeles.
Beating drums, the crowd chanted: “Turn up, turn down, we do this for Mike Brown.”
The crowd was young, mostly in their 20s and 30s. Police squad cars and officers stood by at a few intersections. Some protesters carried their cellphones, recording officers or photographing the scene. Helicopters hovered overhead.
John K. Givens, 45, a Los Angeles resident who works at a freight trading company, marched with the crowd, wearing a gray Dodgers cap and a navy blue vest jacket. “I was emotionally bothered by the decision,” Mr. Givens said of the grand jury in the Ferguson, Mo., case.
Mr. Givens said that as a black male, violent interactions were to be expected. His younger brother, Mr. Givens said, had been beaten by a Los Angeles police officer. “It’s nothing new,” he said. “This is the one that got the most media attention.”
Monday night’s grand jury decision to not indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson over the fatal shooting of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown, led to riots in the Missouri city.
Although Michael Brown’s family, President Barack Obama, and authorities called for peaceful protests, the Ferguson was soon out of control.
The riots saw a return to the looting, fires and property damages which took place on a smaller scale in August, immediately after the shooting of Brown.
Scroll down for video
Damage done: Two buildings still smoulder after the riots that ravaged Ferguson, Missouri overnight
Before: A satellite image taken by Google in September 2012 show the buildings intact
As the sun rose on Tuesday, the cityscape of Ferguson looked worlds away from satellite and Google Street View snaps taken just months earlier.
Pictures from yesterday in comparison with images from before, tracked down byThe Wall Street Journal, show the damage done.
Last night, tens of thousands of people in more than 170 cities across America – including Atlanta, Boston, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles, among others – were demonstrating against the long-awaited verdict.
However, despite the St. Louis grand jury decision, federal investigations into the shooting of Michael Brown continue the US Attorney General said on Monday.
The Justice Department will continue to pursue two investigations, one into potential civil rights violations by Officer Wilson when he shot dead unarmed Brown in August this year, and one into the practices of the Ferguson Police force.
Damaged buildings in Ferguson following night of protests
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Beauty lost: A beauty supply store has been left in ruins after Monday night’s riots
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True beauty: A Google Street View snap from 2010 shows the shop in its original state
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Burned out: A building in Ferguson only has its four walls left after being destroyed by fire
Better times: The building, which appears to be a shop, is pictured on Google earlier this year
The fire at the local Little Ceasars restaurant left the big orange sign in a melted lump on the ground
Neighborhood joint: There is no sign of its former glory, captured by Google in August 2012
Distraught: The manager of the Little Caesar’s said he understood the protesters were angry but added: ‘Speaking your mind – that’s America. You are supposed to be able to protest peacefully and make your point. But this…’
More destruction: The arson frenzy also hit South Florissant Street, about a mile away. This branch of Little Casear’s was burned out
Et tu: The neighboring antique shop to the Little Caesar’s was also destroyed in the orgy of violence which hit Ferguson
Long way back: A woman stops to take a picture using her phone of the damage done
Still intact: The local Clean World Laundromat was still standing on Monday morning
Residents on the streets told MailOnline that the wreckage to Ferguson was so bad that it looked like ‘Ferganistan’.
Another said that it ‘looked like Iraq’.
Almost every building along South Florissant Street, where the Ferguson police station is located, had been ransacked or vandalised.
Tony Koenig and his brother Ray, 38 and 40, had taken the day off from working as school groundskeepers to help rebuild a Mexican restaurant run by a friend.
Tony said: ‘I have lived in Ferguson for 38 years and I have never seen anything like this. They just want street justice and they don’t care about how they get it.
‘This young generation. I cannot understand why they do what they do. The parents are to blame. When me and my brother grew up both our parents worked and we were raised knowing how to show respect, and that doesn’t happen these days.
‘We’ve had a hard enough time paying our mortgages after the economy went down. We don’t need this’.
Their friend Drew Canaday, who was also helping them, lives in the street next to South Florissant and said that it was ‘like a war’ the night before.
Destruction: :A rioter uses a stick to break a window at the Hunan Chop Suey Chinese Restaurant along West Florissant Ave last night
Nothing left: This was all that was left of the Hunan Chop Suey Chinese restaurant this morning after the fire wrecked it
Picture: ‘I don’t condone this but I can understand it. I have been racially profiled myself,’ said Jason Westbrook of Ferguson as he took video of the burning of the Title Max Loans business on West Florissant
As they were: The Hunan Chop Suey and TitleMax loans were both intact before last night’s orgy of violence
Burning: Cars parked outside one row of shops on West Florissant were targeted in the destruction spree
Burned out: Cars parked outside one row of shops on West Florissant were targeted in the destruction spree
Inspection: The scale of destruction became clear today after a night which saw fires raised across the St Louis suburb of Ferguson
Attacked: McDonald’s on West Florissant was smashed up although not set on fire. It had previously (right) avoided damage
Devastated: A gas station was among the targets of the violence. Today property manager Terri Willits witnessed the destruction
Crime scene: Much of West Florissant was under police guard today and described by officers as an active crime scene
He said: ‘These young people are so used to instant gratification, they want stuff now. They are too immature to understand that stuff takes time.
‘Especially something this big. It takes dialogue and not everyone will be happy but that’s compromise.
‘These people don’t want to wait. That what today’s society has come to, not just here in Ferguson – this is America, this is the world.’
Further up South Florissant a Little Caesar’s pizza restaurant had been burned to the ground, as had the antiques store next to it.
The manager of the restaurant, who declined to give his name for fear of reprisals, said that 12 people had now been put out of work and did not know if the owners would rebuild.
The manager said that the store was destroyed by a tornado three years earlier and they did build it back but it cost ‘a lot of money’.
He said: ‘Most of the people here have families and they are very worried about what will come next for them.
‘I’m proud to work here and started as the dishwasher and worked my way up. I had a motorcycle accident and had my foot amputated and they were good enough to give me a job,
The manger, a widower with two children in their 20s, said that he was in principle on the side of the protesters but that this was ‘too far’.
He said: ‘I believe in their right to protest and what they’re doing is a just case.
‘Speaking your mind – that’s America. You are supposed to be able to protest peacefully and make your point. But this…’
Darlena Cunha is a Florida-based contributor to The Washington Post and TIME among dozens of other publications.
The violent protests in Ferguson, Mo., are part of the American experience. Peaceful protesting is a luxury only available to those safely in mainstream culture
When a police officer shoots a young, unarmed black man in the streets, then does not face indictment, anger in the community is inevitable. It’s what we do with that anger that counts. In such a case, is rioting so wrong?
Riots are a necessary part of the evolution of society. Unfortunately, we do not live in a universal utopia where people have the basic human rights they deserve simply for existing, and until we get there, the legitimate frustration, sorrow and pain of the marginalized voices will boil over, spilling out into our streets. As “normal” citizens watch the events of Fergusonunfurl on their television screens and Twitter feeds, there is a lot of head shaking, finger pointing, and privileged explanation going on. We wish to seclude the incident and the people involved. To separate it from our history as a nation, to dehumanize the change agents because of their bad and sometimes violent decisions—because if we can separate the underlying racial tensions that clearly exist in our country from the looting and rioting of select individuals, we can continue to ignore the problem.
While the most famous rant against the riots thus far comes from Hercules actor Kevin Sorbo, where he calls the rioters “animals” and “losers,” there are thousands of people echoing these sentiments. Sorbo correctly ascertains that the rioting has little to do with the shooting of an unarmed black man in the street, but he blames it on the typical privileged American’s stereotype of a less fortunate sect of human being—that the looting is a result of frustration built up over years of “blaming everyone else, The Man, for their failures.”
Because when you have succeeded, it ceases to be a possibility, in our capitalist society, that anyone else helped you. And if no one helped you succeed, then no one is holding anyone else back from succeeding. Except they did help you, and they are holding people back. So that blaming someone else for your failures in the United States may very well be an astute observation of reality, particularly as it comes to white privilege versus black privilege. And, yes, they are different, and they are tied to race, and that doesn’t make me a racist, it makes me a realist. If anything, I am racist because I am white. Until I have had to walk in a person of color’s skin, I will never understand, I will always take things for granted, and I will be inherently privileged. But by ignoring the very real issues this country still faces in terms of race to promote an as-of-yet imaginary colorblind society, we contribute to the problem at hand, which is centuries of abuses lobbied against other humans on no basis but that of their skin color.
PHOTOS: FERGUSON IGNITES WITH VIOLENCE OVERNIGHT
BARRETT EMKE FOR TIME
Law enforcement stands in full gear by tanks in Ferguson, Mo. on Nov. 24, 2014
Sorbo is not alone. A webpage devoted to Tea Party politics has hundreds of comments disparaging the rioters, bemoaning the state of our country and very much blaming skin color as the culprit of this debauched way of dealing with the state of our society.
“To hear the libs, one would think that burning and looting are a justifiable way to judge negative events that effect (sic) the black,” one person wrote. “I intentionally used black because of a fact that you do not hear of these events when another skin color is in play. It is about time that the blacks start cleaning their own backyards before they start on ours.”
However, even the Tea Party gets its name from a riot, The Boston Tea Party. For those who need a quick history brush-up, in 1773 American protesters dumped an entire shipment of tea into the Boston Harbor to protest The Tea Act, which colonists maintained violated their rights. In response to this costly protest and civil unrest, the British government enforced The Coercive Acts, ending local government in Massachusetts, which in turn led to the American Revolution and created our great country.
Samuel Adams wrote of the incident, claiming it “was not the act of a lawless mob, but was instead a principled protest and the only remaining option the people had to defend their constitutional rights” according to John K. Alexander, author ofSamuel Adams: America’s Revolutionary Politician.
That protest back in 1773 was meant to effect political and societal change, and while the destruction of property in that case may not have ended in loss of human life, the revolutionthat took place afterward certainly did. What separates a heralded victory in history from an attempt at societal change, a cry for help from the country’s trampled, today? The fact that we won.
In terms of riots being more common in black communities, that is true only when the riots are politically aimed.
The obvious example here is the L.A. Riots of 1992, after the Rodney King beating and verdict. I would put forth that peaceful protesting is a luxury of those already in mainstream culture, those who can be assured their voices will be heard without violence, those who can afford to wait for the change they want.
“I risk sounding racist but if this was a white kid there would be no riot,” another person wrote on the Tea Party page. “History shows us that blacks in this country are more apt to riot than any other population. They are stirred up by racist black people and set out to cause problems. End of story.”
Blacks in this country are more apt to riot because they are one of the populations here who still need to. In the case of the 1992 riots, 30 years of black people trying to talk about their struggles of racial profiling and muted, but still vastly unfair, treatment, came to a boil. Sometimes, enough is simply too much. And after that catalyst event, the landscape of southern California changed, and nationally, police forces took note.
And the racism they are fighting, the racism we are all fighting, is still alive and well throughout our nation. The modern racism may not culminate in separate water fountains and separate seating in the backs of buses, but its insidious nature is perhaps even more dangerous to the individuals who have to live under the shroud of stereotypical lies society foists upon them.
Instead of tearing down other human beings who are acting upon decades of pent-up anger at a system decidedly against them, a system that has told them they are less than human for years, we ought to be reaching out to help them regain the humanity they lost, not when a few set fire to the buildings in Ferguson, but when they were born the wrong color in the post-racial America.
Dozens in Boston face charges for Ferguson protest
By Martin Finucane and Peter Schworm
Dozens of people are facing charges after crowds took to the streets of Boston Tuesday night to protest a grand jury’s decision not to charge a Ferguson, Mo., police officer in the fatal shooting of a black teenager who was unarmed.
Boston police arrested 47 people on charges that include disorderly conduct and disturbing the peace, said police spokesman Officer James Kenneally.
Still, there were no major incidents or injuries reported in the mostly peaceful demonstrations.
“All in all, I think everybody handled themselves pretty well last night,” said Police Commissioner William Evans. “We wanted people to be able to express their frustration but, at the same time, we did want everybody to be safe.”
Demonstrations also took place in other cities around the country, including in New York, Seattle, and Washington, D.C., as the decision not to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the death of Michael Brown sparked a heated national debate about law enforcement’s relationship with minority communities.
View Graphic
Map: Ferguson protests in US
Though most of the gatherings were peaceful the day after the announcement, many cities saw marchers disrupting traffic and getting into confrontations with police.
Photos: Protesters march
Anthony Braga: Why Boston’s protests were mostly peaceful
Sense of resigned anger in Boston
The Boston marchers faced arraignment Wednesday in Roxbury District Court and Boston Municipal Court. About half those arrested were Boston residents. Most were college students, Kenneally said.
Many were arrested at Melnea Cass Boulevard and Massachusetts Avenue, where there was a sit-in, he said.
Evans said at a news conference that police had gone with a “real soft approach.”
He said he felt the protest went well “because of our whole style,” which includes “great community relations” and a constant dialogue with the community.
He said police recognized a number of the protesters from Occupy Boston, which occupied an area in downtown Boston in 2011.
Police expect protests to continue as long as Ferguson itself is “hot,” but he said, “I’d like to continue dialogue so Boston can be a model of how protests should go.”
At Roxbury District Court, one protester being arraigned painted a less sunny view of how police behaved.
“I was struck in the face by police. They put me in a headlock and dragged me out of the protest group and they hit me in the face, they threw me on the ground. … They handled it pretty poorly,” said David Meredith, a Salem State junior from Revere. Meredith had a black eye, which he said police had inflicted on him.
“I wasn’t shocked. I was appalled, but I wasn’t shocked. The police were being very confrontational. They seemed very angry the entire time,” he said, noting that he saw an officer choking another man, who was holding a camera.
Both Boston police and State Police interacted with demonstrators. It wasn’t clear what agency the officers who confronted Meredith came from.
David Procopio, a State Police spokesman, said that “because of superb cooperation and coordination between State and Boston police, we were able to prevent protesters from entering the Southeast Expressway and the Mass. Turnpike.”
He added that monitoring social media “provided critical intelligence about protesters’ plans to try to disrupt traffic on state highways.”
One state trooper was bitten on the wrist by a protester, Procopio said. He was treated by Boston EMS on the scene.
An estimated 1,400 protesters marched from Dudley Square to the South Bay House of Correction, then onto the Massachusetts Avenue Connector near Interstate 93 before being blocked by police, the Globe reported Wednesday morning
The protesters spread across Boston, through Back Bay and the Financial District, meeting police again in Dewey Square — the former site of the Occupy encampment — outside South Station late Tuesday night, the Globe reported.
State troopers also assisted with other largely peaceful protests in Worcester, Northampton, and Springfield Tuesday night, Procopio said. No tactical and riot-control units were used, though they were on standby.
Procopio said State Police would maintain an increased presence at potential demonstration sites in Boston over the next several days.
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The Pronk Pops Show 379, Story 1: The Lunatic Left Agitators and Activists and The Failure of Government Schools, Housing and Welfare State On Display In Ferguson, Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Oakland, Philadelphia, Seattle, St. Louis, Washington, D.C. — Dumbed Down — Hands Up — Don’t Shoot — Just Loot — Progressive Parade Plays With Traffic On U.S. Highways — Race Riot Route — Videos
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The Pronk Pops Show Podcasts
Pronk Pops Show 379: November 26, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 378: November 25, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 377: November 24, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 376: November 21, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 375: November 20, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 374: November 19, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 373: November 18, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 372: November 17, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 371: November 14, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 370: November 13, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 369: November 12, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 368: November 11, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 367: November 10, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 366: November 7, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 365: November 6, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 364: November 5, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 363: November 4, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 362: November 3, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 361: October 31, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 360: October 30, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 359: October 29, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 358: October 28, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 357: October 27, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 356: October 24, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 355: October 23, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 354: October 22, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 353: October 21, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 352: October 20, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 351: October 17, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 350: October 16, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 349: October 15, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 348: October 14, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 347: October 13, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 346: October 9, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 345: October 8, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 344: October 6, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 343: October 3, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 342: October 2, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 341: October 1, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 340: September 30, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 339: September 29, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 338: September 26, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 337: September 25, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 336: September 24, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 335: September 23 2014
Pronk Pops Show 334: September 22 2014
Pronk Pops Show 333: September 19 2014
Pronk Pops Show 332: September 18 2014
Pronk Pops Show 331: September 17, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 330: September 16, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 329: September 15, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 328: September 12, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 327: September 11, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 326: September 10, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 325: September 9, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 324: September 8, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 323: September 5, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 322: September 4, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 321: September 3, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 320: August 29, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 319: August 28, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 318: August 27, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 317: August 22, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 316: August 20, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 315: August 18, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 314: August 15, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 313: August 14, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 312: August 13, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 311: August 11, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 310: August 8, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 309: August 6, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 308: August 4, 2014
Pronk Pops Show 307: August 1, 2014
Story 1: The Lunatic Left Agitators and Activists and The Failure of Government Schools, Housing and Welfare State On Display In Ferguson, Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Oakland, Philadelphia, Seattle, St. Louis, Washington, D.C. — Dumbed Down — Hands Up — Don’t Shoot — Just Loot — Progressive Parade Plays With Traffic On U.S. Highways — Race Riot Route — Videos
Giuliani Responds to Officer Wilson’s Interview
Darren Wilson Interview With George Stephanopoulos – FULL VIDEO
“This Country Values Property Over People”: Ferguson Activist Speaks Out as Protests Spread
Riot as the Language of the Unheard: Ferguson Protests Set to Continue In Fight For Racial Justice
Documents Released in the Ferguson Case
Here are documents and evidence presented to the grand jury in Clayton, Mo., that was deciding whether to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the August shooting of Michael Brown. The documents were released by the St. Louis County prosecutor, Robert P. McCulloch. Note: Some of the documents contain graphic language. NOV. 25, 2014 RELATED ARTICLE
Witness 10
Witnesses Told Grand Jury That Michael Brown Charged at Darren Wilson, Prosecutor Says
The most credible eyewitnesses to the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., said he had charged toward Police Officer Darren Wilson just before the final, fatal shots, the St. Louis County prosecutor said Monday night as he sought to explain why a grand jury had not found probable cause to indict the officer.
The accounts of several other witnesses from the Ferguson neighborhood where Mr. Brown, 18 and unarmed, met his death on Aug. 9 — including those who said Mr. Brown was trying to surrender — changed over time or were inconsistent with physical evidence, the prosecutor, Robert P. McCulloch, said in a news conference.
“The duty of the grand jury is to separate fact and fiction,” he said in a statement watched by a tense nation. “No probable cause exists to file any charges against Darren Wilson.”
Mr. McCulloch praised the grand jurors, who met on 25 days over a three-month period and heard 60 witnesses, for pouring “their hearts and souls into this process” and said that only by hearing all the evidence, as they had, could one fairly judge the case.
The task facing the St. Louis County grand jury was not to determine whether Officer Darren Wilson was guilty of a crime, but whether there was evidence to justify bringing charges, which could have ranged from negligent manslaughter to intentional murder.
The fact that at least nine members of the 12-member panel could not agree to indict the officer indicates that they accepted the narrative of self-defense put forth by Officer Wilson in his voluntary, four hours of testimony before the grand jury. Mr. McCulloch, in his summary of the months of testimony, said it was supported by the most reliable eyewitness accounts — from African-Americans in the vicinity of the shooting — as well as physical evidence and the consistent results of three autopsies.
At this point it looked like he was almost bulking up to run through the shots, like it was making him mad that I’m shooting at him.
And the face that he had was looking straight through me, like I wasn’t even there, I wasn’t even anything in his way.
At issue, under the Missouri law governing use of deadly force by law enforcement as well as general rules for self-defense, was if Officer Wilson “reasonably believed” that he or others were in serious danger.
According to transcripts released Monday night, Officer Wilson testified that after he encountered Mr. Brown and a friend walking in the street, he realized the pair might be those being sought for stealing cigarillos from a convenience store minutes earlier.
GRAPHIC
What Happened in Ferguson?
Here’s what you need to know about the situation in Missouri, including information about how the grand jury made its decision.
According to witnesses and blood and other evidence found inside the car, Officer Wilson first fired two shots while he struggled with Mr. Brown through the window of his patrol vehicle, a Chevrolet Tahoe, grazing Mr. Brown’s hand.
Mr. Brown started to run away, with Officer Wilson in chase, then stopped and turned. According to the prosecutor’s summary, the officer fired five shots as Mr. Brown charged him, then another five shots as he made what one witness called a “full charge.”
Only 90 seconds passed between Officer Wilson’s first encounter with the youths and the arrival of a backup police car, just after the shooting stopped, the prosecutor said.
Probable cause is not a stiff standard. It does not require that most of the evidence be incriminating, let alone be proof “beyond a reasonable doubt,” as required in a criminal trial. Instead, grand juries are ordinarily instructed to issue an indictment when there is “some evidence” of guilt, legal experts said.
To Mr. Brown’s parents and their supporters, the case for bringing at least some charge in this case seemed open and shut. But the jurors also had to consider whether Officer Wilson acted within the limits of the lethal-force law, raising the threshold for an indictment.
Independent legal experts said it was impossible to analyze the grand jury decision without studying the transcripts of the testimony as well as the police reports, autopsies and forensic evidence that might shed light on what Mr. Brown was doing in his final seconds: whether he was menacing the officer or, as a friend who was with him said, trying to surrender.
Some people claiming to be eyewitnesses said Mr. Brown was shot in the back, Mr. McCulloch said, but later changed their stories when autopsies found no injuries entering his back. But others, African-Americans who did not speak out publicly, he said, consistently said that the youth had menaced the officer.
Mr. McCulloch, had promised that he would allay any suspicions about the fairness of the proceedings by releasing, with names redacted, transcripts of testimony and other evidence heard by the panel.
The release of grand jury information, secret by law, is rare, and Mr. McCulloch originally said he would first seek a judge’s permission. But on Monday, his office said it had determined that it had a right to release most of the transcripts and it did so Monday night.
The grand jury, which included three African-Americans, deliberated for two days. By law, the final vote on whether to bring an indictment is secret and the jurors are legally prohibited from discussing their deliberations.
The United States Department of Justice is conducting a separate investigation of whether Officer Wilson, who is white, intentionally acted to deprive Mr. Brown, an African-American, of his civil rights. But the bar for such cases is a high one, and officials have privately said they are unlikely to bring federal charges. The Justice Department is also conducting a broader investigation into the practices of the Ferguson Police Department.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/us/witnesses-told-grand-jury-that-michael-brown-charged-at-darren-wilson-prosecutor-says.html
Ferguson decision sparks nationwide protests
Ferguson Missouri Riots & Protest – Michael Brown Shooting News
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Ferguson Verdict Sparks Protests In California, New York And Beyond
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Chicago Protests 11/25/2014
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USA: Clashes erupt in NYC following Ferguson Grand Jury verdict
NYC SHUTS DOWN FDR drive due to Ferguson protests
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Protest in Support of Ferguson, Union Square Park NYC
FERGUSON : Protest: Demonstration In NYC. St Louis Missouri after Mike Brown Darren Wilson Verdict
Ferguson Riots, USA | Ferguson Erupts; Turning US Cities Into WARZONES
Michael Brown’s Stepdad Shouting ‘Burn This Bitch Down’ (VIDEO)
Alex Jones Show – Commercial Free Video: Tuesday (11-25-14) Ferguson
Black Genocide – Maafa 21 Full Length
“NUMBER ONE KILLER” by The Radiance Foundation
Just Tell Us The Truth…
Protesters Turn Out in U.S. Cities Following Ferguson Decision
Rallies Largely Peaceful, Though Some Vandalism Occurred in at Least One City
By
Protests broke out in a number of U.S. cities following the decision on Monday by a grand jury not to indict a Ferguson, Mo., police officer in the shooting death of a black teenager.
Marches and rallies had been planned in many of the nation’s largest cities, from New York to Chicago to Houston, regardless of the jury’s finding.
In New York, hundreds of demonstrators gathered in Union Square in Manhattan. When the grand jury decision was announced, word quickly spread through the crowd. In a few minutes, most were holding one fist up in the air as they observed a moment of silence that lasted nearly five minutes.
The only audible sound was the shutter of press cameras. Some demonstrators were in tears.
Then, with the cooperation of New York Police Department officers, the protesters began a spontaneous march, moving north along Sixth Avenue, blocking traffic. Protesters occupied several blocks as they marched toward Times Square.
“I feel like I don’t have an outlet for my anger,” said Monica Thompson, 29 years old, a social worker who lives in Harlem. “There’s not been an indictment. There’s an acceptance that black and brown lives don’t matter.”
RELATED
A police helicopter hovered overhead as protesters marched and a large police presence accompanied the protest. No arrests were reported as of 10:30 p.m.
A sense of anger pulsed through the crowd. “They don’t know what they just started,” said Precious Etsekhume, 22, referring to the government and police. “They are going to regret every bad decision they made.”
At a New York news conference, the Rev. Al Sharpton , who has worked to bring attention to the case since Ferguson officer Darren Wilson shot unarmed teenager Michael Brown, called for a federal investigation into the shooting, saying he had no confidence in local prosecutors.
Mr. Sharpton said the grand jury’s decision was expected but was “still an absolute blow to those of us that wanted to see a fair and open trial.”
Mr. Sharpton appeared with the family of Eric Garner, a New York City man whose death was caused by an apparent police chokehold, according to the city’s medical examiner. Mr. Garner’s family didn’t speak.
In Oakland, Calif. police and protesters clashed violently after groups of protesters blocked a major Bay Area freeway for hours, set piles of trash ablaze on city streets and looted retail shops in the city’s downtown area.
After marching relatively peacefully for more than an hour, the crowd gathered near City Hall grew to stretch more than two city blocks, and became increasingly unruly, vandalizing buildings and smashing windows of a Chase Bank branch as they marched through downtown and then through the city’s increasingly gentrifying Lake Merritt neighborhood.
About 500 protesters ran up a freeway on ramp near a Trader Joe’s grocery store, the Oakland Police Department said, bringing traffic to a halt for hours on Interstate 580. Several arrests were made, Oakland police said, and the freeway was eventually reopened.
But clashes continued both near the freeway and in the city’s downtown, where the protests had originated. By midnight, protesters had ignited large fires on a street in downtown Oakland and looters could be seen breaking into several stores.
Inside a Metro PCS store, one woman tossed packages through a smashed glass door to gathered crowds. Down the street, young men hurled beer bottles at people passing bye.
Close to the city’s police headquarters, protesters confronted officers in full riot gear and gas masks, linking arms and advancing toward the police shortly after midnight. The police, in turn, advanced toward the protesters and some in the crowd threw water bottles and other objects at the officers.
“This is an unlawful assembly,” a policeman announced via a speaker system. “You may be arrested and subject to removal by force if necessary.”
A man in the crowd wearing a sweatshirt and carrying a bullhorn answered back with his own announcement.
“The Oakland Police Department is now under citizen’s arrest,” he said. “By the power invested in the people of California, the Oakland Police Department is now under arrest. We are arresting you for violating our civil rights.”
Clashes continued into the early morning as police steadily moved up the street arresting and confronting protesters.
D’Andre Teeter, 70, from Berkeley, said before the grand jury’s decision was announced that anything less than an indictment for murder would be an “outrage.”
”We are out here to say this has to stop, and we think the whole country must come to a halt regardless of the outcome of the grand jury’s decision,” he said.
Across the bay in San Francisco, a crowd of a few dozen people gathered in the Mission District to await the grand jury decision. Carrying signs reading “Justice 4 Mike Brown,” they booed and chanted, “The people say guilty! The people say guilty!” when the news came that Officer Wilson wouldn’t be indicted.
In downtown Atlanta, a handful of civil-rights activists gathered outside the Richard B. Russell Federal Building to address the media after the verdict was announced. Markel Hutchins, an African American minister, choked back tears at one point when describing how frustrated he was by the decision.
“If you don’t look like Michael Brown, or have a son or grandson or cousin that looks like Michael Brown, you will never understand why we feel the way we feel tonight,” he said.
With unseasonably chilly temperatures that swept into the area Monday night, most of downtown Atlanta was desolate and no major disturbances were reported. Civil-rights leaders said they planned a peaceful protest Tuesday evening.
In Philadelphia, the city’s police department was monitoring the situation and watching social media, said a spokesman for Mayor Michael Nutter. The mayor earlier told reporters he recognizes the public’s right to demonstrate but urged people to do so nonviolently.
According to the Associated Press, several hundred protesters marched through downtown Philadelphia, yelling, “No justice, no peace, no racist police!” A similar protest of about 50 people in Pittsburgh was short-lived, with activists saying they plan to regroup Tuesday at the federal courthouse, the AP reported.
Law-enforcement officials in Los Angeles said they had prepared for potential unrest in the nation’s second-largest city, but a small protest march that started in Leimert Park in south L.A. blocked traffic along its route but otherwise remained peaceful.
As they marched on foot and on bicycles, the few dozen protesters carried signs, blew whistles and shouted: “If you’re sick of the murdering police, outta your house and into the street.” At one point, a few protesters briefly made their way onto a section of the I-10 freeway before police moved them back.
Cue Jnmarie, a 50-year-old pastor, said he met with police twice to prepare for the response to the grand jury’s decision. He said he is pushing for public policy changes, and doesn’t support violence. He said community organizers and religious leaders there aimed to do more than “blow off steam” about Michael Brown’s death.
”This is not just happening now,” he said. “It has been happening, and it’s part of the culture.”
Mr. Jnmarie described himself as a victim of racial profiling in Los Angeles and said the community is angry. “Police protect and serve everyone except people of color,” he said.
”We do everything in our power to facilitate lawful, peaceful demonstrations as long as they don’t become violent or destructive,” said Andy Neiman, spokesman for the Los Angeles Police Department.
In Seattle, where a protest march also was reported to be nonviolent, the police department said it hadn’t made any major preparations for protests. The department prefers to take a “rather toned-down approach to that sort of thing,” said Patrick Michaud, a Seattle police detective with the force’s public affairs unit.
In Baltimore, two groups said they would wait until Tuesday afternoon to march through downtown, regardless of the grand jury’s decision. “We want the time to have the largest gathering possible,” said Sharon Black, local representative of one of the groups, the Peoples Power Assembly. “It’s difficult to get a large, large group out in the middle of the night. We want our message to be heard.”
http://online.wsj.com/articles/u-s-cities-prepare-for-reaction-to-ferguson-grand-jury-decision-1416874256
Ferguson and Other Cities React to Grand Jury Decision Not to Indict Darren Wilson
Journalists with The New York Times in Ferguson, Mo., are following a grand jury’s decision not to indict Darren Wilson, a white police officer, in the shooting death of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager. On Monday night, the scene in downtown Ferguson grew increasingly unruly as the night wore on with the police using tear gas to disperse crowds who were throwing rocks and shattering store windows. Some businesses were looted, the police said. Protests also broke out in other cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Oakland and Seattle.
Follow Tuesday’s live updates and other ongoing coverage here.
Transcript of the Grand Jury Proceedings
An Overview of What Happened in Ferguson
Timeline: Tracking the Events Following the Shooting
A photograph of Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson presented as evidence to the grand jury.Credit via St. Louis County Prosecutor’s Office
Among the many things found in Darren Wilson’s grand jury testimony are several references to the way he felt intimidated by Michael Brown. Though Officer Wilson is himself a large man – nearly 6’4″, around 210 pounds, according to his own testimony — he repeatedly described Mr. Brown as aggressive, big, and threatening, often in vivid language. Here are a few excerpts from his description of the altercation at the window of his patrol car:
“I tried to hold his right arm and use my left hand to get out to have some kind of control and not be trapped in my car any more. And when I grabbed him, the only way I can describe it is I felt like a five-year-old holding onto Hulk Hogan.”
“I felt that another one of those punches in my face could knock me out or worse. I mean it was, he’s obviously bigger than I was and stronger and the, I’ve already taken two to the face and I didn’t think I would, the third one could be fatal if he hit me right.”
“After seeing the blood on my hand, I looked at him and was, this is my car door, he was here and he kind of stepped back and went like this. And then after he did that, he looked up at me and had the most intense aggressive face. The only way I can describe it, it looks like a demon, that’s how angry he looked. He comes back towards me again with his hands up.”
A police officer from the nearby suburb of University City was shot overnight, but it was unclear if it was related to the grand jury’s decision in the Ferguson case, the St. Louis County police said early Tuesday.
The officer was shot in the arm was expected to be “okay,” the police said in a Twitter post. The police were searching for a suspect.
The officer was shot at the intersection of Canton Avenue and Lamb Avenue in University City, a police spokesman said.
12:42 A.M.Protesters Block Interstate 44 in St. Louis
Protesters shut down Interstate 44 at Grand Avenue in both directions in St. Louis on Monday.Credit J.B. Forbes/St. Louis Post-Dispatch, via Associated Press
12:33 A.M.Sounds of Gunfire and Alarms on Ferguson Streets
Fire roared through a Little Caesar’s restaurant on Monday night in Ferguson, Mo.CreditTannen Maury/European Pressphoto Agency
There were numerous stretches of Ferguson late Monday night where all was calm, all was well. Stores with “I Love Ferguson” signs in the windows. The red bows and holiday lights wrapped around the light poles downtown still perfectly intact.
But there were pockets that felt like a city under siege.
A Little Caesars Pizza shop was in flames. There were shattered windows at El Palenque Mexican restaurant, and at a UMB Bank branch. Thick smoke poured from the busted front entrance of a Walgreens pharmacy. Men stepped in but quickly stepped out, complaining that it was too hard to see anything because of the smoke. The sound of gunfire occasionally rang out in the distance, and the acidic smell and aftertaste of tear gas filled the air. One man exited the store and jokingly asked if anyone wanted cigarettes.
At the intersection of North Florissant Road and Hereford Avenue – “Ferguson, a city since 1894,” reads the sign at the corner – firefighters worked on putting out the Little Caesars blaze, but there were no police or fire officials at Walgreens. The fire inside continued to burn. Spectators drove up to the store, as did news crews. All the while, the pharmacy’s high-pitched security bell echoed, the soundtrack of the evening’s drama.
“Not often you get to see anarchy, huh?” one man taking pictures outside Walgreens said.
— MANNY FERNANDEZ
12:09 A.M.Protesters Block Highway in Oakland
Protesters in Oakland blocked a highway on Monday night in response to the grand jury’s decision in Ferguson, Mo.Credit Jim Wilson/The New York Times
In Oakland, Calif., protesters blocked a portion of Interstate 580, forcing cars to stop. One man said he had been sitting in his car for about 45 minutes. “I knew there would be protests, but I didn’t think it would get this hectic with shutting down the freeway and all the cops,” said the man, Alex Perez, 28, of Oakland. He was trying to get home, but said he was sympathetic to what the protesters were trying to do. “It was unwarranted for a kid to get shot.”
— MOMO CHANG
12:30 A.M.Protesting Coast to Coast
Demonstrators outside the White House on Monday.Credit Jabin Botsford/The New York Times
A gathering in downtown Seattle.Credit Evan McGlinn for The New York Times
12:29 A.M.Flight restrictions at Lambert-St. Louis International
Inbound flights to Lambert-St. Louis International Airport were not being permitted to land late Monday as a safety precaution, officials said. The Federal Aviation Administration issued a temporary flight restriction, or TFR, affecting inbound flights, the airport said in a post on Twitter.
— EMMA FITZSIMMONS
12:13 A.M.Michael Brown’s Mother Reacts
Credit
11:54 P.M.Protesters March in South Los Angeles
Demonstrators reacted on Monday night in Los Angeles to the grand jury’s decision not to indict Office Darren Wilson in the fatal shooting of Michael Brown.Credit Ringo Chiu/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Late on Monday night, a crowd of about 200 people had blocked traffic on Crenshaw Boulevard, a main thoroughfare through South Los Angeles. The crowd swelled to over 250 as it marched north, then turned east on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, a central strip that cuts through South Los Angeles toward downtown Los Angeles.
Beating drums, the crowd chanted: “Turn up, turn down, we do this for Mike Brown.”
The crowd was young, mostly in their 20s and 30s. Police squad cars and officers stood by at a few intersections. Some protesters carried their cellphones, recording officers or photographing the scene. Helicopters hovered overhead.
John K. Givens, 45, a Los Angeles resident who works at a freight trading company, marched with the crowd, wearing a gray Dodgers cap and a navy blue vest jacket. “I was emotionally bothered by the decision,” Mr. Givens said of the grand jury in the Ferguson, Mo., case.
Mr. Givens said that as a black male, violent interactions were to be expected. His younger brother, Mr. Givens said, had been beaten by a Los Angeles police officer. “It’s nothing new,” he said. “This is the one that got the most media attention.”
http://news.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/24/live-updates-from-ferguson-on-the-grand-jury-decision-in-michael-brown-shooting/?_r=0
A town ravaged by anger: Before and after pictures show extent of damage to buildings in Ferguson
By SARA MALM FOR MAILONLINE and DANIEL BATES IN FERGUSON, MISSOURI FOR MAILONLINE
Monday night’s grand jury decision to not indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson over the fatal shooting of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown, led to riots in the Missouri city.
Although Michael Brown’s family, President Barack Obama, and authorities called for peaceful protests, the Ferguson was soon out of control.
The riots saw a return to the looting, fires and property damages which took place on a smaller scale in August, immediately after the shooting of Brown.
Scroll down for video
Damage done: Two buildings still smoulder after the riots that ravaged Ferguson, Missouri overnight
Before: A satellite image taken by Google in September 2012 show the buildings intact
As the sun rose on Tuesday, the cityscape of Ferguson looked worlds away from satellite and Google Street View snaps taken just months earlier.
Pictures from yesterday in comparison with images from before, tracked down byThe Wall Street Journal, show the damage done.
Last night, tens of thousands of people in more than 170 cities across America – including Atlanta, Boston, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles, among others – were demonstrating against the long-awaited verdict.
However, despite the St. Louis grand jury decision, federal investigations into the shooting of Michael Brown continue the US Attorney General said on Monday.
The Justice Department will continue to pursue two investigations, one into potential civil rights violations by Officer Wilson when he shot dead unarmed Brown in August this year, and one into the practices of the Ferguson Police force.
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Beauty lost: A beauty supply store has been left in ruins after Monday night’s riots
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True beauty: A Google Street View snap from 2010 shows the shop in its original state
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Burned out: A building in Ferguson only has its four walls left after being destroyed by fire
Better times: The building, which appears to be a shop, is pictured on Google earlier this year
The fire at the local Little Ceasars restaurant left the big orange sign in a melted lump on the ground
Neighborhood joint: There is no sign of its former glory, captured by Google in August 2012
Distraught: The manager of the Little Caesar’s said he understood the protesters were angry but added: ‘Speaking your mind – that’s America. You are supposed to be able to protest peacefully and make your point. But this…’
More destruction: The arson frenzy also hit South Florissant Street, about a mile away. This branch of Little Casear’s was burned out
Long way back: A woman stops to take a picture using her phone of the damage done
Still intact: The local Clean World Laundromat was still standing on Monday morning
Residents on the streets told MailOnline that the wreckage to Ferguson was so bad that it looked like ‘Ferganistan’.
Another said that it ‘looked like Iraq’.
Almost every building along South Florissant Street, where the Ferguson police station is located, had been ransacked or vandalised.
Tony Koenig and his brother Ray, 38 and 40, had taken the day off from working as school groundskeepers to help rebuild a Mexican restaurant run by a friend.
Tony said: ‘I have lived in Ferguson for 38 years and I have never seen anything like this. They just want street justice and they don’t care about how they get it.
‘This young generation. I cannot understand why they do what they do. The parents are to blame. When me and my brother grew up both our parents worked and we were raised knowing how to show respect, and that doesn’t happen these days.
‘We’ve had a hard enough time paying our mortgages after the economy went down. We don’t need this’.
Their friend Drew Canaday, who was also helping them, lives in the street next to South Florissant and said that it was ‘like a war’ the night before.
Destruction: :A rioter uses a stick to break a window at the Hunan Chop Suey Chinese Restaurant along West Florissant Ave last night
Nothing left: This was all that was left of the Hunan Chop Suey Chinese restaurant this morning after the fire wrecked it
As they were: The Hunan Chop Suey and TitleMax loans were both intact before last night’s orgy of violence
Burning: Cars parked outside one row of shops on West Florissant were targeted in the destruction spree
Inspection: The scale of destruction became clear today after a night which saw fires raised across the St Louis suburb of Ferguson
Attacked: McDonald’s on West Florissant was smashed up although not set on fire. It had previously (right) avoided damage
Crime scene: Much of West Florissant was under police guard today and described by officers as an active crime scene
‘Especially something this big. It takes dialogue and not everyone will be happy but that’s compromise.
‘These people don’t want to wait. That what today’s society has come to, not just here in Ferguson – this is America, this is the world.’
Further up South Florissant a Little Caesar’s pizza restaurant had been burned to the ground, as had the antiques store next to it.
The manager of the restaurant, who declined to give his name for fear of reprisals, said that 12 people had now been put out of work and did not know if the owners would rebuild.
The manager said that the store was destroyed by a tornado three years earlier and they did build it back but it cost ‘a lot of money’.
He said: ‘Most of the people here have families and they are very worried about what will come next for them.
‘I’m proud to work here and started as the dishwasher and worked my way up. I had a motorcycle accident and had my foot amputated and they were good enough to give me a job,
The manger, a widower with two children in their 20s, said that he was in principle on the side of the protesters but that this was ‘too far’.
He said: ‘I believe in their right to protest and what they’re doing is a just case.
‘Speaking your mind – that’s America. You are supposed to be able to protest peacefully and make your point. But this…’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2850383/A-town-ravaged-anger-pictures-extent-damage-buildings-Ferguson.html#ixzz3KCPcRKOm
Ferguson: In Defense of Rioting
Darlena Cunha
Darlena Cunha is a Florida-based contributor to The Washington Post and TIME among dozens of other publications.
The violent protests in Ferguson, Mo., are part of the American experience. Peaceful protesting is a luxury only available to those safely in mainstream culture
When a police officer shoots a young, unarmed black man in the streets, then does not face indictment, anger in the community is inevitable. It’s what we do with that anger that counts. In such a case, is rioting so wrong?
Riots are a necessary part of the evolution of society. Unfortunately, we do not live in a universal utopia where people have the basic human rights they deserve simply for existing, and until we get there, the legitimate frustration, sorrow and pain of the marginalized voices will boil over, spilling out into our streets. As “normal” citizens watch the events of Fergusonunfurl on their television screens and Twitter feeds, there is a lot of head shaking, finger pointing, and privileged explanation going on. We wish to seclude the incident and the people involved. To separate it from our history as a nation, to dehumanize the change agents because of their bad and sometimes violent decisions—because if we can separate the underlying racial tensions that clearly exist in our country from the looting and rioting of select individuals, we can continue to ignore the problem.
While the most famous rant against the riots thus far comes from Hercules actor Kevin Sorbo, where he calls the rioters “animals” and “losers,” there are thousands of people echoing these sentiments. Sorbo correctly ascertains that the rioting has little to do with the shooting of an unarmed black man in the street, but he blames it on the typical privileged American’s stereotype of a less fortunate sect of human being—that the looting is a result of frustration built up over years of “blaming everyone else, The Man, for their failures.”
Because when you have succeeded, it ceases to be a possibility, in our capitalist society, that anyone else helped you. And if no one helped you succeed, then no one is holding anyone else back from succeeding. Except they did help you, and they are holding people back. So that blaming someone else for your failures in the United States may very well be an astute observation of reality, particularly as it comes to white privilege versus black privilege. And, yes, they are different, and they are tied to race, and that doesn’t make me a racist, it makes me a realist. If anything, I am racist because I am white. Until I have had to walk in a person of color’s skin, I will never understand, I will always take things for granted, and I will be inherently privileged. But by ignoring the very real issues this country still faces in terms of race to promote an as-of-yet imaginary colorblind society, we contribute to the problem at hand, which is centuries of abuses lobbied against other humans on no basis but that of their skin color.
Sorbo is not alone. A webpage devoted to Tea Party politics has hundreds of comments disparaging the rioters, bemoaning the state of our country and very much blaming skin color as the culprit of this debauched way of dealing with the state of our society.
“To hear the libs, one would think that burning and looting are a justifiable way to judge negative events that effect (sic) the black,” one person wrote. “I intentionally used black because of a fact that you do not hear of these events when another skin color is in play. It is about time that the blacks start cleaning their own backyards before they start on ours.”
However, even the Tea Party gets its name from a riot, The Boston Tea Party. For those who need a quick history brush-up, in 1773 American protesters dumped an entire shipment of tea into the Boston Harbor to protest The Tea Act, which colonists maintained violated their rights. In response to this costly protest and civil unrest, the British government enforced The Coercive Acts, ending local government in Massachusetts, which in turn led to the American Revolution and created our great country.
Samuel Adams wrote of the incident, claiming it “was not the act of a lawless mob, but was instead a principled protest and the only remaining option the people had to defend their constitutional rights” according to John K. Alexander, author ofSamuel Adams: America’s Revolutionary Politician.
That protest back in 1773 was meant to effect political and societal change, and while the destruction of property in that case may not have ended in loss of human life, the revolutionthat took place afterward certainly did. What separates a heralded victory in history from an attempt at societal change, a cry for help from the country’s trampled, today? The fact that we won.
In terms of riots being more common in black communities, that is true only when the riots are politically aimed.
The obvious example here is the L.A. Riots of 1992, after the Rodney King beating and verdict. I would put forth that peaceful protesting is a luxury of those already in mainstream culture, those who can be assured their voices will be heard without violence, those who can afford to wait for the change they want.
“I risk sounding racist but if this was a white kid there would be no riot,” another person wrote on the Tea Party page. “History shows us that blacks in this country are more apt to riot than any other population. They are stirred up by racist black people and set out to cause problems. End of story.”
Blacks in this country are more apt to riot because they are one of the populations here who still need to. In the case of the 1992 riots, 30 years of black people trying to talk about their struggles of racial profiling and muted, but still vastly unfair, treatment, came to a boil. Sometimes, enough is simply too much. And after that catalyst event, the landscape of southern California changed, and nationally, police forces took note.
And the racism they are fighting, the racism we are all fighting, is still alive and well throughout our nation. The modern racism may not culminate in separate water fountains and separate seating in the backs of buses, but its insidious nature is perhaps even more dangerous to the individuals who have to live under the shroud of stereotypical lies society foists upon them.
Instead of tearing down other human beings who are acting upon decades of pent-up anger at a system decidedly against them, a system that has told them they are less than human for years, we ought to be reaching out to help them regain the humanity they lost, not when a few set fire to the buildings in Ferguson, but when they were born the wrong color in the post-racial America.
http://time.com/author/darlena-cunha-2/
Dozens in Boston face charges for Ferguson protest
By Martin Finucane and Peter Schworm
Dozens of people are facing charges after crowds took to the streets of Boston Tuesday night to protest a grand jury’s decision not to charge a Ferguson, Mo., police officer in the fatal shooting of a black teenager who was unarmed.
Boston police arrested 47 people on charges that include disorderly conduct and disturbing the peace, said police spokesman Officer James Kenneally.
Still, there were no major incidents or injuries reported in the mostly peaceful demonstrations.
“All in all, I think everybody handled themselves pretty well last night,” said Police Commissioner William Evans. “We wanted people to be able to express their frustration but, at the same time, we did want everybody to be safe.”
Demonstrations also took place in other cities around the country, including in New York, Seattle, and Washington, D.C., as the decision not to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the death of Michael Brown sparked a heated national debate about law enforcement’s relationship with minority communities.
View Graphic
Map: Ferguson protests in US
Though most of the gatherings were peaceful the day after the announcement, many cities saw marchers disrupting traffic and getting into confrontations with police.
Photos: Protesters march
Anthony Braga: Why Boston’s protests were mostly peaceful
Sense of resigned anger in Boston
The Boston marchers faced arraignment Wednesday in Roxbury District Court and Boston Municipal Court. About half those arrested were Boston residents. Most were college students, Kenneally said.
Many were arrested at Melnea Cass Boulevard and Massachusetts Avenue, where there was a sit-in, he said.
Evans said at a news conference that police had gone with a “real soft approach.”
He said he felt the protest went well “because of our whole style,” which includes “great community relations” and a constant dialogue with the community.
He said police recognized a number of the protesters from Occupy Boston, which occupied an area in downtown Boston in 2011.
Police expect protests to continue as long as Ferguson itself is “hot,” but he said, “I’d like to continue dialogue so Boston can be a model of how protests should go.”
At Roxbury District Court, one protester being arraigned painted a less sunny view of how police behaved.
“I was struck in the face by police. They put me in a headlock and dragged me out of the protest group and they hit me in the face, they threw me on the ground. … They handled it pretty poorly,” said David Meredith, a Salem State junior from Revere. Meredith had a black eye, which he said police had inflicted on him.
“I wasn’t shocked. I was appalled, but I wasn’t shocked. The police were being very confrontational. They seemed very angry the entire time,” he said, noting that he saw an officer choking another man, who was holding a camera.
Both Boston police and State Police interacted with demonstrators. It wasn’t clear what agency the officers who confronted Meredith came from.
David Procopio, a State Police spokesman, said that “because of superb cooperation and coordination between State and Boston police, we were able to prevent protesters from entering the Southeast Expressway and the Mass. Turnpike.”
He added that monitoring social media “provided critical intelligence about protesters’ plans to try to disrupt traffic on state highways.”
One state trooper was bitten on the wrist by a protester, Procopio said. He was treated by Boston EMS on the scene.
An estimated 1,400 protesters marched from Dudley Square to the South Bay House of Correction, then onto the Massachusetts Avenue Connector near Interstate 93 before being blocked by police, the Globe reported Wednesday morning
The protesters spread across Boston, through Back Bay and the Financial District, meeting police again in Dewey Square — the former site of the Occupy encampment — outside South Station late Tuesday night, the Globe reported.
State troopers also assisted with other largely peaceful protests in Worcester, Northampton, and Springfield Tuesday night, Procopio said. No tactical and riot-control units were used, though they were on standby.
Procopio said State Police would maintain an increased presence at potential demonstration sites in Boston over the next several days.
http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/11/26/arraigned-today-after-crowds-protest-ferguson-grand-jury-decision/nHoyjKL83C6uZyJPevrAGK/story.html
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