Most of those arrested in Kenosha protests, unrest are from outside the city.
Sheriff says social media scare tactics rampant
A majority of the people arrested in Kenosha since the shooting of Jacob Blake last week listed addresses outside the city, authorities said.
And Kenosha has seen a jump in misinformation spread on social media — made in an effort to scare residents, Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth said Monday at a news conference.
“We have vetted out thousands of social media (posts) and most all of them have been false,” he said. “There are people from outside Kenosha, outside Wisconsin, and we’ve had some that are outside the United States, calling in here to scare people of what’s going to happen.”
In one case, Beth said a post warned that buses of people from Wauwatosa were headed to Kenosha suburbs to burn and loot residential homes. Investigators looked into the claim and found it unfounded, Beth said.
But he said by the time deputies can research each post, word has spread to thousands of people. He asked residents to pass on any suspicious information they find online.
“I want the people of Kenosha to know that there are a huge amount of resources here to protect you,” Beth said.
In addition to outside influence on social media, many of those arrested in the unrest and for curfew violations were from outside Kenosha.
Kenosha police arrested 175 people for suspected offenses related to the protests and civil unrest, the department said Sunday.
Those arrested hailed from 44 different cities. Seventy-three people listed
Kenosha addresses.
Most were from Wisconsin, according to booking data. Thirty or so were from Illinois and a handful of others came from other states.
Kenosha police said those arrested included: 69 people arrested for curfew violations 34 people arrested for curfew violations, plus additional charges ranging from carrying concealed weapons, burglary and possession of controlled substances
More than 20 firearms were seized.
Beth also said that a group of three people last week came to Kenosha from “northern Wisconsin” with the aim to kill him and Kenosha Police Chief Daniel Miskinis.
He was not sure how the department found out about the threat, but he said one of the people was wearing an ankle bracelet, which helped police locate and arrest them. The three had guns, Beth said.
Beth also said he watched the video of a Kenosha officer shooting Blake after saying Friday he hadn’t seen it. Soon, a clip surfaced online that apparently showed Beth watching the shooting video on a smartphone at the scene.
Beth said Monday that he was distracted at the scene by the crowd of people that had gathered around him, speaking loudly and demanding someone be held accountable for the shooting, and he did not internalize anything he saw on the screen.
“If you saw that video of me holding the phone, you didn’t look at what was around me. You did not look at the rocks being thrown at me, the Molotov cocktail that was landing near my feet — I wasn’t looking at the phone,” he said.
He also said he would not comment on the video of Blake’s shooting because his department is not part of the investigation.