Curfews set as protests rage on
S.J. to keep order in place for a week; Walnut Creek urges businesses to lock up
As clashes between protesters and police continued for a third night across the Bay Area on Sunday, with police fighting protesters in numerous communities and more looting and violence, San Jose and Walnut Creek joined San Francisco in imposing curfews to try to keep the peace.
In Walnut Creek, with reports of one woman shot in the arm and scores of looters swarming the Broadway Plaza business district in daylight
Sunday, officials imposed an immediate 6 p.m. curfew and asked all businesses “to close immediately. Please ensure your doors are locked & secured.”
In San Jose, a hastily arranged citywide curfew began at 8:30 p.m. but allowed people to go to essential businesses, including grocery stores and hospitals.
Police Chief Eddie Garcia said that while his department has “heard the calls for change, we’ve heard the calls for accountability,” after the police killing in Minneapolis of an unarmed black man, “we can’t allow our city to
devolve into chaos. We’re not instituting martial law, we’re going to use it very judiciously.”
Oakland, where tensions also have been high since the police killing in Minneapolis of George Floyd sparked national outrage, had yet to call for the same restrictions Sunday evening — a sign of the loaded decisions balancing public safety and free speech.
“Tonight (Sunday night) Oakland will continue to have a strong law enforcement presence to prevent and enforce against any illegal acts,” Mayor Libby Schaaf and interim Police Chief Susan Manheimer said in a joint statement. “We ask everyone to stay home — honoring our shelter-in-place health order, and to prevent vandals from hiding within peaceful demonstrations.”
As in other cities across the country, demonstrations across the Bay Area continued Sunday as people took to the streets to protest the killing of Floyd.
The officer who pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for almost nine minutes before his death was fired from the force and charged with third-degree murder.
The citywide curfew in San Jose that will remain in place for at least a week came after peaceful protests turned into frenetic lawlessness.
In San Francisco’s Union Square on Saturday night, high-end shops, including Saks Fifth Avenue, were ransacked, and in Em
eryville, whole strip malls were picked clean. Videos showed people entering Best Buy and loading their trunks with TVs.
The San Jose Police Department received “intel of planned looting” Sunday night in areas across the city, Garcia said, which is why the curfew extends beyond downtown.
Since Friday, vandals have caused “millions of dollars in damages” to public and private property, he said.
His officers made 100 arrests. Although 400 backup officers from the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department were at the ready Sunday, Garcia said, he hoped he wouldn’t need to request the National Guard.
Trouble was brewing before nightfall Sunday. In
downtown San Jose, where an SUV backed over a protester Friday and vandals set fires and broke shop windows, rows of police in riot gear moved a crowd near City Hall down Santa Clara Street.
In Walnut Creek, hundreds of vandals broke into Macy’s and others stores in Broadway Plaza.
The curfews were met with mixed reactions, causing some to fear that the new restrictions would only heighten tensions.
Luis Falcon, a 32-yearold teacher who was one of hundreds protesting at San Jose City Hall, said a curfew would violate his First Amendment rights and could lead to more violence as officers will be forced to enforce it whether or not protesters leave.
“We have been nothing
but peaceful, so I don’t understand why he has to take these drastic measures,” Falcon said of Mayor Sam Liccardo.
“This could escalate things. They’re not letting us peacefully protest, and they’re not taking the appropriate measures to keep it peaceful.”
Ammir Umar, 28, an inventory technician with Google who fled tear gas and rubber bullets in downtown San Jose on Friday, planned to stay home Sunday.
“I’ve seen martial law in other cities, and I don’t want to be any part of that,” Umar said Sunday. At the same time, he added, “things were supposed to be peaceful, but no one on either side, protesters or law enforcement, are playing fair. People need to go home and be mad at the right things, channel their anger in the right direction. Burning up cities is not the right way.”
During a news conference imposing the San Jose curfew Sunday, Liccardo told reporters that he believes the majority of officers have “demonstrated great resolve” and that they have prevented what could have been “much worse” damage and circumstances.
The emergency order in San Jose is in effect from 8:30 p.m. to 5 a.m. nightly for the next seven days or “until further notice,” according to a news release from the city.
In a message posted Saturday night to the Oakland police Twitter page, interim Chief Manheimer urged, “If you’re coming to Oakland or are in Oakland, please demonstrate peacefully and with respect.”
Oakland police said they arrested nearly three dozen people total Friday and Saturday on suspicion of charges including burglary, possession of a firearm and assault with a deadly weapon.
California Highway Patrol officers were stationed around freeway entrances Sunday, as they had been before protests Friday and Saturday nights, hoping to prevent protesters from snarling freeways by walking in the lanes.
San Francisco Mayor London Breed on Sunday morning denounced the damage done to city businesses Saturday night after a peaceful demonstration turned chaotic and confirmed that a curfew would be implemented from 8 p.m. Sunday to 5 a.m. today.
“It has been very difficult. When you see what you see happened to George Floyd and others, it’s hard not to have a reaction. It’s hard not to feel the pain,” Breed told the city in a somber news conference streamed online. “We know people are hurt, are upset, are angry — all kinds of emotions.”
But, she added, assaults on people and the damage done to businesses in the city — including from fires set and looting — “is really not something we can tolerate.”
She added: “We will do what we need to do to protect the city so that people are safe. That includes even, unfortunately sometimes, doing things that make people uncomfortable, such as bringing in additional law enforcement.”
The curfew, Breed said, would last until the situation is “under control.”
San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott said during the news conference that outside of health care workers and other essential workers, such as first responders, people should not be outside during the curfew hours.
He urged people to keep protests peaceful and acknowledged his department’s role in facilitating peaceful demonstrations.
“We understand the reason we’re here,” Scott said. “African American men have been killed at the hands of law enforcement.”