• St. Louis sees third day of protests,
Peaceful marches turn violent at night
Associated Press
ST.LOUIS — Several hundred protesters marched in downtown St. Louis near the city’s police headquarters Sunday evening, and later through the St. Louis University campus, continuing demonstrations over the acquittal of a white former police officer charged in the shooting death of a black man.
Heading into a third night of protests, organizers said they were frustrated that a few people who have caused trouble at night could make it harder to spread their nonviolent message.
Sunday’s crowd began protesting silently in the late afternoon in front of the police department building, then chanted “stop killing us” as officers looked on from headquarters windows. Afterward, they resumed large-scale marching through streets, similar to what they’d done in previous days, chanting slogans such as “this is what democracy looks like.”
As nightfall came, most of the protesters had left, with about 100 remaining near the police station chanting “the whole damn system is guilty as hell.”
After protest organizers of the hourslong nonviolent demonstration asked people to disband, a few dozen remained behind, as they had the previous two nights.
Then,angry crowds broke windows — including those at the Marriott Hotel near the convention center — and damaged property for a third night of what authorities called significant property damage. St. Louis police took at least seven people in custody. Police tweeted that a bike officer was taken to a hospital with a non-lifethreatening leg injury.
Sunday’s protests came on the same day that the Justice Department confirmed that it concluded a year ago that there was insufficient evidence to pursue a separate federal civil rights prosecution of the St. Louis police officer who was acquitted Friday.
Protesters object to the not-guilty verdict released Friday for Jason Stockley, who had been charged with first-degree murder in the killing of Anthony Lamar Smith in 2011.
Authorities closed off several blocks around the police headquarters Sunday afternoon in anticipation of the demonstration, which followed two days of nonviolent marches that devolved after sunset when small groups turned violent on Friday and Saturday nights.
Protesters and organizers say the violence and vandalism by a few people threatens to detract from broader messages of racial equity.
Kayla Reed, an organizer andactivist with the St. Louis Action Council, said actions of those few people have unfairly been used to “demonize” nonviolent protesters. She said not everyone who shows up at protests share the same goals as organizers orthe majority of protesters.
Protest organizer Anthony Bell during demonstrations Sunday said change is made through peaceful protests, such as those led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. But Mr. Bell said he understands the anger that sometimes leads to violence and property damage.
“I do not say the demonstrators are wrong, but I believe peaceful demonstrations are the best,” he said.
The recent St. Louis protests have followed a pattern borne out of months of angry and sometimes violent protests after the 2014 killing of Michael Brown in nearby Ferguson: The majority of demonstrators, though angry, are law-abiding. But as the night wears on, a subsection emerges, a crowd more willing to confront police, sometimes to the point of a violent interaction.
On Friday night, a few thousand protesters were disruptive but organized as they marched in the early evening infront of hospitals and down the streets of the posh Central West End, urging diners at patios of expensive restaurants, “Off the sidewalk onto the street.”
But as the night wore on and protesters converged outside the home of Mayor Lyda Krewson, someone threw a rock through a window and paint was splashed on the home. Police responded in riot gear and, shortly, began tossing tear gas.
The same scene played out Saturday.