BATON ROUGE, La./MINNEAPOLIS
|
Protests
against the shootings of two black men by police officers shut down
main arteries in a number of U.S. cities on Saturday, leading to
numerous arrests, scuffles and injuries in confrontations between police
and demonstrators.
Undeterred
by heightened concerns about safety at protests after a lone gunman
killed five police officers in Dallas Thursday night, organizers went
ahead with marches in the biggest metropolis, New York City, and
Washington D.C., the nation's capital, among other cities.
It
was the third straight day of widespread protests after the fatal
shooting of Alton Sterling, 37, by police in Baton Rouge on Tuesday and
the death of Philando Castile, 32, on Wednesday night in a St. Paul,
Minnesota suburb, cities which both saw heated protests on Saturday.
The
most recent shooting deaths by police come after several years of
contentious killings by law enforcement officers, including that of
Michael Brown, a teenager whose death in the summer of 2014 caused riots
and weeks of protests in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson. On Saturday evening, hundreds of protesters shut down I-94, a major thoroughfare linking the Twin Cities, snarling traffic.
Protesters, told to disperse, threw rocks, bottles and construction rebar at officers, injuring at least three, St. Paul police said. Police made arrests and used smoke bombs and marking rounds to disperse the crowd.
Protesters at the scene said police fired tear gas and rubber bullets. Police said early on Sunday they had begun clearing the highway of debris in preparation for re-opening it.
A
march in Baton Rouge saw scuffles between riot police and Black Panther
activists, several of whom carried shotguns. Louisiana law allows for
weapons to be carried openly.
After
a short standoff later in the evening, riot police arrested as many as
30 demonstrators and recovered weapons. Prominent black activist and
former Baltimore mayoral candidate Deray McKesson was among those
arrested.
Protests
also took place Saturday in Nashville, where protesters briefly blocked
a road, and in Indianapolis. A rally in San Francisco also briefly
blocked a freeway ramp, according to local media.
Hundreds
of protesters marched from City Hall to Union Square in New York. The
crowd swelled to around a thousand people, closing down Fifth Avenue.
Some chanted "No racist police, no justice, no peace" as rain fell in New York.
"I'm
feeling very haunted, very sad," said Lorena Ambrosio, 27, a Peruvian
American and freelance artist, "and just angry that black bodies just
keep piling and piling up."
New York police said they arrested about a dozen protesters for shutting down a major city highway.
(Additional reporting by Laila Kearney, Elizabeth Barber and Chris
Michaud in New York; Writing by Nick Carey; Editing by Mary Milliken and
Ryan Woo)
