ST. LOUIS — St. Louis police made several arrests Sunday night as protesters broke windows and damaged property during a third night of demonstrations over the acquittal of a white former police officer charged in the shooting death of a black man.
After organizers announced the demonstration had ended, a few dozen people continued to march downtown and some in the crowd started knocking over large potted plants and throwing objects through windows.
Buses carrying police in full riot gear and shields arrived near the downtown location where police said significant property damage was reported following an hours-long nonviolent protest Sunday afternoon and evening.
At least seven people were taken into custody.
Nonviolent message
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.
State Rep. Bruce Franks, who has participated in the protests, said those who are violent and vandalizing “are not protesters,” but a group separate from those marching is organized demonstrations.
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.”
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 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.
“It’s counterproductive,” said Democratic Rep. Michael Butler, who added that people he described as “agitators” are not part of protest leadership.
Kayla Reed, an organizer and activist 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 or the majority of protesters.
“At any point, an individual can shift the entire moment that’s planned and organized,” Reed said.
Protest organizer Anthony Bell during demonstrations Sunday said change is made through peaceful protests.
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 different 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 in front 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” as part of broader efforts to force potentially uncomfortable conversations about racial inequity in affluent and mainly white areas.
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. Within an hour, police say protesters were breaking windows.
The same scene played out Saturday. Protesters marched for hours in the trendy Delmar Loop area until organizers announced shortly before 9 p.m. that the event was over and most of the couple of thousand protesters went home.
Around 100 to 150 didn’t, continued to march, and some eventually began confronting police. It wasn’t clear what set off the anger, but police in riot gear began to line the streets and some people tossed rocks, trash cans and other things at them.
