Thousands of demonstrators marched in Washington, New York City and Boston on Saturday to protest killings of unarmed black men by police officers in the US.
Organizers said the marches were among the largest in the recent wave of protests against the killings of black males by police in Ferguson, Missouri; New York City; Cleveland, Ohio, and elsewhere.
The protests were mainly peaceful, although police in Boston said they arrested 23 people who tried to block a highway.
Photo: Reuters
One person was arrested in New York City after two officers were assaulted by protesters, prompting a condemnation from New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, who said the alleged assault marked “an ugly and unacceptable departure from the demonstrations thus far.”
“Those who reject peaceful protest and provoke violence can expect immediate arrest and prosecution,” said De Blasio, who has been sharply criticized by the city’s police officers’ union for not supporting the police department.
Police in Oakland, California, ordered hundreds of demonstrators to disperse on Saturday night after a grocery store was looted.
Decisions by grand juries to return no indictments against the officers involved in the deaths of Michael Brown in Missouri and Eric Garner in New York have put police treatment of minorities back on the national agenda.
“We’re going to keep the light on Mike Brown ... on all of the victims. The only way you make roaches run is to keep the light on,” said Reverend Al Sharpton, the civil rights leader whose National Action Network organized the Washington rally.
Sharpton urged the US Congress to pass legislation allowing federal prosecutors to take over cases involving police violence.
In Missouri, a prosecutor on Saturday made public documents related to the probe into Brown’s killing, saying his office had inadvertently held them back.
In Washington, protesters from around the US gathered at Freedom Plaza, a few blocks from the White House, then marched down Pennsylvania Avenue to the US Capitol.
Marchers, who included many parents with children, chanted: “No justice, no peace, no racist police” and “Hands up, don’t shoot,” while others carried signs reading: “All men are created equal” and “Black lives matter.”
The Washington protest included relatives of Garner and Akai Gurley, who were both killed by New York City police; Trayvon Martin, slain by a Florida neighborhood watchman in 2012; Brown and others.
“What a sea of people,” said Brown’s mother, Lesley McSpadden. “If they don’t see this and make a change, I don’t know what we’re going to do.”
Organizers estimating the crowd at 40,000 to 50,000 people. A police spokesman declined to provide an estimate, citing department policy, and said there had been no arrests.
After the rally, some protesters marched through downtown Washington, briefly closing some streets, police said.
In Boston, hundreds of protesters marched by at the Suffolk County jail near an entrance to Interstate 93. Inmates cheered and banged on cell windows as they passed.
Protesters tried to push through police lines near the highway’s entrance. Massachusetts State Police said 23 people were arrested for disorderly conduct.
The New York march headed north up Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue from Washington Square Park, with protesters chanting: “How do you spell racist? N-Y-P-D.”
At the end of the march, protesters raised their hands in mock surrender outside police headquarters in lower Manhattan.
Observers estimated that 20,000 to 30,000 protesters took part, while police reported no arrests.
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