Man shot by police in Ferguson is charged with assault

Footage of Harris wounded and handcuffed on the floor was posted on Twitter by protester Tony Rice.

“It was a poor decision to use plainclothes officers in a protest setting because it made it hard for people to identify police officers, which is essential to the safety of community members”, Kayla Reed, a field organizer with the Organization of Black Struggle, said in a statement. Nearly 60 protesters were arrested around midday Monday for blocking the entrance to the federal courthouse in downtown St. Louis.

St. Louis County has declared a state of emergency as protestors continue to march on the day after the one-year anniversary of the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson Missouri, according to multiple reports.

The march toward the church was halted while police and ambulances rushed to an area behind the church where the shots were thought to have come from. Police charged a 17-year-old in that incident. The protesters then scaled a waist-high barricade, staging a sit-in before advancing past police to the entrances.

St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger announced the state of emergency in a press release “in light of last night’s violence and unrest in the City of Ferguson, and the potential for harm to persons and property”.

News of the Sunday night shooting quickly spread to demonstrators on the streets of Ferguson.

They named the suspect as Tyrone Harris, 18, who was critically wounded in a gun battle with police on Sunday.

None of the officers was seriously injured. Harris’ father says he believes that his son was unarmed, and he called the police version “a bunch of lies”.

As people in Ferguson, Missouri, gathered a year on to remember slain Michael, a friend of the late 18-year-old was shot by police when he allegedly used a stolen handgun to shoot at officers.

Authorities said 18-year-old Tyrone Harris, of the 6700 block of Donald Street, has been charged with four counts of assault on law enforcement in the first degree, five counts of armed criminal action and one count of discharging or shooting a firearm at a motor vehicle. All 10 charges are felonies. Harris said shortly after 3 a.m. that his son had just gotten out of surgery.

Belmar said those resorting to violence are not protesters.

Belmar said early Monday that police estimated more than 40 rounds had been fired.

The chief said the man again fired on the officers, prompting all four to fire back.

All four officers in the van, each wearing protective vests, escaped injury.

Police later said that the shooting was unrelated.

Two others were also shot in a drive-by shooting overnight.

St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar says the suspect was among about six people who fired shots during a protest.

Nonetheless, Gaskin says he expected Monday night to be free of reactive violence, thievery and destruction.

The anniversary of Brown’s killing, which cast greater scrutiny on how police interact with black communities, has sparked days of renewed protests, though until Sunday they had been peaceful and without any arrests. Brown’s death helped spur a national “Black Lives Matter” movement that raised hard questions about law enforcement attitudes toward minorities and the militarization of police.