People across US gather to protest recent police shootings

During a briefing Monday, Mayor Kasim Reed said more than 15,000 protesters have taken to the streets and there have been fewer than 25 arrests. After meeting at the National Center for Human and Civil Rights, supporters on Friday headed south through Centennial Olympic Park to the CNN Center, chanting and picketing in a call for police accountability.

– Atlanta’s mayor said the daily and sometimes multi-location protests are putting an enormous strain on the police department.

So they demanded that Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and Police Chief George Turner meet with them at the governor’s mansion, pledging that they would not budge until the men came.

The march came a day after a similar demonstration in Dallas was marred by a deadly sniper attack, in which five police officers were killed and seven others wounded.

“The overwhelming consensus was that the event was peaceful and largely positive”.

Indeed, only two out of 10,000 protesters were arrested. There, law enforcement officers formed a blockade to prevent the group from getting onto the highway.

“Everything we have seen suggests that there was no foul play involved, but I want to state clearly and unequivocally that we will not prejudge the circumstances surrounding this young man’s death”, Reed said. I have sat with people who have held hands and literally locked arms with Dr. Martin Luther King.

“This is the first major protest on this side of town and we know they care a lot about this side of town”.

Traffic on Interstate 40 was blocked in both directions for hours after hundreds of angry Black Lives Matter protesters marched onto the bridge to show their anger about police killings of black people. Darin Schierbaum said about 200 officers from his department worked the protests, none of whom were in riot gear. On Friday, keeping people off the highway was a priority for law enforcement. “Yet they have remained calm and professional”.

“We have to vote to make change”, he said. “Today is about unity, coming together. It’s police killing us”. Castile told the officer he was armed and had a concealed carry permit, she said. “We’re going to be protesting every single day”, said Bri Cole. “We need to block roads until, instead of having a ‘hood or a ghetto, we can have a community”.

For four consecutive nights, protesters have gathered calling for police reform.

Of course, there’s a long history of civil rights leaders risking their own lives to occupy public streets and highways-from Freedom Riders riding buses on Southern interstates to the three highway marches from Selma to Montgomery-in the name of tolerance. It also says that “failure to comply with the warning can result in an arrest”.