State of Emergency Declared After Ferguson Violence

The Associated Press reported that St. Louis County police chief Jon Belmar has been trying to maintain a state of calm between the force and the protesters.

At the Old Courthouse in downtown St. Louis, protesters hung a banner from two balloons. St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger to declare a state of emergency in the St. Louis suburb on Monday, in effort to preempt the kind of violence that marked the wave of protests last August following Mr. Brown’s death.

Rallies over the past few days have been mostly peaceful, but late on Monday, police carrying shields rushed a crowd of protesters prompting many to scream and run. At one point, officers in riot gear forced people out of the street, which prompted demonstrators to hurl water bottles and other debris at officers. “That’s not going to happen”.

Brian Fletcher is a former Mayor of Ferguson. “Most of the police that I saw, they’re fully dressed in combat”. Police yesterday made at least a dozen arrests, but no shots were fired.

Police told News 4 they never had to use smoke or tear gas overnight. There were no reports of injuries, gun shots or property damage in the protest near the scene of Brown’s death.

Clergy and civil rights groups led a series of protests, staging a demonstration at a courthouse in St. Louis where 60 people were arrested, including Princeton University professor and activist Cornel West, according to a protest organizer.

Around 5:30pm. yesterday, multiple police departments were dispatched to the area of Highway 70 and Earth City Expressway for a group of protestors shutting down eastbound and westbound traffic. Several protesters were arrested during demonstrations that began Sunday night. Then, several gunshots suddenly rang out from an area near a strip of stores, including some that had been looted moments earlier. Protesters and police were involved in a tense standoff in the location where Brown was shot, West Florissant Avenue.

Surveillance video has been released showing suspect Tyrone Harris, who was critically wounded after being shot by police, minutes before he fired a gun at plainclothes officers, police said. Police said the suspect shot into the windshield of the van.

Belmar said the suspect is in surgery in “critical… unstable condition”. Police charged Harris, 18, 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 the charges are felonies”. Both men say they were arrested violently after failing to leave a McDonald’s fast enough.