Police officers in riot gear charged at peaceful protesters camped outside the Minneapolis 4th Precinct early Thursday morning in an effort to violently evict demonstrators who had already been attacked by vigilante white supremacists weeks earlier.
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Following in the footsteps of the Occupy Wall Street fiasco, race activists set up the encampment outside the Fourth Precinct police station in north Minneapolis to protest the fatal shooting of 24-year-old Jamar Clark.
Officers told about 50 demonstrators outside the police precinct to disperse about 4 a.m. and began tearing down tents about 15 minutes later. At least two municipal dump trucks were required to haul away tents, blankets and other material from the site early Thursday.
Police spokesman Scott Seroka said there were a few arrests, but provided no details.
“We have been balancing the safety needs of the community with the right for people to protest and have their voices meaningfully heard”, said Mayor Betsy Hodges in a statement to BuzzFeed News. Police secured the station with fencing and will facilitate protests, but not allow a new occupation, she said.
Montgomery says investigators still haven’t released videos of the November 15 shooting of Jamar Clark, and that a grand jury will decide on charges against the officers involved. The police union has said Clark was grabbing for an officer’s gun during an altercation, while witnesses and activists maintain he was in handcuffs when Clark was shot in the head.
Protests have focused on the precinct since Clark’s shooting, with some confrontations between police and demonstrators that included spray-painting the building.
Between April and September, the time between dispatch and police arrival for those calls averaged 5 minutes, 26 seconds citywide.
Police have said he was not cuffed.
Johnson tweeted that while police have backed off from the protesters, they are still monitoring the group from a distance.
Minneapolis Police Chief Janee Harteau said seven people were arrested for obstructing the legal process and one for trespassing. You need to quit mismanaging, quit mis-micromanaging the police department, and let people who have experience on how to remove unlawful protesters in.
A handful of neighbors upset about noise, vandalism and blocked streets vented concerns to the City Council’s public safety committee Wednesday, the first time the council has invited the public to formally weigh in on protests over the shooting of Clark on the street by a white police officer.
Officials called it a public safety issue.
Police said that officers located in the Fourth Precinct have had slower response times sinceprotestors began camping out in front of the Fourth Precinct police station.
“We’re not going to wait any more for Mayor Hodges to just sit and talk about racial equity and not do anything”, she said.
As police officers ordered the protesters to leave, they also brought in barricades to keep them out.
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“We’re not going to take anything off the table”.
