Berkeley Crowds Protest Over Police Killings of Black Men

By Alison Vekshin  

More than 300 protesters roamed the streets of Berkeley, California, for a third night, closing a train track and an Interstate and chanting “we want justice” as they joined international calls for attention to the killing of black men by white police officers.
“What you have in the Bay Area is a resident group of anarchists, and they pretty much float around between San Francisco, Oakland and Berkeley,” Oakland Mayor Jean Quan said in a telephone interview. “Before, they tagged them as the Oakland occupiers. It’s the same kind of m.o. They wear black, they hide within bigger crowds and then late at night they commit vandalism.”
Public anger continues over the killing of two unarmed black men by police, fueling violent rallies nationwide. Rallies and riots have raged since a grand jury refused last month to indict former officer Darren Wilson for shooting unarmed teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and a New York panel last week declined to charge Officer Daniel Pantaleo for
choking Eric Garner to death during an attempted arrest on suspicion of selling untaxed cigarettes.
In Brooklyn, demonstrators trained their sights on a Nets basketball game with royal attendees, Prince William and his wife, Kate Middleton. Inside the Barclays Center, LeBron James, star of the visiting Cleveland Cavaliers, wore a black warm-up shirt bearing Garner’s last words: “I can’t breathe.” Hundreds of protesters chanting “hands up, don’t shoot” filled the courtyard outside, flanked by dozens of police and metal barricades.

Weekend Demonstrations

Demonstrations in Berkeley and Oakland over the weekend led to smashed store windows, looting, a freeway closure and damaged police cruisers as protests continue for a third week. Police made five arrests Dec. 7 and six arrests the night before, police department spokeswoman Jennifer Coats said.
Last night, protesters marched from Berkeley police headquarters to Interstate 80, where they were met by about 40 police officers in riot gear and black helmets. Access to the highway was cut off by demonstrators chanting: “Whose tax dollars? Our tax dollars.”
Some protesters blocked a train at an Amtrak station as others closed I-80, hanging over the edge of a concrete barrier bordering the highway. Police formed a line and edged protesters away from the highway, reopening it at about 10:30 p.m. local time. The protests also led to the closure of a rapid transit train station.

Protesting Mother

“I’m out here to protest against police brutality and systemic racism,” said Angelica Foreman, 31, a Berkeley resident and stay-at-home mother of two.
Foreman, who marched with a sign reading “black lives matter!” attached to her back, said she’s not concerned about protesters turning violent.
“There are others who come out here and they start tearing things up and they’re violent,” Foreman said. “But that’s not really what this group is about. The people who are out here every day are trying to make real change.”
More protests are scheduled in Oakland and Berkeley this week. The demonstrations appear to be reviving the Occupy Oakland movement of three years ago, which produced some of the most violent clashes with police in demonstrations against income inequality, foreclosures and other economic injustices. Berkeley is home to the University of California’s flagship campus, which has a history of political activism, including the Free Speech Movement of the 1960s.
“The Oakland police are getting much better at crowd control and how to arrest these guys without creating a situation where we create chaos,” Mayor Quan said.
Since the Occupy protests, Oakland police have trained in crowd-control procedures and have learned to isolate violent protesters in a crowd by following them and arresting them, or enclosing a group in which they are hiding and asking them to disperse, she said.

Tear Gas

The latest round of protests have many of the same hallmarks as Oakland’s Occupy rallies, which featured looting, breaking of storefront windows and police use of tear gas to disperse crowds. Occupy Oakland organizers appear to be involved in the scheduling of events, using their website to release details of this week’s rallies.
“Occupy was focused on upward gazing at the unfairness of how elites are treated in our society,” Jonathan Simon, a professor at the Berkeley School of Law, said in a telephone interview. “In this case, it’s also about unfairness but now people are reflecting on the way people at the bottom of our society are treated in terms of the heavy-handed policing tactics that so many young men of color experience routinely.”

Destructive Energy

The protesters should channel their energy in a less destructive way, Jesse Arreguin, a Berkeley council member who represents the downtown where businesses were damaged, said in a telephone interview.
“What kind of message is being sent by breaking windows and stealing things?” Arreguin said. “How does that in any way advance the agenda of addressing police brutality and racial profiling and trying to advocate for equality and justice? Going forward, we have to find a way to differentiate between the peaceful protesters and the press and the violent destructive element.”
Police used tear gas in Dec. 6 demonstrations, he said. A Trader Joe’s grocery store, two Radio Shack (RSH) electronics stores, a McDonald’s and a Whole Foods Market (WFM) were vandalized, he added.
A protest dubbed a “Day of Anger: Millions March Oakland” is scheduled for 2 p.m. local time in Oakland on Dec. 13.
“We must come together in unity and speak out against the brutality and murder of black and brown bodies!” according to a notice posted on the Occupy Oakland website. “Oakland is Ferguson. Ferguson is Oakland.”