No just-us, no peace.
Police made more than 150 arrests as a crowd broke windows and knocked down fences, protesting a Los Angeles court decision to sentence a white former transit officer to the minimum term for fatally shooting an unarmed black man.
Friday night’s unrest was the latest in the case against defendant Johannes Mehserle, which has provoked periodic racial strife in Oakland since he shot and killed Oscar Grant while trying to arrest him on an Oakland train platform nearly two years ago.
The protests erupted hours after Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert Perry sentenced Mehserle to a two-year prison sentence, provoking immediate anger from the victim’s family and friends who demanded a much harsher punishment.Oakland Police Chief Anthony Batts said the protest was declared an illegal assembly after one officer had his gun taken from him in a fight and another officer was hit by a car and suffered non-life-threatening injuries.
Officers began making arrests about 8 p.m. and had detained and handcuffed 152 people by the time the protest had died down about 90 minutes later.