Saturday, 25 April 2015 00:00

Tensions Boil Over After Baltimore Police Call Protesters 'Lynch Mob'

Written by Lauren McCauley | Common Dreams
Residents kneel down, raising their hands to the sky behind concrete barriers placed there to expand the barriers of the Western District of the Baltimore Police as marchers take to the streets for another day of protests over the death of local resident Freddie Gray, while in police custody. Residents kneel down, raising their hands to the sky behind concrete barriers placed there to expand the barriers of the Western District of the Baltimore Police as marchers take to the streets for another day of protests over the death of local resident Freddie Gray, while in police custody. (Photo: Karl Merton Ferron/Baltimore Sun)

Demonstrators still seeking answers over the mysterious and troubling death of Freddie Gray, who died of a spinal injury while in the custody of the Baltimore Police Department, circled City Hall on Thursday after Maryland Governor Larry Hogan announced that he had called in state troopers to help quell the protests.

Anger seems to be reaching a boiling point. On Wednesday, the Baltimore Police Union issued a statement comparing the peaceful demonstrators to a "lynch mob"—the irony of which has only inflamed tensions.

RT has a live-stream of the growing demonstration.

"While we appreciate the right of our citizens to protest and applaud the fact that, to date, the protests have been peaceful, we are very concerned about the rhetoric of the protests," the Baltimore Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 3 said in a statement. 

"In fact," the statement continues, "the images seen on television look and sound much like a lynch mob in that they are calling for the immediate imprisonment of these officers without them ever receiving the due process that is the constitutional right of every citizen, including law enforcement officers."

Daily demonstrations have grown since Sunday, when news broke that Gray, a 27-year-old black man, had died from his injury a week after he was arrested. The protesters are seeking answers and accountability for a tragedy which is being compared with other recent incidents of police brutality against people of color.

During the Thursday protest, demonstrators raised their arms in the air in the "hands up don't shoot" gesture that became a symbol of the uprisings that followed the killing of black teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri last August.

Earlier in the day, Maryland State Police spokesman Sgt. Marc Black confirmed to the Baltimore Sun that 32 troopers "with expertise in crowd control" had arrived in Baltimore to "be in place for help whenever the Baltimore City Police department asks."

Images from the protest is being shared online under the hashtag #FreddieGray.

Link to original article from Common Dreams

Read 40361 times

Latest Zero Climate Emissions News

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • 6

Latest News

  • Trump administration's voter suppression attempts ahead of midterms are not only 'morally wrong,' they're illegal +

    Trump administration's voter suppression attempts ahead of midterms are not only 'morally wrong,' they're illegal Imagine going to the polls on Election Day and discovering that your ballot could be collected and reviewed by the Read More
  • ACLU Blueprints Offer Vision to Cut US Incarceration Rate in Half by Prioritizing 'People Over Prisons' +

    ACLU Blueprints Offer Vision to Cut US Incarceration Rate in Half by Prioritizing 'People Over Prisons' ACLU Blueprints Offer Vision to Cut US Incarceration Rate in Half by Prioritizing 'People Over Prisons' Read More
  • As Florence Makes Landfall, Poorest Once More Likely to Suffer Most From Storm's Destruction +

    As Florence Makes Landfall, Poorest Once More Likely to Suffer Most From Storm's Destruction "These disasters drag into the light exactly who is already being thrown away," notes Naomi Klein Read More
  • How about some good news? Kansas Democratic Representative advances bill for Native Peoples. +

    How about some good news? Kansas Democratic Representative advances bill for Native Peoples. How about some good news? Kansas Democratic Representative advances bill for Native Peoples. Read More
  • How One Dying Man Changed The Debate About The Tax Bill +

    How One Dying Man Changed The Debate About The Tax Bill What mattered was that he showed up — that he put himself in front of the people whose opinions on Read More
  • Democrats Just Won a Major Victory in Virginia +

    Democrats Just Won a Major Victory in Virginia On a night of Democratic victories, one of the most significant wins came in Virginia, where the party held onto Read More
  • Repealing the Jim Crow law that keeps 1.5 million Floridians from voting. +

    Repealing the Jim Crow law that keeps 1.5 million Floridians from voting. A seismic political battle that could send shockwaves all the way to the White House was launched last week in Read More
  • Nuclear Weapons: Who Pays, Who Profits? +

    Nuclear Weapons: Who Pays, Who Profits? In an interview with Reuters conducted a month after he took office, Donald Trump asserted that the U.S. had “fallen Read More
  • Sessions issues sweeping new criminal charging policy +

    Sessions issues sweeping new criminal charging policy Attorney General Jeff Sessions overturned the sweeping criminal charging policy of former attorney general Eric H. Holder Jr. and directed Read More
  • 1
  • 2

Featured Zero Climate Emissions News

  • Kerry Would Sue Trump for 'the Lives That Will be Lost' Due to Climate Change +

    Kerry Would Sue Trump for 'the Lives That Will be Lost' Due to Climate Change Former Secretary of State John Kerry, author of Every Day is Extra, predicted that “lives will be lost” due to Read More
  • California to launch its 'own damn satellite' to track greenhouse gases +

    California to launch its 'own damn satellite' to track greenhouse gases Announcement at climate summit comes after former US secretary of state John Kerry warns that international action is slowing Read More
  • 'Major Victory': Landowner's Legal Challenge Halts Construction of Bayou Bridge Pipeline in Louisiana +

    'Major Victory': Landowner's Legal Challenge Halts Construction of Bayou Bridge Pipeline in Louisiana While celebrating the win, activists noted that "construction of the Bayou Bridge Pipeline continues in other parts of the Atchafalaya Read More
  • DAPL Investors Getting Antsy: If Pipeline Doesn’t Move Oil by January First the Contract EXPIRES +

    DAPL Investors Getting Antsy: If Pipeline Doesn’t Move Oil by January First the Contract EXPIRES Though water protectors have held their ground at Standing Rock against the Dakota Access pipeline for months now, they need Read More
  • WV Supreme Court: No Pipeline Surveys for Private Gain +

    WV Supreme Court: No Pipeline Surveys for Private Gain West Virginia property owners won an important case at the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals on Tuesday when that Read More
  • Report: Combat Vs. Climate +

    Report: Combat Vs. Climate Fifteen of the sixteen hottest years ever recorded have occurred during this new century, and the near-unanimous scientific consensus attributes Read More
  • Corporate Media Silent as States Declare Emergency In Aftermath Massive Pipeline Rupture +

    Corporate Media Silent as States Declare Emergency In Aftermath Massive Pipeline Rupture Since an Alabama mine worker first alerted Colonial Pipeline officials to a massive rupture, more than a quarter million gallons Read More
  • The Big Difference at Standing Rock Is Native Leadership All Around +

    The Big Difference at Standing Rock Is Native Leadership All Around This year’s massive buildup of resistance to the Dakota Access pipeline follows closely on the heels of the victory over Read More
  • Beyond Paris: Finding the Courage to Face the Climate Emergency +

    Beyond Paris: Finding the Courage to Face the Climate Emergency Last weekend in Orlando the platform committee of the Democratic Party added language into their platform acknowledging the official position Read More
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5