in the NY Times

Oakland Turns Violent Over Shooting

By JESSE McKINLEY

Protesters angry over a deadly New Year’s Day shooting of a young black man by a transit police officer erupted into violence in downtown Oakland on Wednesday night while investigators struggled to determine what prompted the officer to fire his gun into the unarmed man’s back.

After an afternoon of peaceful demonstrations and a memorial service, protests turned chaotic after dark as a small clutch of protesters set trash cans and cars afire and busted windows on police cruisers and storefronts. Police in riot gear responded with tear gas and billy clubs and at least 14 arrests were made, according to local television reports. Several major downtown streets were closed, and helicopter footage showed small groups of protesters roaming through the city’s deserted center. There were no immediate reports of injuries, but sirens continued to echo into the late evening.

Mayor Ron Dellums pleaded for calm as anger continued to build in the city’s black community over the shooting of Oscar Grant III, a 22-year-old butcher’s apprentice who was shot in the back while lying on the platform at the Fruitvale station of the Bay Area Rapid Transit system.

“We’ve got to have a real investigation that people can have confidence in,” said Mr. Dellums on Wednesday night. “And my sense of it is that part of this reaction is that people have lost confidence.”

Mr. Grant, who had been involved in a scuffle aboard a train after leaving a New Year’s Eve celebration in San Francisco, died at a local hospital several hours after being shot. The bullet, which had passed through his lower back, ricocheted into his lung. The officer, Johannes Mehserle, resigned on Wednesday, but investigators said efforts to interview him about the circumstances of the shooting had been rebuffed by his lawyers and police union leaders, according to Linton Johnson, spokesperson for the transit districtThe incident was captured by at least four cellphone cameras held by passengers on a train idling next to the platform. The videos, which have been widely broadcast and streamed online, show Mr. Grant lying face down when Mr. Mehserle, 27, pulls his gun and fires a single shot. Mr. Mehserle looks stunned for a moment, and then handcuffs Mr. Grant with the assistance of another officer.

John Burris, a lawyer for Mr. Grant’s mother and his live-in girlfriend, said he had asked Tom Orloff, the Alameda County District Attorney, to consider filing criminal charges against Mr. Mehserle.

“If you can’t file charges in a case like this,” said Mr. Burris, “I don’t know what kind of case you can file in.”

Mr. Orloff said he was still investigating the case, as was the BART police department. Federal law enforcement were also reported to be looking into whether Mr. Grant’s civil rights were violated in his killing.

be the change we wish to see….

Obama Biden, Oakland Riots, originally uploaded by Thomas Hawk.

Posing in Front of a Burnt Out Car, Oakland Riots, originally uploaded by Thomas Hawk.

this is my car after the riots

at least they didn’t set it on fire, originally uploaded by obi-j.

“it’s not a riot, it’s a protest”, she said

so, yeah: all the windows in my car, parked RIGHT NEXT TO THIS ONE ON FIRE, were smashed.

in case you missed it, on new year’s day, a BART policeman shot an unarmed man in the back.

and obviously, people are pissed.  there were protests all over today, and this one got way out of hand. the earlier part of the protest included a candlelight vigil and very peaceful. i know that, and that was the right thing to do. it’s just really unfortunate that what it spiraled into was completely counterproductive and violent.

i wasn’t there to participate in the protest. my friend and i had parked downtown to have dinner before we went dancing, and just got caught in the middle of it, like 3 times over the course of several hours between our dinner and dancing (but i twittered what i saw in real time!—>).  we initially moved from one restaurant location @ 8th street/Broadway to another one @ 13th/Franklin to avoid the protest, which i thought was fairly peaceful looking, but it eventually followed us uptown and got more violent, and when we left the 2nd restaurant i couldn’t get to my car because it was being blocked by riot police. we just figured….what can we do? and went dancing. it was actually really nice to have this safe-feeling dance space to walk into after being surrounded by so much negativity and anger, and we danced hard. if armageddon or somesuch ever really does happen, can someone please just throw a party?

during the invocation, the speaker told everyone there was a riot going on outside and to be really aware and partner up when leaving, and some valiant defender of active democracy interrupted with”it’s not a riot, it’s a protest”.  had she been outside?  THAT WAS A RIOT. it was hard for me to keep quiet.

anyway, i figured it would all be gone by the time we were done, as this thing had been going on for HOURS already,  but when we left the ballroom @ 19th/Broadway there was a huge crowd of police and protesters and ambulances right outside, and when we got back to my car it had been smashed.  i guess i’m an idiot for not realizing it was going to get that out of hand and move all over and not getting the fuck out of downtown, but when we parked at the 2nd restaurant, there was no sign of the protest in that area, and it had seemed like it was dispersing. WRONG. it’s still going on now, i’m sure, after midnight. actually, i was invited to join the protest with some friends, and i was like “NO FUCKING WAY”, so i guess part of me did know it would get out of hand. more than anything i didn’t realize it was going to last so long and cover so much of the city.

i have a lot of thoughts in my head about this right now - about what options we have to stand up for justice besides rioting in the streets, about what to do with our anger, about violence begetting violence - but i need to go to bed so i can get up and deal with my car before i go to work tomorrow.

or maybe i need a day off.