Curfew, State of Emergency Declared By Missouri Governor

16 Aug, 2014

Missouri Governor Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency and imposed a curfew in Ferguson on Saturday, trying to restore order after a week of racially charged protests and looting over the shooting of an unarmed black teenager by a white police officer.

The curfew will run midnight until 5 a.m. until further notice, said Highway Patrol Captain Ron Johnson. Johnson was named by the governor this week to oversee security in the suburban St. Louis community that has been roiled by the Aug. 9 shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown.

“The eyes of the world are watching. This is the test of whether a community, this community, any community, can break the cycle of fear, distrust and violence, and replace them with peace, strength and, ultimately, justice,” Nixon told a gathering at a church near Ferguson.

Some in the crowd reacted angrily to the news and several said the police officer who killed Brown must be prosecuted for murder if peace is to return to the community. There were shouts of “hands up, don’t shoot,” a phrase that has become a rallying cry in Ferguson over the last week.

The unrest erupted after police officer Darren Wilson, 28, shot and killed Brown shortly after noon a week ago as Brown and a friend walked down a street that runs through an apartment complex where Brown’s grandmother lives.

Tensions have been high all week but escalated on Friday evening as protesters again swarmed through a residential and retail district that has become a center of the unrest, pitting mostly black protesters against mostly white police.

On Saturday, people marching through city streets held signs that read “black lives matter,” and “Don’t shoot.”

For days, police repeatedly refused to identify the officer involved, citing concerns for his safety. On Friday, Ferguson Police Chief Tom Jackson gave in to community pressure and identified Wilson as the officer involved.

But at the same time, Jackson added to the community’s outrage when he announced Brown had been a suspect in the robbery of a convenience store at the time he was shot.

Jackson later told a news conference that when Wilson shot Brown, the officer did not know the teen was a suspect in the robbery. There was no connection between the shooting and the alleged robbery, Jackson said.

Reuters

Image Christian Gooden 

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