Libby Schaaf

Dozens Arrested, Cited After Oakland Street Protest

Authorities acting under a new get-tough policy for monitoring street protests arrested or cited dozens of demonstrators for ignoring police orders to end a demonstration in Oakland.

The Oakland police said the protesters were detained Saturday night after about 100 demonstrators confronted a line of officers. After a brief standoff, the police ordered the protesters to disband. Dozens of protesters who sat in the middle of the street were detained along with several others who tried to flee.

The Oakland Tribune reported Sunday
that police cited a new policy by the city's mayor to force protesters from the street to the sidewalk after Oakland experienced several violent demonstrations in the past year. Oakland has hosted rallies in the streets for years, but the mayor said the new policy is needed to combat damage to property and violence.

Mayor Libby Schaaf said earlier that existing policies and laws allows police to clear streets of protesters. Many businesses along the city's automobile sales district were badly damaged by protesters who broke away from the main demonstration on May 1. Businesses also sustained heavy damage during protests arising from the deaths of unarmed black men in police custody in Ferguson, Missouri, and elsewhere over the last two years.

Tensions rose anew in Oakland on Thursday when protesters marched in honor of black women killed by police across the nation. But organizers said they were surprised when police pushed them off the streets and onto the sidewalks, citing the mayor's new policy. No one was arrested Thursday.

Organizers then called for another protest Saturday to demonstrate against the new policy.

"You can't run roughshod over people because they're protesting your oppression,'' said Cat Brooks, an organizer of both protests. "You can't push us off the streets.''

Further protests over the new policy are planned, Brooks said.

Rachel Lederman, a lawyer with the National Lawyers Guild who helped Oakland craft its crowd-control policies, said the new tactics appear to violate the guidelines.

"It doesn't make any sense because saying that marches have to be on the sidewalk has absolutely no relationship to impending property damage that might occur,'' Lederman said. "Obviously that would happen on a sidewalk, not a street.''

The mayor didn't respond to a request for comment.
 

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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