Deadpool1986
Cook with a Mouth
Susan Montgomery took this photo of her son, Taye, whose eyes were treated with milk to counteract a chemical irritant she said was sprayed by a police officer.
Police Chief Janeé Harteau said there would be a full investigation “into the concerns brought forth” over her officers’ conduct in handling the protest.
The mother of a 10-year-old boy among a handful sprayed by police with Mace during a street protest in downtown Minneapolis Wednesday night said the officer gave no warning of what he was about to do and then sprayed others who objected to his actions.
Susan Montgomery said Thursday that she and her son, Taye, were among up to 100 people who closed down two blocks downtown Wednesday night to protest the March shooting death of biracial youth Tony Robinson by a white police officer in Madison, Wis., and the decision Tuesday that the officer would not be charged.
Police Chief Janeé Harteau issued a statement later Wednesday night saying there would be a full investigation “into the concerns brought forth” over her officers’ conduct at the protest.
The chief said the investigation “will include gathering surveillance video and interviewing witnesses. I understand and appreciate people’s concerns and will gather the full set of facts as quickly as possible. I assure everyone this will be a thorough investigation.”
In an incident report released late Thursday morning, Minneapolis police said protesters repeatedly “engaged motorists, jumping on cars and trying to pull open doors. Officers pushed back the crowds to get the motorists out of harm’s way. … Chemical aerosol was used to drive back the hostile crowds.”
The groups Black Lives Matter and Black Liberation Project are hosting a march Thursday starting at 7 p.m. at the Hennepin County Government Center in downtown Minneapolis “to stand in solidarity with 10-year-old Taye, who was pepper-sprayed by Minneapolis police last night during a march, and other victims of police abuse here and around the country,” newly elected Minneapolis NAACP President Nekima Levy-Pounds announced on her Facebook page Thursday morning.
Montgomery, of St. Paul, said the officer had been near her group of fewer than 10 protesters for some time and had to have known that her son was among them.
At one point, the officer drove up abruptly to Montgomery and the others with his siren sounding and lights flashing on S. 7th Street. “I was thinking, ‘This guy is gonna run us over,’ ” she said. “People started running. It seemed like he was mad at that point.”
After stopping, the officer “just jumped out of his car and started spraying everybody,” Montgomery said. “The Mace just happened. It hit everybody in that area. There was a mother with two sons in a stroller. We were being peaceful the entire time.”
Other protesters confronted the officer, screaming that he had just Maced a child, Montgomery continued. The officer responded by spraying them as well, she said.
With the spray in his eyes, Taye went to the ground and was carried into a nearby hotel, where milk was poured into his eyes as a remedy against the chemical irritant, his mother said.
“I’m not going to take back anything we did,” said Montgomery, who has brought her fourth-grade son to other protests. “I didn’t do anything wrong, and he didn’t do anything wrong.”
Levy-Pounds, who has been a leading voice on behalf of the Black Lives Matter movement in the Twin Cities, said in her Star Tribune blog early Thursday, “When I heard the news of Taye and other protesters being maced, I wondered how could police spray chemical weapons into a crowd of people without warning or regard for the possible harm that would be caused. And then I remembered Ferguson.”
http://www.startribune.com/mom-with...maced-10-year-old-other-protesters/303757551/
