Pandemonium Broke Out in Ferguson Last Night

Sunday night saw the worst clash between police and protesters yet.

Charlie Riedel/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

The peaceful protests in Ferguson, Missouri, descended into pandemonium on Sunday night just hours before the start of a curfew imposed by Gov. Jay Nixon. This morning, it remains unclear what stoked the chaos. Captain Ron Johnson of the Missouri Highway Patrol accused protesters of deliberately provoking the police with gunfire and Molotov cocktails. Protesters deny that anyone attacked the police.

What is clear is that Sunday night saw the greatest show of force since the start of the protests. The Missouri Highway Patrol, which replaced local police forces after those officers drew criticism for their aggressive stance toward demonstrators and journalists, fired rubber bullets into the crowd and marched in formation against protesters.

Photos and shaky video from the scene show tear gas and smoke streaming through disoriented crowds and police in riot gear lining up against citizens. Police ordered television news crews to turn off their lights, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and responded to a fire at a local store that appeared to have been set by looters. There are reports that violence broke out between civilians and that some civilians shot at police. Antonio French, a St. Louis alderman who has helped lead the protests, addressed those reports on Twitter:

The clash began at about 9 p.m. on West Florissant Avenue, a short walk from the spot where Michael Brown was slain by a police officer. Hours later, news broke that a preliminary autopsy of Brown revealed that the unarmed 18-year-old had been shot six times. Brown’s death, on August 9, inspired the protests after police withheld details about the shooting. The Department of Justice plans its own autopsy.

Demonstrators flee tear gas fired by police in Ferguson J.B. Forbes/AP

By about midnight last night, Ferguson’s streets were empty of protesters. Time‘s Alex Altman watched demonstrators return to the scene of the chaos just after dawn this morning and clean up broken bottles and empty shell casings. French posted a photo of the clean-up this morning:

Nixon announced early Monday morning that he would deploy the state’s National Guard to take control of the town. Civil rights groups, including the NAACP and American Civil Liberties Union, have called on the governor to roll back the curfew. The groups say the curfew “suspends the constitutional right to assemble by punishing the misdeeds of the few through the theft of constitutionally protected rights of the many.”

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch posted video of last night’s confrontation:

Many photos show McDonald’s workers washing a protester’s eyes out with milk after the woman, Cassandra Roberts, was tear-gassed by police. “I just came down here to support my people,” Roberts told reporters. “What the hell is going on in this world?”

Police continued their aggression toward journalists on the scene. Chris Hayes, the MSNBC host, tweeted:

Robert Klemko, a journalist for Sports Illustrated, reported that he was told by Missouri Highway Patrol Captain Ron Johnson to “walk away or be arrested.” Klemko walked away—and was arrested:

Video posted on YouTube reportedly shows police yelling at a member of Argus Radio, a volunteer-run music station that has been live streaming the protests, to “get the fuck out of here and keep that light off or you’re getting shelled with this.”

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate