First of all, the fire department would like to assure you that
the massive fire from the
senior center was not related to the rioting last night.
However, the burning and looting at the CVS and the
rioters who cut the the fire department's hose certainly was.
And just because that guy is walking away from a police van does not mean he was the one who set it on fire. Though those
people at Mondawmin loading racks of clothes into their trunks are definitely guilty.
But heroes emerged, like the
man who danced on top of a box truck to Michael Jackson, the (different?) v talented Michael Jackson impersonator who
danced to "Beat It" and the
mom who saw her son rioting on TV and ran out and beat him. Yes, even CNN concedes, "A few people tried to stop the unrest," including
Vietnam vet Robert Valentine, who told young people to go away and told CNN,
"I've seen more than all this. This here is not relevant need to have their butts at home, viewing this with their families, studying and doing something with their life. They do not respect this young man's death. Their mom and daddy done lost a child. I am very pissed. .. I love my country, I love my charm city."
The
riots ignited at the conclusion of Freddie Gray's funeral, a high and solemn-yet-firey event attended by Gray's family, including
his mum, twin sister Fredricka, sister Carolina, stepfather; White House officials, Eric Garner's family; an all-star show of orators:
- Jesse Jackson - "all of our sons are at risk .. police wagon became a tomb ... he is more than a citizen, a martyr. ...go out and march, and march and call his name"
- Scruffy, tie-less Billy Murphy - "this is like a bad marriage, but we're not interested in divorce"
- Jamal Bryant - "he was a threat because he was man enough to look somebody in the eye .. they're used to black men with their head bowed down low, their spirit broken. .. but he stopped running"
- Elijah Cummings [tears]
And then at around 11:30 a.m. police claimed a "credible threat" of talks of gangs targeting police and "purge" on social media. As we were later to discover,
apparently a guy said on Facebook:
"We gonna unify, you got Bloods, Crips, Muslims, BGF, you got everybody out here, you ain't never see it like this before. Everybody together just to go against these pigs"
So downtown schools and businesses then began to close starting at around 2 p.m., including UMAB, T. Rowe Price and Legg Mason. But at the end of the funeral, mourners rolled out, protestors converged, students from schools including Frederick Douglass near Mondawmin spilled into the streets. "outsiders" including press, national groups like the Crips, Bloods and Nation of Islam took to the streets, and on the East side Dunbar students near Hopkins Hospital hit the bricks.
And the mayor made good on her quip from last week about allowing civilians on the streets
"space to destroy." Indeed, police held back, not just at Mondawmin and with Dunbar students but as North Avenue and the CVS were smashed and burned, until the men started cutting the fire hose. And at some point the police claimed someone shot at them, and boys and men definitely threw rocks and bricks. And 144 burnt cars.
Tuesday city schools were closed, and Tuesday morning the National Guard rolled in. City private schools were open, but sports were cancelled, and one school decided at 1:10 to close at 1:30 out of fears of .... no one is sure what, exactly.
But no fatalities that we know of yet.
At the moment Baltimore is on the front page of the BBC News, and
thousands of troopers have been deployed. Hogan is moving his office to take over from Stephanie, who is clearly overwhelmed (I miss Sheila Dixon, she got stuff done).
A warm, clear and sunny day, the cloying sweet smell of burnt lead-painted wood dominates the air, with pockets of burnt rubber, sulphur and plastics.
