A man sustained critical injuries after authorities say he opened fire on police officers in Ferguson, Mo., on the anniversary of Michael Brown’s death, an act that prompted the officers to shoot back.
According to St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar, officers had been tracking the suspect during Sunday evening’s rowdy demonstrations. At the height of the protests, rocks and bottles were reportedly thrown at officers. Officials say gunshots were heard from an area near a strip of stores, some of which had been looted. The motivation for the shooting wasn’t clear, but Belmar said various groups had been feuding.
“It was a remarkable amount of gunfire,” he said, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Belmar added the people doing the shooting were “criminals” and said, “they were not protestors.”
After crossing the street, the suspect spotted plainclothes officers arriving in an unmarked van with distinctive red and blue police lights, Belmar said. He said the suspect fired into the hood and windshield.
The officers returned fire at him from inside the vehicle and when he ran, they pursued him on foot.
When the suspect became trapped in a fenced-in area, the officers came under fire again, the chief said. In response, all four officers fired back. The suspect was struck and fell, and is now in “critical, unstable” condition.
While officials have not released the names of those involved, Tyrone Harris identified the suspect as his 18-year old son, Tyrone Harris Jr., according to the Post-Dispatch.
Harris is pushing back on the police version of events, calling them “a bunch of lies.” He contends that two girls who were with this son told him the younger Harris was unarmed and had been drawn into a dispute with two groups of young people.
On Monday,St. Louis County prosecutors announced 10 felony charges against Harris. The charges include five counts of armed criminal action, four counts of first-degree assault on a law enforcement officer and a firearms charge.
None of the detectives sustained any serious injuries, Belmar told reporters, and all four have been placed on administrative leave. The officers were not wearing body cameras and each has six to 12 years of experience, the chief said.
Protest groups are criticizing St. Louis County for putting plainclothes officers without body cameras in Ferguson, especially after Brown’s death.
“After a year of protest and conversation around police accountability, having plainclothes officers without body cameras and proper identification in the protest setting leaves us with only the officer’s account of the incident, which is clearly problematic,” the Ferguson Action Council said in a news release Monday morning. The coalition includes the Don’t Shoot Coalition, Hands Up United, Organization for Black Struggle and several others.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch weighed in Monday morning, saying the violent acts serve as a distraction from the ongoing effort to rebuild trust between law enforcement and the communities they try to protect.
“I strongly condemn the violence against the community, including police officers, in Ferguson,” she said. “As we have seen over the recent months and years, not only does violence obscure any message of peaceful protest, it places the community, as well as the officers who seek to protect it, in harm’s way.”
“The weekend’s events were peaceful and promoted a message of reconciliation and healing,” she added. “But incidents of violence, such as we saw last night, are contrary to both that message, along with everything that all of us, including this group, have worked to achieve over the past year.”
Organizers of some of the weekend’s protests have pledged a day of civil disobedience on Monday, but have yet to offer specific details.
