The Morning Jolt, Friday:
Ferguson, Staten Island . . . Baltimore?
Keep an eye on Baltimore, Md., where we have another case of a black man dying after being in police custody, and a variety of unanswered questions:
Freddie Gray, a Baltimore man injured during an arrest by Baltimore police last week, died Sunday at Shock Trauma, prompting protests by city residents and out-of-town activists and promises from city officials for a thorough investigation.
Gray, 25, died a week after he suffered a broken vertabra after being arrested near Gilmor Homes in Sandtown-Winchester.
Police have not given a cause for Gray’s injuries or specified why he was arrested, citing an investigation into the incident.
Here’s an aspect that’s different from Ferguson, Mo., and Staten Island, N.Y.: Maryland has a Republican governor, Larry Hogan, whom local Democrats would love to cast as a villain in any conflicts to come. Hogan is sending in Maryland State Police officers to assist the city police:
There’s raw emotions. People legitimately have concerns, and the community is out in force protesting,” Hogan said. “I want to thank the folks involved in that. So far it has been peaceful. We want to try to keep things under control. The last thing we need is more violence in Baltimore City.”
Hogan said city police will remain on the front lines as the demonstrations, which began Saturday and have been mostly peaceful, continue in city streets. The governor said the city has asked for help, and that he would continue to grant it whenever asked. “We don’t want to interfere,” he said.
Thirty-two troopers with expertise in crowd control arrived in Baltimore early Thursday afternoon, Maryland State Police spokesman Sgt. Marc Black said. The team will be in place for help whenever the Baltimore City Police department asks, he said.
During Ferguson and Staten Island, angry urban progressives kept looking for a Republican villain and failed; Missouri governor Jay Nixon, St. Louis County prosecutor Robert McCulloch, New York City mayor Bill de Blasio, and New York City police commissioner William Bratton are all Democrats.
At the Gallery at Harborplace around 7 p.m., a window at the Michael Kors store was smashed and shoppers were evacuated. Those running from the mall held coats and scarves over their faces and reported hearing a loud bang as the window was smashed with a trash can.
Leila Rghioui, 20, of Randallstown had stopped by the mall after protesting earlier in the day with her friends.
“All I remember is the security guards started barricading doors and everyone started losing their minds coughing,” said Rghioui, who said she threw up from pepper spray in the air.
Outside Oriole Park at Camden Yards, demonstrators clashed with police.
A few protesters jumped on police cars and smashed their windows with trash cans and traffic cones as the group moved north on Howard. They grabbed police caps from the cars and posed atop them to cheering and howls of laughter. The group quickly dispersed, sprinting away as a line of police officers came running down the street.
The crowd gets more violent, which prompts police forces to crack down in a harsher manner. Sooner or later, some other law-enforcement official will be accused of using unnecessary force or excessively violent methods of controlling a rioting crowd. When that happens, you’ll see a lot of Maryland Democrats attempt to dump the blame on Hogan.