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Boston police arrests 23 at demo against police brutality

14 December 2014 04:54 (UTC +04:00)

Peaceful protestors marching in Boston on Saturday were met with multiple lines of police barricades, as well as helicopters and automatic weapons outside the Suffolk County Jail on Nashua Street, the Boston Globe reported.

Inside the jail, the inmates banged on their windows in support of the demonstration.

Boston police said the forces made at least 23 arrests, while a journalist, called Debra Glidden, wrote on Twitter that the cops suddenly went into a “mass arrest mode” during the demonstration.

The arrests occurred “after some demonstrators failed to comply with orders to obey the law,” said David Procopio, a state police spokesman in an email.

Procopio added that police had placed an emphasis on preventing demonstrators from “trespassing onto state highways.”

Meanwhile, social media images showed police troops lining up to block people from entering highways and demonstrators peacefully staging die-in protest.

The protest, which started around Saturday noon near Massachusetts State House, reportedly brought together at least 1,500 people.

On Friday, Massachusetts State Police Colonel Timothy P. Alben said in a statement that he expected “several thousand” demonstrators to attend Saturday’s march.

The Boston protest came amid nation-wide demonstrations of hundreds of thousands of protesters in major US cities against rampant racism and police violence in the country.