Police shooting, protests put Ferguson back on edge

1St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar gestures during a news conference, Monday, Aug. 10, 2015, in Clayton, Mo.
2Belmar said a suspect fired on police Sunday during a protest on the anniversary of the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo.
3Police returned fire and the man was taken to a hospital, where Belmar said he was in surgery early Monday morning.
4Protesters yell at police, Sunday, Aug. 9, 2015, in Ferguson, Mo., before shots were fired near the protest.
5The one-year anniversary of Michael Brown's death in Ferguson began with a march in his honor and ended with a protest that was interrupted by gunfire.
6Police stand near a suspect in a parking lot after gunfire during a protest on the anniversary of the death of Michael Brown, Sunday, Aug. 9, 2015, in Ferguson, Mo.
7St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar said that plainclothes officers had been tracking the man, who they believed was armed, during the protest.
8Belmar said the man opened fire on police and was struck when the officers returned fire.
9The man was taken to a hospital, where Belmar said he was in surgery early Monday morning.
10St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar speaks during a news conference, Monday, Aug. 10, 2015, in Clayton, Mo.
11Police form a line across West Florissant Ave. during a protest, Sunday, Aug. 9, 2015, in Ferguson, Mo.
12Protesters yell as police form a line across West Florissant Ave., Sunday, Aug. 9, 2015, in Ferguson, Mo., before shots were fired near the protest.
13Police take cover after gunfire near a protest in Ferguson, Mo., Sunday, Aug. 9, 2015.
14St. Louis police arrest a protester outside the Thomas F. Eagleton Federal Courthouse, Monday, Aug. 10, 2015, in St. Louis.
15Protesters have been arrested after blocking the entrance to the St. Louis federal courthouse while calling for more aggressive U.S. government response to what they call racist law enforcement practices.
16FERGUSON, Mo.
17Ferguson was a community on edge again Monday, a day after a protest marking the anniversary of Michael Brown's death was punctuated with gunshots and police critically wounded a black 18-year-old accused of opening fire on officers.
18Police, protesters and people who live and work in the St. Louis suburb were bracing for what nightfall might bring following more violence along West Florissant Avenue, the same thoroughfare that was the site of massive protests and rioting after Brown was fatally shot last year in a confrontation with a white Ferguson officer.
19"Of course I'm worried," said Sandy Sansevere, a retired health care worker who volunteers at the retail store operated by the nonprofit group I Love Ferguson, which was formed after Brown's death to promote the community.
20"What scares me are the guns."
21The father of the suspect who was shot called the police version of events "a bunch of lies."
22He said two girls who were with his son told him he was unarmed and had been drawn into a dispute involving two groups of young people.
23St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger declared a state of emergency, which authorizes county Police Chief Jon Belmar to take control of police emergency management in and around Ferguson.
24Protests spilled outside of Ferguson.
25Almost 60 protesters were arrested around midday Monday for blocking the entrance to the federal courthouse in downtown St. Louis.
26Authorities planned to release them on a promise to appear later in court.
27Among those arrested was scholar and civil rights activist Cornel West.
28That protest, like other commemoration events over the past few days, was largely peaceful and somber.
29But on Sunday, several hundred people gathered in the street on West Florissant, ignoring an officer on a bullhorn repeatedly warning them to get to the sidewalk or face arrest.
30Eventually, a few lobbed glass bottles and rocks at officers.
31One officer was hospitalized with cuts to the face after being hit with a rock.
32Two others had minor injuries after protesters sprayed them with pepper spray.
33As tensions escalated, several gunshots suddenly rang out from the area near a strip of stores, including some that had been looted moments earlier.
34Belmar believes the shots came from about six different shooters.
35What prompted the shooting was not clear, but Belmar said two groups had been feuding.
36The shots sent protesters and reporters running for cover.
37The shooters included the suspect, identified by his father as 18-year-old Tyrone Harris Jr., whom police had been watching out of concern that he was armed, Belmar said.
38During the gunfire, the suspect crossed the street and apparently spotted plainclothes officers arriving in an unmarked van with distinctive red and blue police lights, Belmar said.
39The suspect allegedly shot into the windshield of the van.
40The four officers in the van fired back, then pursued the suspect on foot.
41The suspect again fired on the officers when he became trapped in a fenced-in area, the chief said, and all four opened fire.
42Harris was in critical condition after surgery.
43Prosecutors announced 10 charges against him - five counts of armed criminal action, four counts of first-degree assault on a law enforcement officer and a firearms charge.
44All 10 are felonies.
45All four officers in the van, each wearing protective vests, escaped injury.
46They were not wearing body cameras, Belmar said.
47Tyrone Harris Sr. told The Associated Press his son was a close friend of Michael Brown and was in Ferguson Sunday night to pay respects.
48The elder Harris said his son got caught up in a dispute among two groups of young people and was "running for his life" after gunfire broke out.
49"My son was running to the police to ask for help, and he was shot," he said.
50"It's all a bunch of lies ... They're making my son look like a criminal."
51Belmar said the suspect who fired on officers had a semi-automatic 9 mm gun that was stolen last year from Cape Girardeau, Missouri.
52The police chief drew a distinction between the shooters and the protesters.
53"They were criminals," he said of those involved in gunfire.
54"They weren't protesters."
55Gov. Jay Nixon agreed, saying in a statement that such "reprehensible acts must not be allowed to silence the voices of peace and progress."
56Some protest groups said police were too quick to go into riot mode.
57Others questioned why plainclothes officers were part of the patrol.
58"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," said Kayla Reed, a field organizer with the Organization of Black Struggle.
59Belmar said it is common to use plainclothes officers.
60In addition, there were more than 100 uniformed officers from the Missouri State Highway Patrol and the Ferguson and St. Louis County police departments.
61Some protest leaders worried about how the latest police shooting - especially on a day honoring Michael Brown - could escalate tensions.
62"It changes the equation," said Rebecca Ragland, an Episcopal priest who was part of a group that marched to the federal courthouse in St. Louis.
63"The way the police will respond now will be much more militaristic. It legitimizes a response from the police that's a lot more aggressive."
64John Gaskin III, a member of the NAACP national board from St. Louis, was more hopeful.