Photo by Ethan Duran
A hybrid of driving and walking protesters mobile since this afternoon have walked and driven approximately 10 miles overnight from Westown to Shorewood on the night of Tuesday, June 2 and the morning of Wednesday, June 3. Mayor Tom Barrett, who briefly joined the march Tuesday afternoon, announced that the curfew that was held Saturday, Sunday and Monday nights would be lifted if protests stayed peaceful. The march ended before 3 a.m. Tuesday morning when the Milwaukee Police Department broke it up near W. Capitol Drive and N. Port Washington Road.
This has been the fourth night of rallies across Milwaukee demanding justice for the murder of George Floyd, a black man who was killed by four police officers in Minneapolis.
Earlier that evening, Milwaukee police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at a crowd of protestors on N. 6th Street and W. McKinley Avenue during a tense standoff. Frank Nitty, a peaceful protest leader, was arrested yesterday by Milwaukee County Sheriff deputies after several hundred protesters walked onto the 794 Interstate and tried to walk onto the Hoan Bridge. Nitty is currently still in police custody.
Photo by Ethan Duran
Walk Down Pleasant Street
After the tear gassing on W. McKinley Avenue, marchers continued down E. Pleasant Street and turned on Water Street. They marched through Brady St., chanting and stopping on Prospect Avenue. Thomas, who was leading the march with a megaphone, announced that the rally would end at 9 p.m. even with the absence of a curfew.
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“I’m worried about the safety of the people out here,” said Thomas, who suffered the effects of tear gas on N. 6th Street and W. McKinley Avenue. “There’s kids out here, there’s mothers out here, there’s elderly out here.
“I don’t want anyone to be attacked and I want to send a message to our governor that we can end on a peaceful note,” said Thomas. An unidentified group of men took his place in leading the protest and continued down to Kilbourn Ave., where they circled around Yankee Hill and the Lower East Side.
“Let’s take it to the neighborhood,” one of the new protest leaders shouted, and the march set a course for Shorewood. The protesters marched almost four miles into Whitefish Bay, being made of mostly young adults. Cars honked their horns and coasted behind the group of marchers, some passengers holding signs or dangling their bodies out of the windows. Walking past college houses in the Upper East Side, crowd members would chant “Walk with us,” to people on balconies or in doorways.
While leaving the Lower East Side, torrents of rain started poured down on the group. Drenched with rain and chilled by the wind, most of the group continued walking and driving through Shorewood and Whitefish bay.
Photo by Ethan Duran
Cases of Vandalism
Though the group was self-policing, there were still cases of vandalism and cars driving on sidewalks. Some drivers shot fireworks into the air or lit piles of firecrackers on the pavement. Smaller cars scouting ahead would warn the group of spike strips and police checkpoints – on Oakland Avenue and E. Newport Avenue, a passenger in one of the leaving cars yelled “Y’all are walking into a trap,” out the window
Suburban police were visible as the group walked up N. Lake Drive and on the group’s way to N. Santa Monica Boulevard., though no arrests were visible in the darkness of night. Before 1 a.m. the protest exited Santa Monica and split up on E. Capitol Drive, where the remainder was later diverted to a side street and were forced to disperse by tear gas.
For more of our coverage of the protests occurring across Milwaukee, click here.
