City Hall damaged by Occupy protesters
OAKLAND, Calif. (KGO) --
ABC7 got an exclusive first look Sunday morning at the mess Occupy Oakland demonstrators made inside City Hall on Saturday night. In total, nearly 300 protesters were arrested during a day and night of confrontations with police.
City Hall became one of the targets of demonstrators when a few people managed to force their way in. Mayor Jean Quan showed us the damage which included a broken window of a conference room, some papers strewn around the front lobby area, overturned displays, and some graffiti scrawled on some of the walls. Also, the California and American flags were taken from the front mezzanine area out onto the front steps of City Hall and burned.
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View all 15 photos Saturday night, the mayor and her staff said that their tolerance for violent Occupy demonstrations in Oakland has come to an end. A visibly flustered Quan voiced her frustration with this latest demonstration.
"The Occupy Oakland has got to stop using Oakland as its playground and that people in the community and people in the Occupy movement have to stop making excuses for his behavior," said Quan on Saturday night.
At the height of protests during the day on Saturday, demonstrators squared off with police. Some tossed objects at officers and police responded with flash bangs and smoke grenades. The demonstrators would disperse, and then regroup. And as the day wore on, several conflicts erupted such as one near 14th and Broadway. ABC7 spoke with one woman who watched as this action went down. She says the police are being too heavy handed.
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But after watching demonstrators throwing objects at officers, then break into city hall and damage other property, city leaders are clearly at their wits' end.
"It's an escalation when our&I think basically, in my opinion, what amounts to kind of a domestic terrorism where people start taking buildings and start costing the city an incredible amount of resources," said Oakland City Councilmember Ignacio De La Fuente.
One of the buildings a large group rushed was the downtown YMCA. Police removed a few dozen from inside and encircled another group outside. About 70 of them were arrested. The police say they plan on holding and charging all of them.
"I would expect in the future, especially after what happened tonight, the level of violence, and everything that preceded this on the Internet, all their tweets -- which they know we read -- their intent is to commit acts of violence and vandalism and break into something that doesn't belong to them," said Oakland Police Deputy Chief Jeff Israel.
Quan told ABC7 that they do have surveillance video of people who were prying their way into City Hall and running throughout. She estimates about a couple dozen make their way in, but none were arrested at City Hall because police were not able to get there that fast since they were handling the situation at the YMCA.
Again about 300 people were arrested on Saturday and overnight.
A photo was taken by our media partner, the MercuryNews.com, of protesters burning the American flag on the steps of City Hall.
The demonstrators issued an email saying, "Occupy Oakland's building occupation an act of constitutionally protected civil disobedience was disrupted by a brutal police response."
Sunday afternoon Occupy protesters plan to march on a San Jose bank they accuse of predatory lending practices. Members of Occupy San Jose and Occupy Redwood City will protest at 2 p.m. in front of the Chase Bank at the Westfield Valley Fair Mall. They say the bank is foreclosing on two homes, one belonging to a 72-year-old woman whose home is set to be auctioned off on Valentine's Day.
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local/east_bay&id=8523318&rss=rss-kgo-article-8523318
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