MINNEAPOLIS - Emotions cooled overnight as temperatures dipped below freezing at the Minneapolis Police Department 4th Precinct, which since Sunday has been the center of protests in the police shooting of a black man.
A day after tensions rose as police moved protesters away from the police station, but still on the grounds, things were calmer.
However, police did arrest two people after the outside walls and windows of the station were vandalized with graffiti: "Jamar Clark," "No Justice, No Peace" and an obscenity.
Also overnight, a sports utility vehicle driver was arrested after driving into a precinct parking lot gate. Tests were taken to check whether the driver had been drinking. There was no indication whether the incident was connected to the precinct occupation.
An expected influx of protesters at a Minneapolis City Council meeting did not materialize at mid-morning today.
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The protest followed the early Sunday shooting of 24-year-old Jamar Clark, a North Minneapolis resident who police said was interfering with ambulance personnel who were treating his girlfriend. He was unarmed, but police union President Lt. Bob Kroll said Clark was in the process of getting an officer's gun when another Minneapolis policeman shot him in the head once. Clark died Monday.
Some protesters shut down Interstate 94 Monday night.
Protesters demand that video of the shooting be released. The state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension will not release it yet, saying the video collected from several sources does not show the entire incident. The BCA and federal authorities are investigating the shooting.
The number of protesters at the precinct has varied from a few dozen to hundreds since Sunday. Some have set up tents and started fires to keep warm. A warming house was moved in Thursday.
The protest takes on a higher profile at 4:30 p.m. today when the president of the country's leading civil rights organization leads a candlelight vigil and rally at the precinct.
NAACP President Cornell William Brooks is in the Twin Cities seeking a peaceful solution, organization spokeswoman Raquel Coombs said.
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By Don Davis, Forum News Service
