Here’s what you need to know:
- Violent confrontations erupted across the city.
- Police and demonstrators clashed in Lower Manhattan and at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
- Mayor Bill de Blasio gave a conflicted response to the protests.
- The marches began peacefully. Some police officers knelt with protesters.
- Anarchist groups appeared to have exploited the marches to sow chaos, police said.
Violent confrontations erupted across the city.
Parts of New York City descended into chaos for a fourth night on Sunday as largely peaceful demonstrations over the death of George Floyd turned into jarring scenes of flaming debris, human stampedes and looted storefronts.
As the night wore on violent confrontations erupted throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn. Protesters threw glass bottles and trash at the police, while large groups of officers charged down streets, pushing crowds of demonstrators aside and using batons as they made arrests.
In Lower Manhattan, some protesters shouted angrily at looters who were breaking into shops like a Duane Reade drugstore.
The city has been reeling from days of chaotic confrontations between protesters and the police that have resulted in dozens of injuries, hundreds of arrests, smashed windows and burned police vehicles.
On Sunday night thousands of demonstrators fanned across the city in different groups. One group crossed the Brooklyn Bridge and another briefly shut down the Manhattan Bridge.
Some groups paused every few blocks to take a knee, while others gathered in Times Square in Manhattan and outside the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
A demonstration at Bryant Park in Midtown Manhattan began with raised fists and a moment of silence. Many surrounding businesses had boarded up their windows in anticipation of trouble.
The protests in New York were part of escalating demonstrations in dozens of cities across the country that were sparked by a video capturing the final moments of Mr. Floyd, who was black, as a white police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.
Some cities, including Los Angeles and Chicago, imposed curfews as the protests escalated, but officials in New York said that so far they would not order people off the streets.
After Saturday’s protests in New York, 33 police officers were injured, and 47 police vehicles were damaged or destroyed, the police said.
As of Sunday morning, about two dozen protesters had been transported to area hospitals for injuries, according to a spokesman for the New York Fire Department.
In SoHo, a series of small trash fires were set and stores were looted, including Bloomingdale’s and Chanel. One man with a gunshot wound was loaded into an ambulance.
Police and demonstrators clashed in Lower Manhattan and at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
The most jolting scenes of violence late Sunday appeared to take place in Manhattan, where chaos erupted in Union Square at around 10 p.m. Flames nearly two stories high leapt from trash cans and piles of street debris in the neighborhood, sending acrid smoke into the air.
Protesters threw bottles and other objects at police officers armed with batons who pushed into crowds on Broadway and nearby side streets. As flames spread across one downtown street, officers ordered protesters to disperse.
“You are creating a disturbance,” an officer announced over as megaphone, as protesters shouted and sirens blared nearby. “You are being ordered to disperse. If you do not disperse, you will be subject to arrest.”
Nearby, looters smashed windows and stole merchandise from upscale stores. One group of young men took crowbars to the windows of a large clothing store but scattered when a loud banging noise announced the arrival of police officers at the end of the block.
“No protection for looters!” one protester could be heard shouting, as police officers sprinted toward a store being targeted near Union Square.
Video posted to Twitter also showed a group of young men looting a Game Stop electronics store on 14th Street, milling around inside the store and then running down the street with arms full of goods.
“This is a community!” a woman could be heard screaming at the men, as they scurried through the store. “Stop it! Go home! Stop looting!”
The looting on Saturday night had also taken place primarily in SoHo, a trendy neighborhood in Lower Manhattan. The storefronts that had been robbed included Adidas, CVS and 7-Eleven, police said.
“Unemployment is gasoline and then abuse of power is the match,” one protester, who gave his name as Sam B., said after looters smashed the windows of a Duane Reade in Lower Manhattan on Sunday.
“In the right circumstances, ka-boom. People don’t have anything to lose,” he said. “If a guy can get away with murdering a guy, I’m pretty sure I can get away with stealing an iPhone, is the attitude.”
Around 11 p.m., hundreds of protesters faced off against the police near the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Overhead, a police helicopter monitored the scene.
Police vehicles raced to the area as water bottles and other objects rained down on officers. Peaceful protesters fled the area as tension rose, but others moved closer to the police, who quickly swept demonstrators out of the area.
Protesters chanted, “Arms up, don’t shoot!”
“You are unlawfully in the roadway,” a police recording bellowed over the crowd, warning protesters that they could be arrested if they did not leave.
A firework landed in the road about 30 feet in front of a line of police officers. As red sparks shot toward a group of protesters on the sidewalk, a police officer kicked the firework back down the street.
Video posted to Twitter showed crowds of officers pushing protesters and beating those who fell to the ground with their batons. As officers surrounded a fallen protester, more demonstrators would soon arrive, cellphones held aloft to record the scene.
Later, officers pushed protesters down Fourth Avenue into the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, where the sound of shouting and broken glass could be heard.
Mayor Bill de Blasio gave a conflicted response to the protests.
Mayor Bill de Blasio on Sunday morning tried to defend the protesters and the police, saying he would investigate any abuses by the police while urging protesters to refrain from violence.
The mayor said most demonstrators had expressed their anger peacefully, but pointed out that a small number of protesters “came to do violence in a systematic, organized fashion.”
One of the tensest moments of Saturday’s protests — captured in a video that quickly went viral — unfolded on Flatbush Avenue in Park Slope, Brooklyn, where police officers in a Sport Utility Vehicle were blocked by a throng of protesters carrying a yellow metal barricade.
As other demonstrators pelted the vehicle and a second police S.U.V. with objects from the street, the cars suddenly surged forward into the crowd. It was not immediately clear if anyone was injured.
Referring to the episode, Mr. de Blasio said, “I did not want to ever see something like that,” and announced that he had directed two city officials to investigate that incident and other reports of police misconduct during the protests.
“But I also want to emphasize that situation was created by a group of protesters blocking and surrounding a police vehicle, a tactic that we had seen before in the last few days, a tactic that can be very, very dangerous to everyone involved,” he said.
Mr. de Blasio’s response seemed like a careful balancing act: trying to support police officers who have been subject to violence while also acknowledging the police abuses, especially against black and Hispanic men, that he highlighted as a major campaign issue when he first ran for mayor.
The mayor’s remarks on Sunday represented a shift in tone from Saturday night, when he said that the New York Police Department had “overwhelmingly” acted appropriately and with restraint during the protests.
Jumaane Williams, the city’s public advocate, criticized those comments at a news conference on Sunday, saying the lack of accountability for police misconduct was at the heart of the protests.
“The answer to what’s going on cannot be ramming protesters,” Mr. Williams said.
Mr. Williams also said the heavy police presence meeting protesters was escalating tensions. “We don’t need to see as many police vehicles that then become the focus of people’s attention,” he said.
Police officials said they have made 786 arrests since the protests started three days ago, including three people who faced federal charges in connection with throwing Molotov cocktails at police cars.
Mr. de Blasio estimated that during the peak of the protests on Saturday night, 5,000 to 6,000 people had participated across the city.
One of the people arrested was the mayor’s daughter, Chiara de Blasio, according to a police official. Ms. de Blasio, 25, was arrested around 10:30 p.m. on Saturday near Union Square in Manhattan, the official said.
The outrage over Mr. Floyd’s death has collided with the monthslong shutdown of New York City as officials attempted to curb the coronavirus pandemic. With the outbreak receding, the city is set to begin reopening on June 8.
The protests have raised fears among public health officials about a second wave of the virus. Dr. Theodore Long, a top official at the city’s public hospital agency, urged anyone who had been involved in the demonstrations to get tested for the virus.
The marches began peacefully. Some police officers knelt with protesters.
On Sunday afternoon, several hundred people gathered in Bryant Park in Midtown Manhattan, chanting the names of black men killed by the police followed by a moment of silence for each one.
Later, a woman climbed atop a fountain at the western edge of the park and raised her fist to the sky.
“I am a black woman and I will not be a hashtag!” she shouted.
The group then marched out of the park and began winding its way through the neighborhood. As the crowd moved, they were monitored by police officers who carried stun guns and had white plastic handcuffs dangling from their belts. Police vehicles slowly followed the march.
The throng of protesters in the street brought traffic to a standstill, including a city bus, where a white girl pressed against the window and raised her fist in solidarity with the protesters, who raised their fists back in response.
As the crowd moved peacefully up Fifth Avenue, a small group of teenage protesters started knocking over trash cans, drawing rebukes from the rest of the demonstrators.
“Quit that!” protesters shouted at them. “Get out of here with that. Join us peacefully or leave! Just leave!”
Workers were boarding up the windows of the flagship Saks department store on Sunday afternoon, and more than a dozen police officers wearing helmets and armed with batons stood guard outside St Patrick’s Cathedral, which was defaced with graffiti on Saturday.
Protesters also marched through McCarren Park in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, where many urged picnicking park goers to join them with chants of “white silence is violence!”
Some got up to join the march. Jackie Rodriguez, 56, said she had to come to the park to sunbathe but thought there was “no way not to join” the protesters. Others were not so moved, however, and clapped to show their support.
“It’s astounding how many people can watch as if this were entertainment, especially in gentrified Brooklyn,” said Roni Lee, 21, one of the protesters. “To stand by and applaud doesn’t do anything.”
In Times Square, protesters chanted for police officers to kneel with them. Under the red light of a Walgreens store, a black female officer dropped her knee to the ground. She stood back up and fist-bumped one of the protesters.
A protester made a heart sign with her hands. Another police officer then went down on one knee.
“I know you’re one of us,” a protester told him.
Anarchist groups appeared to have exploited the marches to sow chaos, police said.
Before the first demonstrators in New York even took to the streets to protest the death of George Floyd, anarchists were planning to use the demonstrations to commit violence, a top police official said on Sunday.
The official, Deputy Commissioner John Miller, who oversees the New York Police Department’s counterterrorism and intelligence-gathering efforts, said the groups used encrypted messaging apps ahead of the protests to raise bail money and recruit medics in anticipation of violent interactions with the police.
The groups also developed supply routes to transport gasoline, rocks and bottles during the protests. A complex network of bicycle scouts were tasked with moving ahead of the demonstrators to let them know where small groups could break off to do damage out of sight of the police, he added.
Mr. Miller said the police were still investigating who planned the violence and how they orchestrated their efforts.
Among the 786 people who have been arrested during the demonstrations so far were bicyclists transporting gasoline and people whose backpacks contained hammers, hooks and ropes.
One out of every seven people arrested lived outside of New York, including from as far away as Texas and Minnesota.
The anarchists were not alone in wanting to use the protests as cover for destruction, Mr. Miller said. The Islamic State and Al Qaeda affiliates, as well as white supremacists and neo-Nazi groups, had all distributed propaganda recently “attempting to exploit the unrest for either recruitment or mobilization,” he said.
The materials included encouragement to commit lone-wolf attacks at protests around the country, he said.
Reporting was contributed by Emily Jo Corona, Emma Goldberg, Colin Moynihan, Nicole Hong, Derek M. Norman, Nate Schweber, Matthew Sedacca, Ashley Southall, Liam Stack, Ali Watkins and Michael Wilson.
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