Omali Yeshitela, head of the Uhuru movement for black independence, lead a peaceful protest at 5th Street and Central Avenue in downtown St. Petersburg today, on the heels of a Missouri grand jury's decision not to charge Officer Darren Wilson in the death of Michael Brown, the unarmed Ferguson teen who was shot six times and killed by Officer Wilson.
About 75 people circled around the intersection of 5th and Central in downtown St. Pete, many wearing all black and chanting things like: "I am Mike Brown," and "Stop police terror/on the black community," and "Two, four, six, eight, tell the people who you hate/the police, the grand jury, the whole damn state."
The protest lasted about an hour, and seemed to face no real opposition. A religious zealot came by for ten minutes to shout about considering God before making any "genius decision," and a couple guys in a truck stopped at the red-light on 5th got frustrated when they realized they couldn't cross Central and were going to have to turn around. "This isn't the answer," the driver said to a couple reporters before pulling his hat down and driving forward, realizing his image might later be on TV.
During the concluding press conference, Mr. Yeshitela derided the "disproportionate" amount of "power that white people have" over black people and reiterated some of the more polarizing evidence much of the public holds against Officer Darren Wilson, like the amount of shots fired, and the fact that Brown was unarmed. Before the event was over, Mr. Yeshitela brought out a relative of TyRon Lewis, the black teenager who was shot three times and killed by police during a traffic stop in 1996, which led to riots on the south side of St. Pete after a Florida grand jury failed to criminally charge either police officer involved in Lewis' death.
The most exiting moment came during a somewhat heated exchange between NBC 10 reporter Kendra Conlon and Mr. Yeshitela, when Conlon asked Yeshitela if what people were doing in Ferguson, "the looting, the burning, the rioting was the answer." To which Mr. Yeshitela responded, "No, the answer was to take it to the grand jury," with a flat face and those who picked up on his sarcasm laughed and applauded.
