30 arrested in Portland 'Occupy' protest
Police in the US city of Portland arrested about 30 anti-Wall Street protesters early today, dragging and carrying them to waiting vans after they refused to leave a park.
The arrests came after protesters from the Occupy Portland movement marched to the affluent Pearl District, with some saying they viewed its residents as part of the wealthy demographic they are protesting against.
Dozens of them gathered in Jamison Square last night, defying a midnight curfew to vacate.
As police moved in, most of the protesters backed off but a core group of about 30 sat in a circle in the park and awaited arrest.
A witness at the scene said most of the protesters were carried or dragged away. There was no violence during the arrests, which took about 90 minutes.
The protesters – all aged in their 20s and 30s and with many wearing Halloween-style face paint – were handcuffed before they were placed in police vans and driven off.
“We are the 99%,” one arrestee continued to chant.
Police said they arrested more than two dozen people on charges that included criminal trespassing, interfering with a police officer and disorderly conduct.
The showdown came in the shadow of high-rise condos in the middle of Pearl District, with some residents watching the events from their balconies.
In Tennessee, about 50 demonstrators in Nashville chanted “Whose plaza? Our plaza”, early today in defiance of an official curfew.
Police sporadically made their rounds, but authorities signalled no immediate attempt to make arrests as law enforcement agents had done on the two previous nights.
Protester Elizabeth Sharpe, 20, said she felt the need to be an activist in the movement that expresses opposition to perceived greed on Wall Street and across corporate America.
“How can I as an individual change this?” she said. With the Occupy movement’s far-flung reach across American cities, she said she felt there was strength in numbers, adding, “I got for the first time a glimpse of hope.”
