A second night of protests Sunday in downtown Gainesville resulted in one arrest for vandalism, but the city's police chief said the crowd of 200 was mostly peaceful and civil.
Chief Jay Parrish said a man, whose name was not immediately available, was arrested for spray painting graffiti after the protest moved from Jesse Jewell Parkway to the downtown square. After the arrest, Parrish said, the remainder of the rally to protest the death of George Floyd in Minnesota was peaceful.
"Most of these demonstrators are young and they have some frustrations, and the awful murder of George Floyd has brought that to the front," Parrish said. "Now is not just the time to talk, but the time to find out what we need to do to be better."
A permitted rally is scheduled for 5 p.m. today in the vacant lot adjacent to the pedestrian bridge on Jesse Jewell Parkway. The event is being sponsored by the Newtown Florist Club, and it designed to give a voice to people who want to protest police treatment of black citizens.
"I think this event tonight is a great opportunity to, in a structed way, to hear those voices and to be able to come up with what our next steps should be," the chief said. "We will be there both to protect the crowd, but most importantly to hear what they have to say."
Parrish said a total of 10 people were arrested over the two nights of protest. One business had its windows broken out, he said. Some vandalism occurred downtown. And six Gainesville police cars sustained damage, such as broken windows and spray painting.
On Saturday afternoon, a peaceful crowd of about 20 people began protesting at the corner of Jesse Jewell Parkway and Main Street. By dark, the crowd has grown to an estimated 700. Parrish said some protesters began moving into Jesse Jewell Parkway, interfering with traffic flow, so police officers stepped in.
"When they went to into the street and started stopping cars, it became a very dangerous situation to the protesters themselves," Parrish said. "As we addressed that and asked them to step back onto the sidewalk, a very small number of those people became agitators. Bottles and things like that began to be thrown."
Around midnight, Parrish said, some of the crowd of about 20 people moved westward on Jesse Jewell Parkway, throwing items into the road and at businesses. It was during this part of the protest that most of the arrests were made, he said.
But he also said most of the protesters remained calm.
"By and large, most of the people - as angry as they are with what has happened and as passionate as they are about being heard - they were civil protesters and they did it the way it should have been done," he said.
On Sunday, again a small crowd in the daylight hours grew to about 200 at nightfall. As the group began to move up Main Street toward the square, Parrish said, the people in the front of the group began to tear up the downtown landscape and vandalize buildings and other property.
The man arrested at that point is believed to be responsible for spray painting graffiti on the statue of Old Joe, a granite statue depicting a Confederate soldier. The words "KKK" and "I Can't Breathe" were painted on three sides of the statue's base.
After the arrest, leaders of the protest called for calm and the remainder of the events was peaceful, Parrish said.
"After that, we had zero incidents," he said. "We didn't have any reason to need to respond. Their voices were heard. I was very pleased with the peaceful demonstration."
Parrish said he is grateful for the professionalism of his officers as well as the respectful way most of the protesters handled themselves.
"As police officers, we're just humans," he said. "We were sickened and disgusted by George Floyd's murder as anyone is. We're hurt by it. We feel the pain of the community. Those frustrations were very present."
He praised his officers and Hall County Sheriff's deputies and Oakwood Police Department officers who assisted them on Saturday, despite some verbal abuse hurled at them.
"But last night, I was just as proud. I was proud of our officers, but also proud of our community for how they handled themselves."
He said he expects future protests to be civil, as well.
"We don't want Gainesville to turn into what we have seen around the county with looting and vandalism," he said. "We want to hear protests and voices."
