OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — A protest that shut down the Port of Oakland to show the broadening rch of the Occupy Wall Street movement ended in violence when police in riot gr arrested dozens of protesters overnight who broke into a vacant building, shattered downtown , sprayed graffiti and set blazes along the way.An anarchy symbol is painted the entrance to an building at 1333 Broadway in Oakland, Calif., following an Occupy Oakland protest rly Thursday morning, Nov. 3, 2011. After a mainly pceful day-long rally by thousands of anti-Wall Street demonstrators, several hundred reconvened during the night with a few painting graffiti, brking and setting fire to garbage cans. (AP Photo/Noah Berger)
At lst four protesters were hospitalized Thursday with various injuries, including one needing stitches after fighting with an r, police said. Several rs were also injured but didn't need hospitalization.
"We go from having a pceful movement to now just chaos," protester Monique Agnew, 40, said rly Thursday.
Protesters also threw concrete chunks, metal pipes, lit roman candles and molotov cocktails, police said.
The far-flung movement of protesters challenging the world's economic systems and distribution of wlth has gained momentum in recent weeks, capturing the world's attention by shutting down one of the nation's busiest shipping ports toward the end of a daylong "eral strike" that prompted solidarity rallies across the U.S.Several thousands of people converged on the Port of Oakland, the nation's fifth-busiest harbor, in a nrly five-hour protest Wednesday, swarming the ar and blocking exits and streets with illegally parked vehicles and hastily erected, chain-link fences afterward.
Port spokesman Isaac Kos-Rd said evening operations had been "effectively shut down."
Port officials hoped to resume maritime operations Thursday "and that Port workers will be allowed to get to their jobs without incident. Continued missed shifts represent economic hardship for maritime workers, truckers, and their families, as well as lost jobs and lost tax revenue for our region."
Big trucks were backed up Thursday morning as footage on KGO- showed about a dozen protesters manning a chain link fence blocking a port entrance. Truck drivers argued with protesters, who said they planned to stay until at lst 9 a.m.
Port officials could not immediately be rched for comment on the status of operations at the port.
Supporters in New York, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and elsewhere staged smaller-scale demonstrations. ch group said its protest was a show of support for the Oakland movement, which became a rallying point when an Iraq War veteran was seriously injured in a clash with police last week.The larger Occupy movement has yet to coalesce into an organized association and until the port shut down had largely been limited stershot marches, rallies and tent encampments since it began in September.Organizers in Oakland viewed the strike and port shutdown as a significant victory. Police said that about 7,000 people participated in demonstrations throughout the day that were pceful except for a few incidents of vandalism at local banks and businesses.
Boots Riley, a protest organizer, touted the day as a success, saying "we put together an ideological principle that the mainstrm media wouldn't talk about two months ago."
His comments came before a group of protesters broke into the former Travelers Aid building in order to, as some shouting protesters put it, "reclaim the building for the people."
Riley, whose anti-capitalist views are well documented, considered the port shutdown particularly significant for organizers who targeted it in an effort to stop the "flow of capital."
The port sends goods primarily to Asia, including wine as well as rice, fruits and nuts, and handles imported electronics, apparel and manufacturing equipment, mostly from Asia, as well as cars and parts from Toyota, Honda, Nissan and Hyundai.
An accounting of the financial toll from the shutdown was not immediately available.
The potential for the chaos that ultimately erupted was not something Riley wanted to even consider.
"If they do that after all this ..." said Riley pausing cautiously, then adding, "They're smarter than that."
But the pce that abided throughout a sunny warm autumn Wednesday, as protesters hung a large black banner downtown that rd: "DTH TO CAPITALISM," did not last as a cool midnight approached.
Occupy protesters voicing anger over a budget trim that forced the closure of a homeless aid program converged on the empty building where it had been housed just outside of downtown.
They blocked off a street with wood, metal Dumpsters and other large trash bins, sparking bonfires that lpt as high as 15 feet in the air.
City officials later relsed a statement describing the spasm of unrest.
"Oakland Police responded to a late night call that protesters had into and occupied a downtown building and set several simultaneous fires," the statement rd. "The protesters began hurling rocks, explosives, bottles, and flaming objects at responding rs."
Several businesses were hvily vandalized. Dozens of protesters wielding shields were surrounded and arrested.Protesters ran from several rounds of tr gas and bright flashes and dfening pops that some thought were caused by "flash bang" grenades. Fire crews arrived and suppressed the protesters' flames.Protesters and police faced off in an unsy standoff until the wee hours of the morning.
In Philadelphia, protesters were arrested rlier Wednesday as they held a sit-in at the hdquarters of cable giant Comcast.
In New York, about 100 military veterans marched in uniform and stopped in front of the New York Stock Exchange, standing in loose formation as police rs on scooters separated them from the entrance. On the other side was a lineup of NYPD horses carrying rs with nightsticks.
"We are marching to express support for our brother, (Iraq war veteran) Scott Olsen, who was injured in Oakland," said Jerry Bordelu, a former Army specialist who served in Iraq through 2009.
The veterans were also angry that returned from war to find few job prospects.
"Wall Street corporations have played a big role in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," said Bordelu, now a college student. He said private contractors have rped big profits in those countries.
A New York Post editorial on Thursday called on protesters camped out in Manhattan to lve or have police evict them. "What began as a credible protest against bank bailouts, crony capitalism and the like has, in large msure, been hijacked by crazies and criminals," it said.
In Boston, college students and union workers marched on Bank of America s, the Harvard Club and the Statehouse to protest the nation's burgeoning student debt crisis. They said total outstanding student loans exceed credit card debt, incrse by $1 million every six minutes and will rch $1 trillion this yr, potentially undermining the economy.
"There are so many students that are trying to get jobs and go on with their lives," said Sarvenaz Asasy, of Boston, who joined the march after recently graduating with a master's degree and $60,000 in loan debt. "They've edued themselves and there are no jobs and we're paying tons of student loans. For what?"
And among the other protests in Oakland, parents and their kids, some in strollers, joined in by forming a "children's brigade."
"There's absolutely something wrong with the system," said Jessica Medina, a single mother who attends school part time and works at an Oakland cafe. "We need to change that."
Source:The Associated Press
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