FERGUSON, Mo. – Despite the cancellation of a planned Labor Day shutdown of Highway I-270 at West Florissant to protest the Aug. 9, killing of Michael Brown by local policeman Darren Wilson, demonstrators still took action and jammed up traffic during a short time around 4:40 p.m.
Several other nearby streets also experienced similar expressions of outrage, protesting the shooting of the unarmed Black 18-year-old by the Caucasian cop, such as on I-70 near Bermuda, where drivers slowed down and stopped, in defiance. St. Louis County police also stopped protesters who walked along I-70 carrying signs.
Initially scheduled for Monday, protesters were advised to turn on their hazard lights and stop on the highway for four and a half minutes to symbolize the four and a half hours Brown remained on the ground unattended, after being shot and killed by Wilson. But by Monday afternoon, Brown’s family had requested that the proposed protest be delayed, for unknown reasons.
Seemingly, many were not aware of the announcement and showed up anyway to answer the call, like Sherhonda Golden, who said, “I would definitely stop and I would do it as my form of protest coming from myself to symbolize that this is the mark we’re trying to make, and we want to keep trying to do any kind of protest we can to bring attention and awareness to basically getting anyone’s body from out from laying on the ground for that period of time.”
Reportedly, the highway shutdown has been rescheduled for Sept. 10. Activist Eric Vickers wrote President Barack Obama about that possibility. Zaki Baruti, with the Universal African Peoples Organization, confirmed the target date, saying, “We’ll be looking at that proposal by Eric. Eric is a very strong member of our community, the civil rights and human rights struggle in the area. I’ll personally probably support that cause and ask others to support it.”
Baruti stated that they have five demands, including the immediate termination of Wilson and for him to be formally charged with murder, adding, “As of now, not one demand has been met and that’s why we’ve got this ongoing tension. We’re saying that leadership just do the right thing.”
Police were concerned about serious and potentially deadly accidents from the protest where people are stopping on a highway.
Vickers walked the area around Lucas and Hunt and I-70 Monday afternoon, doing research about where they might organize the rescheduled shutdown, saying it looked like a good spot for Sept. 10 and that it will be better organized and prepared.
