Day Of Peaceful Brockton Protest Turns Confrontational At Night

BROCKTON, MA — A day of peaceful protests in Brockton followed what has become a disturbing pattern on Tuesday as protesters clashed with Brockton and Massachusetts State Police in front of the Brockton Police Station Tuesday night.

A fraction of the crowd that attended the protest at West Middle School pushed toward Brockton police headquarters about 8 p.m. when a series of skirmishes broke out between lines of officers and the crowd that alternated between retreating and charging the police barriers.

Read about Boston's Tuesday protest: Protesters Hold 'Die-In' Outside Boston's Franklin Park

Police used teargas to try to disperse the crowd, while members of the protest group threw fireworks, water bottles and the cans of teargas back toward officers.

The Massachusetts National Guard was also called on scene to provide support.

"It's just a sad day," Brockton Mayor Robert Sullivan said in an interview with WCVB-TV. "I love the city of Brockton. It's always been a wonderful community of diversity and this is not a helpful endeavor tonight at all."

While the State Police called in additional support, the crowd engaged in a methodical game of advance-and-retreat in front of the officers as they alternated between taking a knee in silence, and throwing fireworks and playing loud music.

At about 9:40 p.m. State Police advanced toward the crowd in formation in attempt to push the crowd from the police station entrance.

"It's disturbing," Sullivan to WCVB-TV. "We started at 5 o'clock with a wonderful, peaceful protest and a great, great sharing of ideas with diverse aspects of our community. This has drastically changed. These are not the same individuals that were at West Middle School at 5 o'clock."

Sullivan said Brockton police were given an indication that some were planning to make things more unsettled into the night.

"Unfortunately, right now we are seeing some really bad things in the City of Champions,"
Sullivan said.

Former Brockton Mayor Moises Rodrigues was also on scene and sustained some teargas in his eye when the conflict escalated.

"This is not something that we were expecting," Rodrigues told WCVB-TV. "We had a great event that went on at the school. There were a great number of young people with positive messages and messaging. That's what we need to do to make our society better. The recent events take away from the entire situation that we had here in Brockton."

A virtual standoff took place between a couple of dozen protestors and officers near the station for about an hour before tensions appeared to ease and the remaining crowd dispersed.

A Dunkin' Donuts in the city had its glass doors smashed, while debris from fireworks and bottles littered the roads around the police station as of about 11:30.

Related Patch Coverage: Protesters Hold 'Die-In' Outside Boston's Franklin Park