Police Worry Racial Unrest in Ferguson, MO, May Spill Over in Detroit

PHOTO: Detroit police had to ask for help from another unit to disperse an unruly crowd at Berkshire and Nottingham, where police shot at two suspects they said tried to run them down in an SUV. One of the men in the crowd allegedly began comparing the incident to a deadly police shooting in Ferguson, MO, where an unarmed black teen was shot and killed. (Screenshot: WDIV video)

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Detroit police are worried that violence could escalate – as it has in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, MO, where police shot an unarmed black teen – after officers opened fire Wednesday on a pair of men they said were trying to run them down with an SUV.

Both men, who officers said they witnessed involved in an illegal gun deal for an assault weapon, have been arrested, WXYZ, Channel 7, reports. One of the men was shot in the arm in the brief gun battle and was taken to hospital for treatment.

Police have retracted an earlier statement that one of the suspects shot at the officers with an AK-47.

After the shooting, one man in the unruly crowd that gathered at Berkshire and Nottingham mentioned the situation in Missouri and Detroit police needed help from other units to disperse the group, The Detroit News reports.

As the gathering crowd in Detroit became more unruly, a man was subdued with pepper spray and taken into custody after he crossed the yellow police line and allegedly tried to attack an officer.

Detroit Police Chief James Craig said Thursday morning that given the situation in Missouri, where protesters lobbed Molotov cocktails at police Wednesday, his department is appealing to residents for calm to prevail.

“My view is to keep dialogue in the community open,” Craig said. “There may have been some upset over Ferguson and expressed their frustration during our investigation Wednesday.”

The Detroit Police Department has been operating under federal oversight since 2003 under an agreement reached to avoid lawsuits alleging police brutality and deplorable jail conditions, but that will end soon.

The U.S. Justice Department and Detroit law officials jointly filed a federal court motion last week asking that oversight be terminated. The DOJ says the Detroit Police Department has made significant improvements in the last 11 years and direct federal oversight is no longer necessary. An 18-month transition agreement with the police department will allow the DOJ to review internal police audits and conduct on-site visits.

The unrest in Ferguson, MO, is symptomatic of friction between law enforcement groups and blacks nationwide, raising questions about the use of force and abuse of civil rights, Bloomberg News reports.

In Ferguson, a suburb of St. Louis, police shot an unarmed man, Michael Brown, 18, as he was walking near his grandmother’s house. It was the latest in a spate of police killings in New Mexico, Florida, New York and Ohio that experts say have exposed deep cracks in police-minority community relations.

“The minority community is on heightened alert because they believe, rightfully, when it comes to law enforcement, that the brunt of it takes place in poor and minority communities,” Eugene O’Donnell, a former New York police officer who teaches law at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, told Bloomberg.

“They’re going to say at the end of the day, ‘Why is it that people of color disproportionately end up on the ground, dead?’ ” O’Donnell said.