'Justice For Jocques' Protesters Bring Metro Council To Standstill

NASHVILLE, TN — Demonstrators chanting "Justice for Jocques!" forced a rare mid-meeting adjournment from the Metro Council Tuesday night and a chant of "Amend the agenda!" prompted the council to do.

Roughly two dozen protesters wisely positioned themselves behind the microphone used for public hearings ahead of Tuesday's regular meeting of the Metro Council. Tuesday's public hearing was related to a request by the owners of Wild Cow restaurant to be exempt from the standard minimum-distance requirements for a beer permit, but when Vice Mayor David Briley gaveled in the hearing, no one was really interested in the 500-foot rule.

A protester interrupted the hearing — which was a pretty de riguer matter in any event — before the broader group began chanting "Justice for Jocques," referring to Jocques Clemmons, the 31-year-old man shot and killed by Metro Police officer Joshua Lippert at Cayce Homes February 10. Briley attempted to bring the meeting back to the order of the day, but eventually had to call for an adjournment as the chants swelled.

As pictures circulated on social media of a growing police presence outside the council chamber and as the video feed of the meeting on Metro 3 was cut off, the demonstrators spoke with council members — particularly Antioch's Sam Coleman and Karen Johnson — and chanted "Amend the agenda!" in response to urges from the council that the body needed to conduct its scheduled business.

Once Briley brought the meeting back into session, Johnson moved that a 20-minute, uninterrupted free comment period be added to the end of the night's meeting, a solution which seemed amenable to everyone involved. In the end there were no arrests nor removals from the chamber.

And when the time came, Briley called first for a moment of silence in remembrance of Clemmons and began the unscheduled comment period, saying it was "an extraordinary event in the history of the Metro Council."

During the time, members of Clemmons' family spoke, his cousin saying he missed being able to call Clemmons and his sister saying she had trouble sleeping at night. One speaker referred to Councilman DeCosta Hastings as an "Uncle Tom" and a "house n-----." Another described Clemmons' death as "cold-blooded murder." Still others called out Chief of Police Steve Anderson for "hiding back there" behind the dais during the demonstration. Anderson remained throughout the meeting. He was seated in his usual position.

The demonstrators came with demands: the firing of Lippert, immediate release of the police report, release of the termination protocol for police, an independent citizen review board with subpoena power, immediate equipment of Metro officers with body cameras and a rollback of increased police presence at public housing.

It's unlikely any of those demands will be met with the alacrity the demonstrators demanded, though Mayor Megan Barry has promised body cameras will be fully funded in her next budget.