WASHINGTON — Despite federal and state attempts to intervene during the two months since 18-year-old Michael Brown was shot and killed, the Ferguson Police Department continued — and even accelerated — efforts to suppress peaceful protests using arbitrary and inconsistently applied arrest policies, according to Justice Department officials who are investigating the department and county police officials who have since taken over for the city.
A Washington Post review of county and state arrest records, and interviews with Justice Department officials, Ferguson and St. Louis County police chiefs, dozens of protesters and several civil rights officials reveal numerous questionable practices.
Hundreds of protesters have been arrested since August for violating unwritten rules and committing minor offenses, such as failure to disperse or unlawful assembly, and for violating a noise ordinance.
Many have been taken to jail without being told what charges they might face and often been released without paperwork.
For weeks, officers employed a “five-second rule” under which any protester who stopped walking was subject to arrest — a policy ruled unconstitutional by a federal judge this week.
A least one officer patrolling protests wore a wristband that said “I am Darren Wilson,” referencing the officer whom protesters want jailed and prosecuted for the Aug. 9 shooting of Brown. County Police Chief Jon Belmar confirmed that an officer wore one of the wristbands and said he understood why protesters felt taunted.
And, in recent weeks, protesters have complained that bail amounts are rising, jail time has increased and that their organizers were being singled out from crowds of 100 to 300 people and arrested.
The controversial practices continued into October until Belmar stepped in — stripping jurisdiction for policing the protests from the Ferguson station.
In an interview with The Post, Belmar said that, under the Ferguson Police Department’s command, laws and policies were being enforced arbitrarily.
“We have a real issue when we start taking away people’s ability to express their opinions,” Belmar said.
Officials with the Ferguson Police Department did not respond to requests for comment.
In an earlier interview about the Justice Department’s intervention, Ferguson Police Chief Tom Jackson defended his officers.
“Even if it’s a small group, there’s a very effective group of violent individuals who are looking for confrontation, and the best way to avoid that confrontation is to bring in assistance from other agencies,” Jackson said. “So although it doesn’t feel good to need to have assistance, I am deeply grateful to those who have come to help us, and I’ll never be able to fully express my gratitude or make it up to them.”
On Sept. 4, the Justice Department announced that its Community Oriented Policing Service, or COPS, Office would work with community groups and police officials in St. Louis. They would assess and make recommendations regarding officer training, use of force, handling demonstrations, stops, searches, arrests and fair and impartial policing.
The department is conducting a broad civil rights investigation into the Ferguson Police Department.
The breaking point for Belmar with the Ferguson department’s handling of recent protests came last week, when arrests that were captured on video by a CNN freelance journalist showed a loud but otherwise peaceful group of protesters demonstrating outside the Ferguson police station. The protesters were ordered to move from the street to the sidewalk, and as the group raced back, an officer in a brown uniform was recorded saying, “Get them.”
Belmar said he decided that night that his department would take over the crowd-control efforts.
He said the incident illustrated problems he hopes to “shore up,” where protesters are arrested based on an arbitrary application of rules and laws, a frustration also held in the halls of the Justice Department.
“They were arrested for violating a noise ordinance. I hadn’t noticed us enforcing that,” he said. “So I wondered why, all of a sudden, why are we doing this now?”
Two months ago, Belmar’s team would have seemed an unlikely solution to burning tension between protesters and police.
Ferguson’s Jackson immediately handed control over to Belmar after the shooting, and it was Belmar’s officers who rolled into Ferguson in armored trucks, wearing helmets and camouflage, and carrying automatic rifles.
The American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International all sent legal teams to document the response and criticized the department for inciting rather than quelling violence.
Gov. Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency in the days that followed, giving the Missouri Highway Patrol command of the protests for two weeks. On Sept. 3, Nixon lifted it, shifting control for the first time to the Ferguson Police Department.
Things quickly deteriorated, according to records and interviews with federal and St. Louis law enforcement. Ferguson’s force of 54 people was spread too thin.
During the weeks that protests were policed by the Ferguson department, arresting officers sometimes weren’t wearing name tags, prompting reprimands from the Justice Department.
Meanwhile, protesters say their organizers were targeted for arrest. On nights when crowds of more than 100 people stood chanting, there would be just a handful of arrests — almost always of the protest organizers.
Even though they were in charge, just three or four Ferguson police officers were able to staff nightly protests, Belmar said. “They couldn’t provide the majority of resources down there,” he said.
It’s difficult to know precisely how many people have been arrested in Ferguson protests and on what charges. A Post analysis of arrest records from county police and Missouri Highway Patrol shows 258 people have been arrested — 95 percent of them booked on either a charge of refusal to disperse or unlawful assembly. Less than a dozen were for more serious charges, such as disorderly conduct. There was only a handful of assault and burglary charges.
