Over 100 #OccupyBoston Activists Arrested After Attempting to Expand Their Encampment to a Second Park
BOSTON/Dewey Square - At 1:30 a.m. this morning, elements of the Boston Police Department, Transit Police and the Massachusetts State Police - with assistance from the Suffolk County Sheriff's Department - arrested approximately 100 protestors who engaged in non-violent civil disobedience in defense of a second encampment started by #OccupyBoston activists adjacent to their existing Dewey Square encampment yesterday on a stretch of the Rose Kennedy Greenway bounded by Purchase St., Pearl St., Congress St. and Atlantic Ave.
Full Set of 255 Unprocessed Photos of the Arrests, Processed Set of Best Photos to Follow
Over 300 occupiers had linked arms around several tents in the new encampment in anticipation of the move - after receiving warnings from the BPD yesterday evening - while at least another 300 occupiers defended their first camp in a similar fashion.
The arrests began with the surrounding of the park by Transit Police and State Police. Access to the park from Atlantic Ave. and Purchase St. was blocked. Shortly afterwards, police vans from the BPD, Transit Police and Suffolk County Sheriff's Department lined up on the Pearl St. side of the park. Boston police then entered the park from the Pearl St. side, ordered people to leave, and began arresting those who refused or who simply got caught in the police sweep. They also began dismantling the tents, and makeshift barricades that the occupiers had constructed during their brief few hours at the site.
In the chaos that resulted, many occupiers, legal observers, medics and members of the press were pushed back through bushes and plants and over a short wall onto the Congress St. sidewalk. At least one legal observer was reported arrested along with the occupiers.
After being arrested, occupiers were lined up at the corner of Purchase St. and Pearl St., each being escorted by 1 or sometimes 2 officers. Most walked out, but at least 2 women occupiers were seen being carried out by police. The arrestees were sorted by sex and escorted or deposited into the waiting vans.
As this process was being completed, Boston DPW workers took all the occupiers' tents and some possessions that had been dropped during the arrests and fed them into waiting garbage trucks. Boston Parks Department personnel worked with police to surround the park with metal barricades - preventing anyone from entering the park until further notice. Boston EMS vehicles remained on standby through the arrests.
Arrestees were taken away in police vans. Women detainees were taken to the South End police station. At least 30 are reported to have been bailed out, and the rest are spending the night in jail and are expected to go straight to arraignment at Boston Municipal Court at 24 New Chardon St. this morning.
