Hundreds of George Floyd protesters arrested on Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge in Dallas
Hundreds of chanting protesters were about halfway across the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge in Dallas on Monday night when they realized they had nowhere to turn.
Moving in from both sides of the bridge, law enforcement officers in riot gear instructed the huddled mass of people to lie on the ground and then put them one by one into zip ties. The arrested sat in the road waiting — though they didn’t know for how long, or where they were going.
The fourth night of protests in Dallas had begun peacefully hours earlier with a march through downtown ending at the Frank Crowley Federal Courthouse, where speakers addressed a large crowd gathered close on the steps. Around 8:30 p.m., people began to march down Riverside Avenue, waving signs and pausing for a moment to take a knee. When they stood back up, they walked up the road before turning left toward the ramp onto the bridge.
Dallas police officers stood in the way but the group walked past them. They were able to walk onto the bridge, until they encountered Dallas officers and state troopers waiting.
Law enforcement moved the group back with tear gas and fired some type of projectile, as the lights from the bridge were dark. On the other end of the bridge, where the protesters had entered, more police — rows and rows of car with flashing lights — began to block off the only other exit. And they started telling protesters to get down, as some pleaded with them to let them go home, and others shouted insults.
Jarrard El, a 31-year-old Dallas resident who was arrested, said he thought it was unnecessary. But he had been prepared for this possibility.
“I didn’t come down here to care about going to jail,” he told the Star-Telegram. “I came down here for a reason. I came down here for a statement. I came down here to get the message portrayed to everyone who isn’t listening.”
The protest in Dallas on Monday night was one of several happening around the country, including in Fort Worth, following the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. It was representative of growing unrest among North Texas residents angry about systemic racism and police brutality, as well as increasing efforts by law enforcement to control large demonstrations.
Though the bridge was outside of the protest zone, police considered protesters to be obstructing a highway, according to the Dallas Morning News. Police blocked off both sides of the bridge to traffic.
Judge Clay Jenkins said on Twitter around 10 p.m. Monday people were headed back to the courthouse and then to their cars.
El waited for around an hour on the bridge before he said officers loaded him and 11 other people into a van and dropped them off at the Crowley courthouse where the protest began. Officers took his license as he was being arrested, he said, and then returned it later.
“We don’t know if we’re charged or not,” he said. “They took all our information.”
‘We want them to see us’
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson told WFAA-TV, a Star-Telegram media partner, “I have serious concerns about what happened on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge tonight, but I will not have further comment until I hear a full explanation from the city manager and police commanders tomorrow.”
Protesters who spoke with the Star-Telegram said one woman was hit by what they thought was a rubber bullet and had blood streaming down her face. Other people had runny and pained eyes, but police told the the Morning News officers deployed smoke — not tear gas — to control the crowd.
Although the group on the bridge was mostly made up of young people, there were some older individuals and even a couple children. When police began making arrests, some people began shouting there were children there, and officers let them and the adults they were with come through.
Nicole Mansfield, 21, of Dallas, said she felt police created a hostile environment even before the bridge. She didn’t think the large police force at every turn was necessary.
“They’re creating that mentality that we can rise up and be a mob,” she said. “If they were to take off their gear and stuff and come march with us — that’s what we want. We want them to be with us. We want them to see us.”
The protests on Monday night, even from the beginning, revolved around the 7 p.m. curfew set for areas around the city that law enforcement was blocking off with vehicles. The Crowley courthouse, which is a county property, fell outside of the city’s curfew order, Jenkins told the Star-Telegram. He had spoken to a leader of the protest from Next Generation Action Network and hoped they were going to stay there until 10 p.m.
Dallas Police Chief Renee Hall told the Star-Telegram earlier in the night officers were there for the safety of the protesters and it was “not adversarial.” But she also said police understood there have been agitators over the previous nights who had committed violent acts.
She said she understands there’s validity to complaints from citizens.
“We’ve had our issues here in Dallas where that is concerned,” she said. “And what we’re committing to is making sure that we have change — that we have cultural changes, that we have system changes that keep us from being in that position over and over again.”
One of individuals who was arrested on Monday night was Carlos Quintanilla, a community organizer and congressional candidate. As officers led him away to a van, the hundreds of people in plastic handcuffs cheered for him.
At the rally in front of the courthouse, Quintanilla had told the crowd he spoke with Chief Hall earlier on Monday and she expressed “we want to work with you.”
His feeling, he said, was that it was too late.
“They’ve had many years to build an oversight board,” he said, “that would have the power to tell police officers who commit crimes against our community that they’re going to be punished and sent to jail.”
— Staff writer James Hartley contributed to this report
This story was originally published June 1, 2020 at 9:43 PM.
