{"id":7721,"date":"2020-06-01T19:04:44","date_gmt":"2020-06-01T23:04:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=7721"},"modified":"2020-06-01T19:04:55","modified_gmt":"2020-06-01T23:04:55","slug":"black-lives-matter-organizers-completely-disgusted-with-sunday-night-events","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2020\/06\/01\/black-lives-matter-organizers-completely-disgusted-with-sunday-night-events\/","title":{"rendered":"Black Lives Matter organizers completely disgusted with Sunday night events"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Carl Soto, a co-organizer of Black Lives Matter Restoration Polk, said the permitted rally in Munn Park that drew upwards of 500 people ended at 4 p.m. The Memorial Boulevard demonstration that followed was unrelated, according to Soto.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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 \u201cWe are completely disgusted,\u201d he said. \u201cThat is not the way to protest. It\u2019s not the way to solve a problem, it just creates more.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mercedes Werbinsky, co-organizer of the Lakeland rally, said she first contacted a Lakeland Police Department detective the night before the event to report outside groups threatening to \u201ctear up the city.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Sunday, Werbinsky said she saw two white men arrive at the rally \u2014 one wearing a confederate flag hoodie and face mask \u2014 who began antagonizing the gathered crowd. The event co-organizer said she learned the men were from Orlando and reported them immediately to police.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cLakeland police department was aware of what was happening and chose to ignore it,\u201d she said. \u201cIt shows exactly what is wrong with our justice system.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Werbinsky said she offered to immediately share photos of the alleged antagonists with police.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Robin Tillett, police spokesperson, said the department was carefully monitoring the rally from start to finish. The police will not shut down a peaceful demonstration due to a potential threat, according to Tillett.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cIt would be absolutely not true that we would purposefully want something to escalate,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s our people who are responding. Our No. 1 priority is protecting the citizens and our teams here at the police department.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Soto said he attempted as the original rally\u2019s organizer to put a stop to the road blockage, but had underestimated the size of the crowd.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One woman was struck by a vehicle, according to Werbinsky, but she could not confirm the severity of her injuries. That car was immediately engulfed by protesters who destroyed the front windshield and kicked in the back window before the driver was able to speed off through the large crowd.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s when things started getting a little wilder,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Polk County Sheriff\u2019s Office declared a state of emergency and enacted a 10 p.m. curfew, effective until 5 a.m. Monday. That curfew was extended again from 8 p.m. Monday until 5 a.m. Tuesday. The extension was announced Monday afternoon in a PCSO news release.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Commissioner Walker said he plans to call for a community forum to discuss racial issues in Lakeland and start a conversation between residents and the police department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mayor Mutz said he will support the measure. He believes the city\u2019s police officers handled Sunday\u2019s events well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have one instance in the Minneapolis scenario that is horrific and uncalled for,\u201d he said. \u201cWe need to work together as a city and a nation to correct that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Carl Soto, a co-organizer of Black Lives Matter Restoration Polk, said the permitted rally in Munn Park that drew upwards of 500 people ended at 4 p.m. The Memorial Boulevard… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7722,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7721\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}