BREAKING NEWS: frequent updates
I just received a phone call from someone I know who insists around 1,000 people have been arrested. The Star Tribune is reporting that its 53, but this is a fluid situation. This report from the Strib was from earlier in the day while the RNC08 protest march was taking place. However, St. Paul is on a bluff and below the bluff, hundreds of protesters ... some caught by sheer bad luck in the police cordon ... are being arrested. Some of the people arrested were trying to block the delegate buses.
The UpTake has video from a team of two videographers who were surrounded by hundreds of armored, baton-wielding policemen. From this video, it is apparent that at least 50 people but more likely hundreds would be arrested. There are hundreds nearer the river.
This is the area below the bluff from the convention center next to the river. Just downriver from those new condos and just about where you turn in from Shepard Rd to go to the Science Museum or the convention center.
People were watching from across the river and even people on their boats. There are people on the High Bridge watching as well. From some people I talked to on the phone in the area, there are a lot of people who filmed all this.
Police let the members of the press leave the area they'd cordoned off then began rounding up the hundreds they are going to arrest.
Here's a snap I took from the Uptake vid. This is one of the three phalanxes of policemen who arrested the protesters.
There are many more people behind this group of a dozen or so folks. The river is about 30-40 yard past these folks.
-- cross-posted from mnblue.com, home of the Norm Coleman Weasel Meter ---