Reports are coming in of a shooting that resulted in a death in the immediate vicinity of the Occupy Oakland encampment. Details and updates to be posted here as they develop.
Man shot, killed near Occupy Oakland encampment
OAKLAND, Calif. — A man was shot and killed in downtown Oakland near the Occupy encampment in front of City Hall Thursday afternoon.
A KTVU cameraman witnessed the man collapse in front of the Tully’s Coffee Shop at 14th Street and Broadway shortly before 5 p.m. KTVU reporter Janine de La Vega was in the area preparing to go live on the air when she said she heard several shots.
Emergency responders tried to resucitate [sic] the victim, who was described as a black male, as he was being lifted into an ambulance.
The victim died shortly after, authorities said.
Police cordoned off a large area where the shooting took place and were pouring over the area with flashlights searching for evidence.
There was also word of possible injuries to members of the media at the scene unrelated to the shooting.
Video from NewsChopper2 showed a person being wheeled into the back of an ambulance and driven away at about 5:15 p.m. BART held a train at the 12th Street/City Center Station to search for a suspect in the incident.
Occupy Oakland protesters told the media that the shooting had nothing to do with the encampment and didn’t involve any activists. Proteers [sic] surrounded the scene of the shooting and made a human chain to keep photographers from filming the victim.
Barucha Peller, who is part of the Occupy Oakland encampment, said some of the first people to help the victim were medics from the camp.
She said the shooting happened next to the camp, not in it. “The only direct Occupy Oakland involvement was in order to provide emergency first-aid services,” she said.
Let me highlight that last bit, in case you missed it:
Protesters surrounded the scene of the shooting and made a human chain to keep photographers from filming the victim.
From what I could see in the raw video, the Occupy protesters also seemed to be interfering with and/or not cooperating with the police.
The murder happened around 5pm; perhaps not so coincidentally Occupy Oakland had heavily advertised their one-month birthday party starting today — at 5pm:
You are cordially invited to Occupy Oakland’s one month birthday celebration!
Thursday November 10, 2011
5-10pm in the Amphitheater of Oscar Grant Plaza
Music, Dancing, Retrospective Slide Show & much more!
please bring donations of cakes, sweets & party favors!
SHOW HELLA LOVE FOR OCCUPY OAKLAND!!!!!
Could there be a connection? Had revelers shown up for the party, and then gotten into a fight?
Here’s a photo of the victim being loaded into an ambulance:
NBC News now has more info:
Man Shot, Killed Near Occupy Oakland
Chaotic scene followed deadly shooting. Two news photographers were hurt by occupiers who attacked them as they tried to video tape the man who was shot.
Just moments before NBC Bay Area’s Jodi Hernandez was to go on the air with a live report, she reported hearing shots fired near Occupy Oakland.
Hernandez said she heard 6 to 8 gunshots on the south side of Frank Ogawa Plaza followed by screaming from people in the area at 4:59 p.m.
Police were not in the area at the time.
An ambulance arrived at the scene within a few minutes to treat the victim of the shooting. The injury appeared to be serious with emergency workers performing CPR on the man before he was taken away to the hospital. That man did not survive. He was declared dead after arriving at the hospital.
@scott_c_johnson tweeted” “Bystanders weeping, chaos, police everywhere, sirens,”
Hernandez said the mood prior to the gunshots was festive, adding people at the campground were getting ready to have a birthday cake to mark the one month anniversary of the encampment.
That changed dramatically after the shooting as it turned from calm to chaos. Police swarmed Frank Ogawa Plaza and closed off some streets in the area.
Hernandez reported that two Bay Area photographers covering the story were injured in the melee that followed the shooting. One of the photographers worked at KGO and suffered a cut to his head. He was apparently attacked by members of the occupy movement who did not want him to videotape the victim. The second photographer who was hurt was from KTVU. He said Occupiers wrestled him to the ground.
Occupy Oakland protesters told reporters the man who was shot was not part of their camp. They said they didn’t recognize him and said the shooting was not occupy related. In fact, some people on the scene said the man was coming to the area for help and/or protection.
“The person on the ground was not part of the occupation. I canverify that,” Shake Anderson, an Occupy Oakland organizer said. “This is a street incident. It happens all the time.”
TwitVid (Twitter Video) of the immediate aftermath of the shooting from the San Jose Mercury News, which reports:
The tent village is quiet as police and evidence technicians walk around with flashlights, searching for evidence, and 14th Street is closed while officers investigate. The occupiers were having a celebration to commemorate one month of their camp when the shooting occurred, and now many of them are relighting candles at a memorial set up for Scott Olsen, a former Marine and Iraq War veteran injured in an earlier rally.
Update (From Ed Driscoll): More from Allahpundit at Hot Air, who writes that Occupy Oakland “did more than make a human chain:”
Reporter Aimee Allison of the Chronicle says she was attacked when she tried to take a cell phone photo. And she wasn’t the only one: “A few feet away a TV cameraman was shooting footage and a crowd of twenty or so men attacked and punched him, forcing him over the railing of the 14th Street BART Station.” Which means, even in the best-case scenario, there was an unconnected murder right next to the camp and a mob of protesters decided to do “damage control” by beating the hell out of journalists who were trying to report on it. That’s where we’re at here. And do note: This wasn’t the only fatal shooting at an Occupy camp today.
The campsite in Oakland has become menacing enough that city council members were already calling yesterday for it to be dismantled and may force a vote of no confidence in terrible, terrible, terrible Mayor Jean Quan. Given how nasty things have gotten in Oakland over the past few weeks, I wonder if Oakland P.D. is up to the task; soon we may be hearing rumblings about Jerry Brown having to send in the national guard. Three clips for you here: The first two purport to be cell-phone video taken after the shooting in Oakland today. The cameraman says the dispute was over marijuana. The third, via Breitbart TV, comes from San Diego, not Oakland, but it’s a nice, short encapsulation of what seems to be the basic attitude at these things. Content warning.
Update: Confirmed: The victim in Oakland has died.
Click over to Hot Air for the videos that Allah references above; more as it comes in.
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