SAINT LOUIS – Demonstrators took to the streets for a second night after a white police officer in Berkeley, Missouri, killed a black 18-year-old who police said pointed a gun at him.
Dozens of protesters held a vigil late Wednesday at the gas station in the St. Louis suburb where Antonio Martin was shot, and they briefly blocked traffic on Interstate 170 during a march before returning to the station. Berkeley Police Chief Frank McCall told KMOV-TV that six to eight people were arrested.
Later, about 75 people staged a peaceful protest early Christmas morning outside of a nearby church, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Police in riot gear were present.
The actions were calmer than a night before, when a crowd of about 300 people gathered at the gas station, throwing rocks and bricks in a scene reminiscent of the sometimes-violent protests that followed the death of 18-year-old Michael Brown in nearby Ferguson.


Unlike in the death of Brown, who was unarmed and whose shooting was not captured on video, Berkeley Mayor Theodore Hoskins said Wednesday that surveillance footage appeared to show Martin pulling a gun on the unidentified 34-year-old officer who questioned him and another man about a theft at a convenience store.
Hoskins urged calm, saying, “You couldn’t even compare this with Ferguson or the Garner case in New York,” a reference to the chokehold death of Eric Garner, another black man whose death was caused by a white police officer.
Hoskins, who is black, also noted that unlike in Ferguson – where a mostly white police force serves a mostly black community – more than half of the officers in his city of 9,000 are black, including top command staff.[…]
Police were searching Wednesday for the other man, who ran away.
Belmar said Martin had a criminal record that included three assault charges, plus charges of armed robbery, armed criminal action and unlawful use of a weapon.
Phone messages left for his parents were not returned. His mother, Toni Martin-Green, told the Post-Dispatch that Antonio was the oldest of four children.
“He’s like any other kid who had dreams or hopes,” she said. “We loved being around him. He’d push a smile out of you.”  (read more)