Police Handled Confrontation With Restraint
Coeur d’Alene Police Chief Dave Scates walked wearily across City Park, surveying the trash left behind following a clash between racists and protesters.
For an hour Saturday afternoon, Scates and dozens of uniformed officers ringed the park.
They watched closely while the rivals shouted and shoved their way around the grounds. Officers had decided long before the rally started to exercise restraint.
“Oftentimes you bring law enforcement officers into this type of situation as peace keepers and they are not seen as peace keepers,” Scates said. “They’re seen as protecting one side or the other.”
Police have weathered criticism over how they handled last summer’s Aryan Nations parade and responded to a downtown melee two weeks ago.
Kootenai County has paid out $80,000 in settlements over last summer’s parade, when people who were arrested claimed their civil rights were violated. Complaints still are pending against the city.
Although Saturday’s strategy by police angered some, many applauded officers’ judgment. No arrests were made, and only a few minor injuries were reported.
“At what scale do you intervene?” asked one man, watching from a picnic gazebo. “A little provocation and it probably would have gotten ugly around here.”
Saturday’s rally posed a much different crowdmanagement dilemma than last summer’s Aryan Nations parade down Sherman Avenue. Unlike the “100 Man March” - which had defined boundaries separating racists from protesters - the rally was more of a free-forall.
Inside the large scrum of skinheads, protesters, onlookers and reporters, plainclothes officers relayed updates on crowd temperament to police commanders watching from the park’s east side.
Mixed in the colorful crowd were five members of Anti-Racist Action in Moscow, who came masked in black bandanas, saying they didn’t want either the Aryans or law enforcement to identify them.
The Aryans spent much of their energy restraining a beefy skinhead in a black Nike tank top who was doing everything possible to start a fight - and seemed the most likely candidate for arrest. At one point, he dropped his drawers and mooned the human rights activists.
“Take a picture of this … that’s white,” he shouted over his shoulder.
About 80 city, county and state police officers stood ready should the rally spin out of control.
As tempers flared on the bandshell, two dozen officers quietly began organizing into a crowd-control formation.
Minutes later, tensions eased a bit and officers, who had donned helmets, protective vests and shin guards, disappeared inside a storage building attached to the Coeur d’Alene Cultural Center.
On the other side of the park, police Lt. Ron Hotchkiss calmly sent in teams of two and three officers to break up other hot-tempered combatants.
Anti-Nazi protester Jonathan Crowell, who is suing the city over his arrest at last year’s Aryan parade, gave the cops mixed reviews.
“I was impressed they stayed back in the beginning,” Crowell said. “Once there were assaults, I think it was the police’s responsibility to step in.”
Police took reports from a man who said he was punched after falling off the bandshell stage and a couple of women who complained they had been kicked. The information will be forwarded to prosecutors for possible charges, although police said they received conflicting stories in each incident.