35 detained after violence at Atlanta police training site

ATLANTA (AP) — Nearly three dozen people have been detained after flaming bottles and rocks were thrown at officers during a protest at “Cop City,” a new police training centre that's been the site of prior demonstrations and the death of a protester, Atlanta police said Monday.

Atlanta Police Chief Darin Schierbaum said at a midnight news conference that several pieces of construction equipment were set on fire Sunday in what he called “a coordinated attack” at the site for the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center in DeKalb County.

It was the latest flare-up in a cause that has drawn to Georgia both anti-police demonstrators and environmentalists who call themselves defenders of the forest.

Surveillance video released by police show a piece of heavy equipment in flames at the facility under construction that opponents call “Cop City.” It was among multiple pieces of construction equipment destroyed, police said.

Protesters dressed in all black threw large rocks, bricks, Molotov cocktails, and fireworks at police officers Sunday at the construction site, police said.

Police from nearby communities stepped in to assist city officers, and no officers were injured, Schierbaum said, adding that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has joined police in the case.

Officers used nonlethal enforcement methods to disperse the crowd and detain those involved, he said. Asked about injuries to any of the demonstrators, the chief said that “some minor discomforts” were reported and were being attended to by medical personnel.

“This was a very violent attack, very violent attack,” Schierbaum said. “This wasn't about a public safety training center. This was about anarchy ... and we are addressing that quickly.”

Georgia Governor Brian Kemp said the people involved “chose destruction and vandalism over legitimate protest, yet again demonstrating the radical intent behind their actions.”

“As I've said before, domestic terrorism will NOT be tolerated in this state,” Kemp said in a statement Monday.

“We will not rest until those who use violence and intimidation for an extremist end are brought to full justice,” he said.

The names of those in custody and the criminal charges against them were not immediately available early Monday, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. But Schierbaum said many were not from the Atlanta area.

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