Riot In Riverside! July 4th 2008! riot brings mayhem.

[stephendare]

Reports are flooding in that a riot has broken out in Five Point with the possibility that police have turned Tear Gas onto the crowd.

Several Copters are circling over head with spot lights and the scene on the ground looks like a war zone.

Jacksonville Confidential Editor, Jason is reporting live from the scene that it is mayhem.

This is following an earlier report from Taylor Trastafarian that the entire fivepoints district was lit by sirens, this following a phone call that reported that violence at a show had gotten out of hand.

Jason from Jacksonvilleconfidential.com appears to be confirming that the violence started at a band show in five points.

Although the reports of tear gas are unconfirmed there have been two seperate mentions of it being used.

More coming.

[scaleybark]

After the fireworks I decided to walk to five points to see if there was something going on, and while there was something going on, there was no riot or tear gas while I was there.  I left a bit before 11.  There were a lot of people there, some of whom seemed to be attracted by the helicopter.  Whatever was happening seemed centered around that 4 story brick building on Park St.  I did not walk down Park so I never got a close look.

[scaleybark]

Yes, I think that's it.  There is a bicycle shop on the ground floor.  It was recently renovated.

The police cars were out front and the helicopter kept lighting the area behind the building.

[David]

I figured something not good was up when I drove by there on my way home earlier..

A ghetto bird's been swooping over the area for the last hour or so...

At about 11:15pm I was coming over the Fuller Warren from San Marco after watching the fireworks from the Southbank, I drove my usual way home (which was in gridlock) but upon getting closer to five points noticed park street was blocked off at post and again on the other side of 5 points. Large crowds of kids (teenagers, maybe early 20's)  were running from the area with at least a half dozen JSO cruisers in front of the old club 5 building.

I should've gone in for a closer look, but being around the booze-fueld shennigans at the beach all day wore me out. Hopefully there's no gunfire/deadly voilence and it was just drunken mayhem.

wow!  i am getting old....on metrojax july4th weekend at midnight

But i prefer to stay in on nights like this. As you can see, it's for the amateurs. Some people don't know how to control themselves when they drink.

[rjp2008]

From my impression of that area, I'm not surprised though it doesn't represent all obviously.

[konstantconsumer]

from what i hear two people were shot!  does anyone know the actual scoop? 

[02roadking]

Those TSI hipsters had no place to go... and look what happens        I'm kidding folks
    Hopefully there are no injuries.

   

[downtownparks]

From what I have been told, it related to the 5-points theater. They hosted some sort of rap thing last night (for the third week in a row) and all hell broke loose. Shots fired into the air, and people scrambling as the police arrived. Area businesses, from what I was told, are PISSED because the theater has hosted this type of event now three or four times, and the clientèle they are bringing in are less than desirable.

[David]

Let's just bring club 5 back! Thanks Mr Shad..

Anyway, the special events have been shady at times. Some of them remind me of the cool runnings nights club 5 used to host and the cops have been out in full force because it does seem like the type of crowd that might have alot of drug activity...

A few times it's just some high school graduation/prom party and what appears to be a buncha kids having fun and the cops are out "just incase" it seems.

[Ernest Street]

Is this story getting ignored by the TV stations for some reason? Several thousand residents of the surrounding Blocks witnessed the Fiasco from near and far, and was WAY more spectacle than some random parking lot gunfire at plush...  The copter circled with spotlight on for over an hour.It looked like an action movie set.  Yea thanks SHAD..how many tickets were there?  How many pissed off kids showed up and were turned away?Hmmm

[thebrokenforum]

Is this story getting ignored by the TV stations for some reason?

Fear of bad publicity maybe? Nah, just kidding...normally they would be all over something like this with huge spotlights and raucous interviews from "exclusive" eye-witnesses. Kinda strange. I agree they need footage but they all have police and rescue scanners - they would have to had known about it. Plus the lack of footage doesn't prevent them for going after the fact and doing close-ups of blood stains on the concrete, shattered glass, empty tear gas cans etc. and a quote from Rutherford asking for more cops on the mean streets of Jax.   

[NotNow]

Over reacting seems to be the appropriate term, for this breathless thread.

[caravaggio]

I was there in the thick of it as part of the art shows for First Fridays.

People started showing up early for a Boyz of Poison (I have no idea who this is) show at the theater. Everything was going fairly well early on, though the line was down the street and the crowd kind of screwed up the whole art scene thing.

Anyway, later on the off duty police who were running the show realized that the people running the show weren't counting the number of people going in. I'm pretty sure it was way over capacity as there were easily a few thousand people who showed up for it. So the fire department and police decided to tell everyone else that was waiting in line to go home. That's when problems began... the people (a fairly young crowd 13-mid 20's I'd say) got pretty upset by being turned away.

For the most part they just stood around in the middle of Park St. A few fights broke out. Things didn't get bad until someone got tasered. Then people were running overtop of each other to get away... then they would jsut come back and the whole process would repeat.

Later lots of police showed up and they blocked off the street. The helicopter (only one that I saw) was hovering only a few feet above the buldings doing constant circles for a few hours.

Things I actually saw? Police in the full body armor set up, I saw the tear gas or whatever it was, a few police running up and down Park with what looked like assault rifles (but, they might have been the rubber bullet rifles, not sure)a few art patrons I knew got hit in the face by mace, a lot of small fights and people being put in the big police bus. The police told me that three people had been shot. I thought I heard gun shots more than once through the night, but it was also the 4th, so...

My understanding is much of the bad stuff ended up happening at either end of Park as that is where the police were herding all of these people to go, but I never went over there to look and see what was up.

We had to stay there the whole time (cleared up around 12ish) as the police told all of us it would be too dangerous to try to drive out. At times it would clear up enough on Park that you could go out on the street and take a peek around, but then a few minutes later another few hundred people would press their way in and it would all start over again.

It was pretty out of control. The guy running the show at the theater was really nice, eariler before all of this happened he was sending down his off duty cops to try to get people out of our doors so we could continue with our shows and what not. He hadn't expected more than a few hundred people to show up... so he was completely unprepared for the crowd.

Anyway, that's my perspective.

[NotNow]

What riot?  How much property damage is out there this morning?  What shooting?  The police involved shooting was in Arlington.  What police mis-steps?  Your quote:
"Dane, a neighborhood resident reports that the problem began when the police over reacted to crowd density on the streets.

They felt there were more people than they would be able to handle in case of a problem, and so they started telling people to back off the streets and sidewalks."

gives "Dane" omnipotent knowledge of how this incident began and what the police were thinking.   Was he privy to the initial calls for police service?  Does he have insight into the mind of each Police Officer?  What was his location for such an observation?  How is he biased?  Where did you obtain the number of one thousand people?  From what I have heard, this was a rap concert where a bunch of juveniles got out of hand and were dispersed by the police.  It happens almost every weekend in Jax.

And by the way, I am always amazed when I hear reports such as these how experienced Officers "get real nervous" and over react, while the (usually juvenile) suspects who are causing a police response stay completely calm.  How many injuries to these young "innocents" were caused by these over reacting, nervous Officers?  

[thebrokenforum]

What riot?

From caravaggio's description it sounds like a riot to me.

From what I have heard, this was a rap concert where a bunch of juveniles got out of hand and were dispersed by the police.

Key word there being "heard".

You sound worked up over this...which is odd. I think everyone is just trying to flesh out the story. You have to admit that if tear gas was used, multiple people were tasered, riot gear suited up, helicopters deployed (cue Robert Downey Jr.) and possibly rubber bullets used it seems really odd that the news hasn't picked it up. But then again stuff like that isn't a big deal because it happens almost every weekend in Jax...