Police Hit CNN Reporter, Protesters With Chemical Agent at Pittsburgh Protest
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While covering an anti-G20 protest in Pittsburgh, a CNN reporter was hit with a chemical agent. It appears the chemical substance was fired by police at demonstrators in an effort to disperse the crowd. It is unclear from the video what event occurred to prompt the order declaring the demonstration illegal. It appears the demonstrators may have strayed from their assigned, agreed route, in an effort to get closer to the site of the G20 meeting.
During the CNN report, even as it appears something is being fired by police, the following announcement can be heard over a public address system:
By authority of the city of Pittsburgh Chief of Police, I hereby declare this to be an unlawful assembly. I order all those assembled to immediately disperse. You must leave the immediate vecinity. If you remain in this immediate vecinity, you will be in violation of the Pennsylvania crimes code. No matter what your purpose is, you must leave. If you do not disperse, you may be arrested and/or subject to other police action. Other police action may include actual physical removal, the use of riot-control agents and/or less-lethal munitions, which could cause risk of injury to those who remain.
Brian Todd, the CNN reporter who was gassed by police firing chemical agents at demonstrators said the original route of the march had been blocked by several rows of riot police. The demonstrators, he said, reacted by shifting their route to an open street. Todd reported: “The protesters shifted several streets over, in different directions. Every time they confronted police, they shifted over.”
Todd also reported that once the tear gas took effect “It was hard to see and hard to breathe”, but said by the time he was interviewed by Wolf Blitzer, “I’m doing fine; it’s completely out of our system”. While it seemed some of the demonstrators did disobey police instructions, the need for the use of tear gas has been questioned.
Wolf Blitzer sought to confirm from Brian Todd that he was in fact “a credentialed member of the media” and that he was authorized to be on-site at the demonstration. He said the street was technically an open public street, but that “the cops aren’t really paying a whole lot of attention to who’s media and who isn’t.”
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[...] And you got to pity this poor CNN reporter who got nailed by tear gas. Heh. [...]
[...] police fired tear gas at demonstrators on Thursday, hitting a CNN reporter, who made clear to the world the harsh effects of the chemical [...]