'If it was me, I'd still be alive': Tallahassee sees ninth straight day of protest

The gray skies and rain from the edge of Tropical Storm Cristobal Saturday did not stop a ninth straight day of peaceful protest by Tallahassee college students, residents and others over what they call aggressive police tactics.

More than 1,000 people gathered in the Publix supermarket's parking lot across from Lake Ella shortly after 11:00 a.m.

While organizers briefed them on how to passively resist police or counter-demonstrators when they marched on Tallahassee Police Department headquarters, nearby on East Seventh Avenue, police moved into position around the lake.

TPD officers and Florida Highway Patrol troopers created a buffer zone for the protest to pass through. They blocked westbound traffic to Lake Ella from Meridian and Thomasville roads while remaining out of the protesters' line of sight.

The Tallahassee Community Action Committee (TCAC) is the lead organization that has produced a week of noisy and colorful rebukes of the criminal justice system.

Groups, including Dream Defenders, Black Lives Matter and Tallahassee Democratic Socialists of America, have previously marched on the Capitol, the Leon County jail, TPD headquarters and along Thomasville Road into the city’s northern suburbs.

While benefiting largely from the momentum generated by national protests of the death of George Floyd in police custody, the local protests are rooted in three fatal Tallahassee police shootings this year. Two of the dead men are black. 

More:Why George Floyd's death, COVID-19 inequality sparked protests: 'We're witnessing history'

More:City plans to release officer name in Tony McDade shooting; McDade family hires lawyer

The protesters demand more citizen oversight of law enforcement. Delilah Pierre said the group rejects the police citizens advisory board created in January because it lacks enforcement power, is riddled with conflicts of interest, and is appointed and not elected.

“I want our police system changed on a fundamental level," Pierre told demonstrators as they lined up to march the half-mile to police headquarters. "I want our prison system changed on a fundamental level."

The big change the TCAC proposes is an elected Civilian Accountability Board that would have the authority to set police policy and to fire rogue officers. 

“I want us to have control in our community; that is why I’m fighting for a civilian police accountability board,” Pierre added.

Amid chants of “no justice, no peace, no racist police,” the crowd, followed by a caravan of about 200 vehicles, stopped traffic on Monroe Street. The procession took a half-hour to cross the Tharpe Street intersection.

Demonstrators filled both lanes of Tharpe, effectively shutting it down. With traffic stopped on both Monroe and Tharpe, the group chanted, “Whose streets? Our streets.”

Marchers sported purple hair, emerald green yarmulkes, and bright orange vests. Others were clad in black T-shirts. They waved signs at motorists and passers-by that proclaimed, “I can’t breathe,” which were Floyd’s final words, and “Hands up doesn’t mean shoot.”

More:Protesters peacefully march into North Tallahassee

Asra Smith, a 22-year-old creative writing student at Florida State University, carried a hand-written cardboard sign that read, “If it was me, I would still be alive.”

She said police have more empathy for a white face than they do for a person of color.

“If I had done any of the things the black people who had been killed in this city and around the world had done, I would still be alive ... They would not have shot me,” said Smith, a Tallahassee native.

In addition to a civilian police accountability council, the groups’ demands include:

• The removal of Tallahassee Police Chief Lawrence Revell.
• An investigation into the death of Tony McDade, shot by a TPD officer May 27, and the arrest of all officers involved.
• The release of police body camera video of the McDade shooting and the March 20 shooting of Mychael Johnson by another officer.

More:'I need help': McDade struggled with mental illness before fatal stabbing, police shooting

They have pledged to hold daily rallies through July 26. The Center for Participant Education at FSU has compiled a Facebook events page to alert people as to where and when a protest is scheduled.

“There needs to be a level of accountable community oversight of police that is not there,” said Cosby Hayes, a past co-chair of Tallahassee Democratic Socialists of America.

Hayes has attended several of the Tallahassee rallies and has few complaints about how TPD has handled the protests.

More:Tallahassee city commission to meet as protesters demand police chief's ouster

The marches have not led to confrontations between police and demonstrators as in Minneapolis, where police fired rubber bullets at protesters, or Philadelphia, where officers corralled and tear gassed a crowd up a highway embankment.

“TPD’s strategy, so far, has been peaceful,” Hayes said. “But they seemed to have quarantined us from the rest of the city. We’re visible only to the people on the streets where we’re marching.”

No arrests were immediately reported related to Saturday's protest, according to online dockets. 

James Call is a member of the USA TODAY NETWORK-Florida Capital Bureau. He can be reached at jcall@tallahassee.com. Follow on him Twitter: @CallTallahassee

Never miss a story: Subscribe to the Tallahassee Democrat.