Marchers Halt Georgetown Traffic to Protest Ferguson Decision

The D.C. Ferguson protest movement again marched through Georgetown Nov. 29, stopping traffic, to protest the grand jury’s decision not to indict a Ferguson, Mo., police officer for killing 18-year-old Michael Brown on Aug. 9.

About 200 marchers met at the Foggy Bottom Metro stop around noon and proceeded west to Georgetown to make shoppers, visitors and residents aware that “black lives matter,” seeing Brown’s death as “police brutality” and asking observers to condemn racial profiling and racial bias by police departments across America.

The peaceful protesters blocked the intersection of Wisconsin Avenue and M Street — the center of Georgetown’s retail district — for more than 20 minutes. Driving south, car were blocked on Wisconsin Avenue. On M Street, cars traveling from Virginia idled on Key Bridge. The protestors then backtracked along M Street sidewalks to return to the Foggy Bottom Metro Station to head to Arlington, Va.

A light force of Metropolitan Police Department officers and cruisers closed and protected intersections, helping to coordinate the marchers’ flow along M Street. Some on-lookers took in the protestors’ arguments with sympathy; others asked why they would disrupt the start of the Christmas shopping season on Small Business Saturday. Marchers made the point: “No Justice. No Profits. . . . No Justice. No Peace.”

The protesters later met at Pentagon City Mall in Arlington, Va., with a demonstration that included a “die-in.” The Ferguson, Mo., police officer Darren Wilson — on administrative leave since the shooting — officially resigned from the city’s police department today, according to his attorney.