Threats of violence, looting prompted curfew in San Mateo County

While praising the more than 1,000 peaceful protesters who gathered Monday, June 2, outside of Courthouse Square, Callagy shed light on the thought process yielding the overnight curfew which spanned through the following day.

“It was in no way an attempt to disturb that protest or limit that protest, whatever it may be,” he said. “But it was really an attempt to make sure that those agitators from the outside, those radical groups from the outside, those individuals who want to come into this peaceful event and use it for their own purpose, to hijack it for their own purposes of violence and destruction and looting, did not have that opportunity.”

Callagy signed the mandate instructing most residents to stay inside between 8:30 p.m. and 5 a.m. before the Redwood City protest was underway. It remained in effect through early Thursday, June 4, in observance of protests in East Palo Alto and San Mateo.

He said police did not have similar information indicating the protests scheduled Thursday would be disrupted by the same violent groups threatening the Redwood City event and he did not expect the curfew to be extended.

He described the curfew as an option to be used at the discretion of officers, providing flexibility to either shut down an event turning unruly or allow a peaceful gathering to continue.

“We felt law enforcement needed another tool,” he said.

Ultimately, police officers did not enforce the curfew with arrests at the end of the march. A demonstrator was taken into custody at the event for concealing a 3-foot-long machete inside a poster.

Callagy also said the curfew was necessary to provide relief to local police departments stretched thin by riots and protests across the region. To that end, the mutual aid available under normal circumstances could not be offered as police departments across the Bay Area focused on maintaining order in their own communities.

He added the decision of other Bay Area cities and counties to establish curfews contributed to the decision to set one locally.

More broadly though, Callagy wanted to assure protesters that the curfew was not an effort by local law enforcement agencies to stem their ability to gather or demonstrate.

“We hope people will go out to those and espouse their views and call for change,” he said.

austin@smdailyjournal.com

(650) 344-5200 ext. 105