Police officers reportedly shot during protests in Ferguson

Two police officers were apparently shot outside the Ferguson Police Department during another night of protests in the troubled Missouri city, according to local media and witness accounts.

The Ferguson Fire Department confirmed it had received a report of shots fired, but could not give any additional details.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that two officers were hit. Ferguson Police Lt. Col. Al Eickhoff told the paper he thought that neither officer was from the Ferguson Police Department.

He said he did not know the extent of their injuries.

Two witnesses told the Los Angeles Times that the shots appeared to have come from a hill beyond where protesters had gathered.

Tony Rice, a Ferguson resident and activist at the protest, said about three shots apparently came from up a hill by or behind the Andy Wurm tire store.

About 50 protesters were in the parking lot of the store and police were gathered in riot gear in the parking lot of the police station across the street when the shots rang out, according Heather De Mian, who was recording the events on a live stream.

“It was the first time I’d heard a bullet whiz and pass my head,” Rice said, adding that several officers dropped their riot shields to take cover. “There’s a bunch of shields on the ground,” he said.

One officer fell to the ground and yelled out as if he had been hit, and officers surrounded him and carried him inside, Rice said. “My assumption is he did get hit,” he said.

Rice said he didn’t see who shot at the police. “They were way up the hill” and concealed in the dark, Rice said.

“It came from behind us,” De Mian said.

Protesters had gathered both to celebrate the resignation Wednesday of Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson and to call for mayor James Knowles to resign, De Mian said. “The crowd [had] been dispersing,” De Mian said, when the shots rang out.

Afterward, police with rifles were at the scene, and protesters were also remained on scene. “It’s kind of scary,” De Mian said.

Others at the scene said witnesses at first didn’t realize that shots had been fied.

“We heard, like, a firework -- we thought it was a firework -- it was loud,” said Bradley Rayford, a local journalist who was at the scene. He said about 50 protesters were left in a diminishing crowd when the shots rang out.

“You couldn’t even see where it was coming from, but you saw the muzzle [flash] from it” coming from up the hill, he said. “The bullets went right past my head.”

“We all ducked down” and the police took cover, Rayford said. “I saw a cop on the ground, obviously in pain, they had to drag him from the front lines.”

The protesters that were at the scene have now scattered and crime-scene officials and heavily armed officers have moved into the area, Rayford said.

Times staff writer Ryan Parker contributed

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