Photos: Baltimore Quiet For 2nd Night; New York, Denver Protests Noisier

By Christopher Dean Hopkins / NPR

Published April 29, 2015 at 7:38 PM PDT

This story was published more than 8 years ago.

Demonstrators snarl traffic as they try to block an entrance to the Holland Tunnel during a solidarity protest Wednesday in New York City.

A National Guardsman and a police officer hold their positions at City Hall during a protest Wednesday in downtown Baltimore. Thousands marched, demanding justice for an African-American man who died of severe spinal injuries allegedly sustained in police custody, but most were off the streets shortly after the 10 p.m. curfew.

People kneel in front of riot police Wednesday along Pennsylvania Avenue in Baltimore, past the curfew. The two were among the few to defy the curfew as Baltimore remained relatively quiet two days after rioting and looting.

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Protesters against police violence stop traffic at a major intersection Wednesday in Washington's Chinatown neighborhood as they begin a march towards the White House.

A protester screams Wednesday as she is detained by New York police during a demonstration in the Manhattan borough of New York. Billed as "NYC Rise Up & Shut it Down With Baltimore," the demonstration was being held to support Baltimore's protests against police brutality.

For the second night after Monday's rioting, protesters in Baltimore appear to have mostly heeded a citywide curfew, following largely peaceful mass protests over the death of Freddie Gray.

But solidarity protests resulted dozens of arrests in New York, and police used pepper spray on demonstrators near the Colorado State Capitol in Denver. Other large protests were held in Seattle, Houston, Washington, Boston and Minneapolis.

In Baltimore, authorities announced that a report on Gray's death, which came after his attorney says he sustained a spinal injury while in policy custody, will not be released Friday as planned, and instead will be turned over to a prosecutor.

The Washington Post reports that one internal document written by a Baltimore Police investigator and based on an interview with a prisoner who rode in the same van as Gray to the police station, suggests Gray may have been slamming himself into the van's walls in an attempt to injure himself.

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"Jason Downs, one of the attorneys for the Gray family, said the family had not been told of the prisoner's comments to investigators." 'We disagree with any implication that Freddie Gray severed his own spinal cord,' Downs said. 'We question the accuracy of the police reports we've seen thus far, including the police report that says Mr. Gray was arrested without force or incident.' "

While protests regarding Gray's death dissipated after curfew in Baltimore, they lasted past midnight in New York's Manhattan borough, where about 100 were arrested, some while trying to block major roads or the Holland Tunnel, member station WNYC reports.

"A group of protesters spilled into the street, disrupting traffic. Dozens of police officers moved in with plastic handcuffs and began making arrests while officers with batons pushed the crowd back onto the sidewalk. "Some of the protesters were lifted off the ground and carried to a waiting police van, reminiscent of what police officers did earlier this month to Gray, who suffered a fatal spine injury in their custody and died days later."

And near Colorado's State Capitol in Denver, police responded to a 100-person protest with pepper spray and made 11 arrests, The Denver Post reports.