The Milwaukee police response to a weekend rampage by about 60 young people who beat and robbed a smaller group that had been watching fireworks a park “may not have been our finest hour,” Milwaukee Police Chief Edward Flynn told an audience last night, reports the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Flynn’s comment preceded an account of the assault by a woman who was among the victims. The woman drew applause from the crowd of about 200 after describing how police made her and her friends feel at fault for simply enjoying a holiday weekend at a public park.
“They told us to leave and started kicking us out of the park,” she said. “It was then that we realized that no one got a chance to make statements except the two who required medical attention, even though there were 19 of us who had witnessed something a bit different. They did not even take our names and phone numbers to call us at a later time.” Flynn invited any other victims or witnesses in attendance to provide their accounts to officers after the meeting, which he called to address heightened community concerns after several violent robberies and the looting of a gas station in the neighborhood late Sunday night and early Monday.